Simon & Schuster has officially kicked off its year-long 100th anniversary celebration. Founded on April 10, 1924, by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln (Max) Schuster with the publication of The Cross Word Puzzle Book, the country’s third largest trade publisher has planned a series of events to mark its centennial, beginning with today’s releases of the Simon & Schuster 100, a list of 100 books that S&S said were chosen to represent the breadth and depth of the company’s publishing programs.
The Simon & Schuster 100 is hosted on the company’s new dedicated 100th anniversary website, which also features its prize-winning books and authors, a special centennial video, and a host of other offerings.
A centerpiece of the celebration will come on April 8, when the company will host Author! Author!: A Simon & Schuster Centennial Celebration at New York City’s Town Hall auditorium. The event, which will also be livestreamed, will feature more than 30 notable S&S authors for “an evening of stories, conversation, memories, laughter—and even song,” the publisher said. The event will be open to the public, and S&S will donate 20% of its net proceeds of ticket sales to the Book Industry Charitable (Binc) Foundation.
Also in the works is Simon & Schuster: A Century of Publishing by Julianna Haubner, an illustrated book that will chronicle the history of the publisher, covering the various actions that led to the formation of today’s S&S.
“For one hundred years, Simon & Schuster has brought the works of thousands of authors to millions upon millions of readers worldwide. Books of every kind, for every taste,” said S&S president and CEO Jonathan Karp, in a statement. “Our founders, Dick Simon and Max Schuster, and their successors, have bequeathed us a legacy of entrepreneurial publishing that we are honored to carry on today.”
