When publisher Bruce Franklin received a manuscript from a Civil War buff on a legendary train heist, he was immediately struck by the voice. "This was like looking at the first work of someone you can imagine becoming a very important writer," he said. Franklin's company, Westholme, will bring out Stealing the General: The Great Locomotive Chase and the First Medal of Honor by Coca-Cola attorney Russell S. Bonds in October, and the 464-page retelling of the derring-do of a group of men who commandeered a train and used it to destroy bridges and telegraph lines in Confederate territory is generating considerable pre-pub buzz.
Pulitzer Prize—winning historian James McPherson calls the book "solid history…a stirring account"; it is a selection of Book-of-the-Month Club, and the History and Military Book Clubs; on the retail side, Stealing the General is a Borders Original Voices title and will be featured on the holiday tables at Barnes & Noble. Franklin has announced a first printing of 20,000 copies, more than quadruple his typical first print run. The story of the stolen steam engine has attracted Hollywood before—Buster Keaton mined it for laughs in his classic, The General, and Fess Parker starred in a Disney treatment in 1956. According to Franklin, several studios are again expressing interest.
Franklin learned the publishing business from the bottom up, answering phones in the production department at the University of Chicago Press before moving up to comptroller. He later decamped for the University of Pennsylvania Press, where he started the press's first trade paperback line, Pine Street Books.
Franklin's first Westholme book was a 2003 reissue—B.K. Beckwith's 1940 book, Seabiscuit, which he published in July 2003 to coincide with the film. The press's first full list was in fall 2004. This year, Franklin expects to do 20 titles. The company, which is distributed by University of Chicago, is on track to gross over $1 million by the end of 2008. "I'm not so much a niche publisher," says Franklin. "My long-term goal is to be like Norton."
