page_title: William D. Boyce
section_title: Business enterprises
hierarchical_section_title: William D. Boyce / Business enterprises
caption_attribution_description: Newsboys. Location: Utica, New York (State)
context_page_description: William Dickson Boyce was an American newspaper man, entrepreneur, magazine publisher, and explorer. He was the founder of the Boy Scouts of America and the short-lived Lone Scouts of America. Born in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, he acquired a love for the outdoors early in his life. After working as a schoolteacher and a coal miner, Boyce attended Wooster Academy in Ohio before moving to the Midwest and Canada. An astute businessman, Boyce successfully established several newspapers, such as The Commercial in Winnipeg, Manitoba and the Lisbon Clipper in Lisbon, North Dakota. With his first wife, Mary Jane Beacom, he moved to Chicago to pursue his entrepreneurial ambitions. There he established the Mutual Newspaper Publishing Company and the weekly Saturday Blade, which catered to a rural audience and was distributed by thousands of newspaper boys. With his novel employment of newsboys to boost newspaper sales, Boyce's namesake publishing company maintained a circulation of 500,000 copies per week by 1894. Boyce strongly supported worker rights, as demonstrated by his businesses' support of labor unions and his concern for his newsboys' well-being.
context_section_description: As Boyce traveled, he often started a newspaper wherever he went. His first venture into commercial publishing was compiling a city directory. He also worked briefly for a publisher in Columbus, Ohio, and a newspaper publisher in Kensington, Pennsylvania, part of Philadelphia. He then boarded a train for Chicago and worked as a secretary and salesman for "Western" magazine. Restless again, he moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota, and sold advertisements for a publisher for a short time and then spent a month in Fargo, North Dakota, and Grand Forks, North Dakota. Further north in Canada, in Winnipeg, Manitoba, he and local resident James W. Steen co-founded "The Commercial" in 1881, a newspaper that lasted for 70 years. He sold his share of "The Commercial" to his partner in 1882 and returned to Fargo where he became a reporter. In December 1882, Boyce moved to Lisbon, North Dakota, where he bought the Dakota Clipper.
  Beginning in December 1884, Boyce managed reporters and news releases at the "Bureau of Correspondence" at the six-month-long World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition in New Orleans, Louisiana. Countries from all over the world sent displays. Boyce was responsible for providing news stories on events and displays to over 1,200 newspapers around the country. He returned to North Dakota after the Exposition concluded, but by early 1886 he had moved back to Chicago. He often returned in North Dakota for publishing business deals and deer- and duck-hunting vacations.
  In Chicago, he founded the Mutual Newspaper Publishing Company in 1886 which provided advertisements and articles to over 200 newspapers. In 1887, he established the weekly "Saturday Blade", an illustrated newspaper aimed at rural audiences and sold by thousands of newsboys—an innovation at the time. By 1892, the Saturday Blade had the largest circulation of any weekly newspaper in the United States. Boyce's detailed reports of his foreign travels provided articles for the "Saturday Blade" and were reprinted in books by atlas/map publisher Rand McNally. The success of the "Saturday Blade" spawned the W. D. Boyce Publishing Company, which Boyce used to buy or start several newspapers and magazines. In 1892, Boyce bought out the "Chicago Ledger", a fiction weekly publication. In January 1903 he founded the international "Boyce's Weekly", which advocated worker's rights. Boyce's prominence as a supporter of labor attracted labor/union leaders such as John Mitchell of the United Mine Workers and Henry Demarest Lloyd as writers and editors for "Boyce's Weekly". Eight months later, "Boyce's Weekly" was consolidated with the "Saturday Blade." Boyce also established the selected subject/topical newspapers "Farm Business" in 1914 and "Home Folks Magazine" in 1922. Dwindling sales led to the 1925 merger of the "Blade" and "Ledger" into the monthly "Chicago Blade & Ledger", which was published until 1937. As Boyce's enterprises grew, he insisted on looking after the welfare of about 30,000 delivery boys, who were key to his financial success. Working with them may have helped him gain an understanding of America's youth. Boyce felt that delivering and selling newspapers taught a youth important responsibilities such as being polite, reading human nature, and handling money. Boyce's focused determination was evident in the advice he gave to young men: "There are many obstacles to overcome, but toil, grit and endurance will help you to overcome them all. Help yourself and others will help you." and "whatever trade you have selected; never swerve from that purpose a single moment until it is accomplished".
  In 1891, Boyce began working on his own 12-story office building at 30 North Dearborn Street, known as the "Boyce Building", it was designed by architect Henry Ives Cobb. Even 20 years later, this building was recognized as the most expensive building (in terms of dollars per cubic foot) in Chicago. In 1907, Boyce consolidated his business operations into another office building, also known as the Boyce Building, at 500–510 North Dearborn Street. A new fou
caption: Newschildren, February 1910
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