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56-487: The Automobile Blue Book was an American series of road guides for motoring travelers in the United States and Canada published between 1901 and 1929. It was best known for its point-to-point road directions at a time when numbered routes generally did not exist (Wisconsin became the first state to number its highways in 1918). Hartford automobile businessman and enthusiast Charles Howard Gillette initiated

112-408: A book on random numbers. A Million Random Digits with 100,000 Normal Deviates by RAND Corporation. This book was a product of RAND's pioneering work in computing, as well a testament to the patience and persistence of researchers in the early days of RAND. The book was republished in 2001. This RAND edition reflects the original layout with the addition of a new foreword. Random numbers have been used in

168-492: A commentary for a society or an epoch, and which continually deals with a central character, community or a saga within a family. The river metaphor implies a steady, broad dynamic lending itself to a perspective. Each volume makes up a complete novel by itself, but the entire cycle exhibits unifying characteristics. The metaphor of the roman-fleuve was coined by Romain Rolland to describe his 10-volume cycle Jean-Christophe . In

224-533: A map. In addition, the lack of many signs caused some of the intersections to be shown by pictures, with directions appended. The routes used in the Blue Book were initially developed by amateur "pathfinders" who used their knowledge of local roads to compile the listed routes. Early pathfinders were actually bicyclists, but eventually automobile clubs – especially those of the AAA ;– became

280-422: A numerical order when they do not release each work in its 'proper' order by the story's internal chronology. They might 'jump' back in time to early adventures of the characters, writing works that must be placed before or between previously published works. Thus, the books in a series are sometimes enumerated according to the internal chronology rather than in publication order, depending on the intended purpose for

336-543: A physical address in the Chicagoland area after a round of layoffs following a merger with Safety Direct. The Irvine, California , facilities from the acquisition of Thomas Bros. Maps in 1997 closed in 2010. Rand McNally sold its Canadian subsidiary, located in Markham, Ontario , on June 30, 2008 to the newly formed Canadian Cartographics Corporation . William Rand founded his print shop in 1856 and Rand, McNally & Co.

392-536: A recurring cast of characters; his political novels about the Pallisers have a tighter connection and dynamic. A strict definition might exclude both. With precedents such as Madeleine de Scudéry 's magnum opus, Artamène , the novel sequence was a product of the nineteenth century, with James Fenimore Cooper 's works appearing in the 1820s, and Anthony Trollope 's Barchester books in the 1850s. In French literature , Honoré de Balzac 's ambitious La Comédie humaine ,

448-434: A reported $ 500 million. Much of the purchase price was leveraged, meaning the company took on significant debt hedging on future earnings. AEA intended to capitalize on Rand McNally's brand recognition by bringing digital mapping to the masses and attracting public investors during the dot-com boom . However, the company fell behind the technology curve of upstarts such as MapQuest and fell further into debt. AEA's stake in

504-569: A reprint series of inexpensive paperbound editions of both public domain and copyrighted fiction and nonfiction works. This book series was unique for paying living authors of the works published even though copyright protection did not exist between nations in the 19th century. Later British reprint series were to include the Routledge's Railway Library ( George Routledge , 1848–99), the Oxford World's Classics ( Oxford University Press , from 1901),

560-530: A series can be by discipline, focus, approach, type of work, or geographic location. Examples of such series include the "Antwerp Working Papers in Linguistics", "Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile", "Garland Reference Library", "Canterbury Tales Project", " Early English Text Society ", and " Cambridge Companions to Music ". Book series can be compared with editorial collection, a type of serial publication which

616-447: A series can stand alone—they can be read in any order, as each book makes few, if any, reference to past events, and the characters seldom, if ever, change. Many of these series books may be published in a numbered series. Examples of such series are works like The Hardy Boys , Nancy Drew , and Nick Carter . Some series do have their characters go through changes, and make references to past events. Typically such series are published in

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672-412: A set of nearly 100 novels, novellas and short stories with some recurring characters, started to come together during the 1830s. Émile Zola 's Rougon-Macquart cycle is a family saga , a format that later became a popular fictional form, going beyond the conventional three-volume novel . A roman-fleuve (French, literally "river-novel") is an extended sequence of novels of which the whole acts as

728-461: A specific order, but with a certain affinity in the content of books (collections on art, on religion, on science...), as well as in the format , spine and page layout , even grammage , number of pages and style of typeface . Rand McNally Rand McNally is an American technology and publishing company that provides mapping, software and hardware for consumer electronics, commercial transportation and education markets. The company

784-471: A story chronologically. There is no useful, formal demarcation between novel sequences and multi-part novels. Novels that are related may or may not fall into a clear sequence. It is also debatable whether a trilogy is long enough and whether its parts are discrete enough to qualify as a novel sequence. For example, the Barchester novels of Anthony Trollope are only loosely related, although they contain

840-604: Is a set or series of novels which share common themes, characters, or settings, but where each novel has its own title and free-standing storyline, and can thus be read independently or out of sequence. A novel sequence contains story arcs or themes that cross over several books, rather than simply sharing one or more characters. Fictional series typically share a common setting , story arc , set of characters or timeline . They are common in genre fiction , particularly crime fiction , adventure fiction , and speculative fiction , as well as in children's literature . Some works in

896-508: Is common in the Romance-speaking world , especially in France. Although the two are similar in many ways, book series and editorial collection differ because books in a series generally have a common subject, character, or universe; in other words, a set of volumes that are related to each other by certain thematic elements. While books in a collection do not necessarily have a common subject, or

952-686: Is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois , with a distribution center in Richmond, Kentucky . In 1856, William H. Rand opened a printing shop in Chicago and two years later hired a newly arrived Irish immigrant, Andrew McNally , to work in his shop. The shop did big business with the forerunner of the Chicago Tribune , and in 1859 Rand and McNally were hired to run the Tribune ' s entire printing operation. In 1868,

1008-861: The Everyman's Library ( J. M. Dent , from 1906), the Penguin Classics ( Penguin Books , from 1945) and the Penguin English Library (from 1963). Reprint series were also published in the United States, including the Modern Library ( Boni & Liveright , from 1917), in Germany, including the Universal-Bibliothek ( Reclam , from 1867), and in most other countries of the world. A novel sequence

1064-445: The Blue Book grew to include hundreds of advertisements for hotels, restaurants, garages, and auto dealers in each volume, some retailers hung signs announcing themselves as an "Official Automobile Blue Book Garage" or an "Official Automobile Blue Book Hotel." After reaching peak size by publishing 12 volumes in 1921, publishers consolidated to 4 volumes in 1922, removing routes, shrinking fonts, and increasing use of abbreviations over

1120-490: The Chicagoland area since its inception. Its 1899 headquarters on West Adams Street was the world's first all-steel-framed skyscraper. By the 1950s, its Chicago area workforce had grown to over 1,000 employees and larger facilities were needed. In 1952, it opened a new 283,008 sq ft (26,292 m ) building in suburban Skokie , bringing corporate offices, printing, and distribution operations under one roof. Over

1176-576: The Gulf Oil Company, to be freely distributed at its service stations. By 1930, Rand McNally had two major road map competitors, General Drafting and Gousha , the latter of which was founded by a former Rand McNally sales representative. The Rand McNally Auto Chum , later to become the ubiquitous Rand McNally Road Atlas , debuted in 1924. The first full-color edition was published in 1960 and in 1993, it became fully digitized. The Goode's School Atlas , named for its first editor, Dr. J. Paul Goode ,

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1232-787: The People's Weekly . According to company lore, during the Great Chicago Fire in 1871, Rand McNally quickly had two of the company's printing machines buried in a sandy beach of Lake Michigan , and the company was up and running again only a few days later. The first Rand McNally map, created using a new cost-saving wax engraving method, appeared in the December 1872 edition of its Railroad Guide . Rand McNally became an incorporated business in 1873; with Rand as its president, McNally as vice president, and George Poole as treasurer. The Business Atlas , containing maps and data pertinent to business planning,

1288-555: The Robinson projection , which became very popular and was used extensively for constructing maps of the entire world. Rand McNally began creating maps digitally in 1982. In 1980, Rand McNally sold its educational publishing operations to Houghton Mifflin . In 1989, Rand McNally donated its extensive collection of maps to the Newberry Library . Now in possession of Gousha's archives as well, Rand McNally donated that map archive to

1344-653: The Media Services Group, which employed 350 people with offices in Nashville, Tennessee; Fremont, California ; Shannon , Ireland; and the Asia-Pacific region, was sold to McQueen Ltd., a Scottish software company. The sole remaining group, publishing, represented the core mapmaking business of the company. In November 1997, the McNally family completed its divestiture by selling its majority ownership to AEA Investors for

1400-504: The Newberry in late 2002. With a string of acquisitions and growth throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Rand McNally employed over 4,000 people in four business groups. The company had been majority-owned by the McNally family since 1899, but by 1997 the family had decided to divest its interest. In late September 2018, Rand McNally moved its headquarters back to Chicago, after more than 60 years in suburban Skokie, Illinois. West Bryn Mawr Avenue

1456-572: The Textbook department was established in 1894 with The Rand McNally Primary School Geography . Also in 1894, the company opened an office in New York City headed by Caleb S. Hammond, who later started his own map company, C. S. Hammond & Co. Rand McNally published its first road map , the New Automobile Road Map of New York City & Vicinity , in 1904. In 1910, the company acquired

1512-401: The article's advertisements evidenced a shift toward a larger middle class market as touring in automobiles became more accessible. The book's reliance on mileages as a navigational aid created difficulty at a time when many automobiles were not sold with odometers or speedometers included, but provided an opportunity for the book to regularly advertise after-market versions in its volumes. As

1568-584: The automobile maintenance sections in favor of more space for advertisements related to automobiles and touring. Readers could also find information on trip planning and state road laws. By the 1910s, it became "the standard publication" of its type. Volumes of the Automobile Blue Book published before 1927 were primarily designed to provide routes between cities, focusing on turn-by-turn directions, with supplemental maps providing context and showing connections. Directions were not necessarily intended to be

1624-603: The changes are major and the books must be read in order to be fully enjoyed. Examples of this type include the Harry Potter series. There are some book series that are not really proper series, but more of a single work so large that it must be published over two or more books. Examples of this type include The Lord of the Rings volumes or the Dark Tower series by Stephen King. Some authors make it difficult to list their books in

1680-474: The classical model forms, and become more like the franchises of the film industry. Notable nonfiction book series for the general public have included: In scholarly and academic publishing , scientific and non-fiction books that are released serially (in successive parts) once a year, or less often, are also called a series . (Publications that are released more often than once a year are known as periodicals .) The connection among books belonging to such

1736-426: The company was acquired by Leonard Green & Partners through a prepackaged Chapter 11 restructuring deal on January 15, 2003. In December 2007, Patriarch Partners , which had previously been a minority owner, bought shares owned by Leonard Green and other minority owners to become the sole owner of Rand McNally. In 2020, Teleo Capital purchased Rand McNally as sole owner. Rand McNally had been headquartered in

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1792-460: The computer industry, NASA, probability tables,in the gaming industry and also used in algorithms for encryption. In statistics, a normal distribution or Gaussian distribution is a type of continuous probability distribution for a real-valued random variable. Gaussian elimination method is used to solve a system of linear equations. In the 1950s this was the work of many mathematicians that put this book together. A sequel, A Million And One Random Digits

1848-496: The directions difficult to use if travelers left the designated route or a landmark was destroyed. These turn-by-turn directions may have been a necessity however, as roads at the time were designed for local – not intercity – travel, limiting long stretches of continuous roads, and meaning "anyone wishing to travel cross-country by automobile was forced to make hundreds of turns onto hundreds of different roads" that were impractical to represent visually on

1904-509: The ensuing decades, however, printing and distribution operations relocated, eventually resulting in the underutilization of the aging Skokie building. It was sold in February 2008 to Ida Crown Jewish Academy for $ 11 million, and the approximately 200 current employees relocated in January 2009 to an office building near Skokie's Old Orchard Mall . As of April 26, 2024 Rand McNally no longer has

1960-504: The example of Anthony Powell , a Proust disciple, but consciously adapting the technique to depict social change, rather than change in high society. This was a step beyond the realist novels of Arnold Bennett (the Clayhanger books) or John Galsworthy . The twenty-novel Aubrey-Maturin series by the English author Patrick O'Brian has been called perhaps the best-loved roman fleuve of

2016-488: The line of Photo-Auto Guides from G.S. Chapin, which provided photographs of routes and intersections with directions. Andrew McNally II (son of Frederick McNally) personally took photos on his honeymoon for the Chicago-to-Milwaukee edition. The company continued to expand its book publishing business, with best-selling children's books such as The Real Mother Goose in 1916 and Kon-Tiki in 1950. Rand McNally

2072-463: The list. Examples of this series include works from the Chronicles of Narnia , where the fifth book published, The Horse and His Boy , is actually set during the time of the first book, and the sixth book published, The Magician's Nephew is actually set long before the first book. This was done intentionally by C. S. Lewis , a scholar of medieval literature. Medieval literature did not always tell

2128-518: The major source of routes compiled by the Blue Book . By 1907 the Blue Book had its own fleet of cars and professional pathfinders working in teams of two to create and update routes. Early editions of the book were aimed primarily at wealthy Americans traveling for leisure, as only the rich could afford an automobile in the early 1900s. With the Ford Motor Company 's release of the Model T in 1908,

2184-405: The order of their internal chronology, so that the next book published follows the previous book. How much these changes matter will vary from series to series (and reader to reader). For some, it may be minor—characters might get engaged, change jobs, etc., but it does not affect the main storyline. Examples of this type include Tony Hillerman 's Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn books. In other series,

2240-424: The perspective of a single family, rather than society as a whole. Marcel Proust's À la recherche du temps perdu has come to be regarded as a definitive roman fleuve . Today, however, its seven volumes are generally considered to be a single novel. Proust's work was immensely influential, particularly on British novelists of the middle of the twentieth century who did not favour modernism . Some of those follow

2296-420: The plant was the first to implement a new Kodak computer-to-plate printing system. When the plant was sold in 1997, it was over 1,000,000 square feet (93,000 m ) and employed 1,255 people. In 1961, because the company was not satisfied with the ability of existing map projections to create intuitive depictions of the entire world, it commissioned Dr. Arthur H. Robinson to develop what became known as

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2352-500: The preface to the seventh volume, Dans la maison (1908/1909) he wrote: "When you see a man, do you ask yourself whether he is a novel or a poem? ... Jean-Christophe has always seemed to me to flow like a river; I have said as much from the first pages." The term has subsequently been applied to other French novel sequences, particularly of the years between the world wars, notably: The 19th-century predecessors may be distinguished as being rather "family sagas", as their stories are from

2408-545: The series. It was first published in 1901, covering 62 routes across the American Northeastern metropolitan areas of Boston , New York , Philadelphia , Baltimore , and Washington, D.C. Gillette had originally intended the book to focus on routes that connected automobile supply stations, and included extensive reference sections on automobile repair and maintenance, but the book would find its most success focusing on routes between cities. The Automobile Blue Book

2464-536: The shortest or fastest connection between each city, but to provide interesting scenery and opportunities for rest and maintenance along the route. Each route was listed twice – once in each direction. This emphasis on providing separate routes for each city connection led to volumes often containing more than 800 pages to describe the hundreds of routes contained within. These routes relied primarily on landmarks and right or left turn descriptions, while avoiding compass directions like north or east, which made

2520-680: The twentieth century: "[an] epic of two heroic yet believably realistic men that would in some ways define a generation". Although sequences of genre fiction are sometimes not considered to be romans-fleuves , novel sequences are particularly common in science fiction and epic fantasy genres. The introduction of the preconstructed novel sequence is often attributed to E. E. Doc Smith , with his Lensman books. Such sequences, from contemporary authors, tend to be more clearly defined than earlier examples. Authors are now more likely to announce an overall series title, or write in round numbers such as 12 volumes. These characteristics are not those of

2576-478: The two men, along with Rand's nephew George Amos Poole , established Rand McNally & Co. and bought the Tribune's printing business. The company initially focused on printing tickets and timetables for Chicago's booming railroad industry, and the following year supplemented that business by publishing complete railroad guides. In 1870, the company expanded into printing business directories and an illustrated newspaper,

2632-459: The years. As a number of competing map services arose, including Rand McNally , the Blue Book suffered declining sales, exacerbated when AAA stopped distributing the books in 1926. In response, the 1927 edition was dramatically reformatted, with an emphasis on maps and the elimination of turn-by-turn route directions as the increasing development of highways (and especially numbered routes) made map-based navigation more practical. The last Blue Book

2688-423: Was chosen as the location for the site. Rand McNally has always been a privately held company, with stock held by very few parties and very thinly traded. When Rand retired in 1899, he sold his shares in the company to McNally and the other company officers. The McNally family was the majority owner for nearly 100 years, from 1899 until 1997, at which time the family decided to divest its majority stake. The company

2744-552: Was first published in 1876. The atlas is still updated today, now titled the Commercial Atlas & Marketing Guide . The Trade Book department was established in 1877, publishing such titles as The Locust Plague in the United States . Rand McNally began publishing educational maps in 1880 with its first line of maps, globes, and geography textbooks, soon followed by a world atlas. The company began publishing general literature in 1884 with its first title, The Secret of Success , and

2800-624: Was formally established in 1868. The company was incorporated in 1873 with Rand as the first president and McNally vice-president. When Rand retired in 1899, Andrew McNally assumed the role of president until his death in 1904. Andrew's son, Frederick McNally, became president upon his father's death, just as the age of the automobile was beginning. When Frederick McNally died in 1907, his sister's husband, Harry Beach Clow, became president. Andrew McNally II took over in 1933. He and his heirs, Andrew McNally III and IV, successively served as president until 1993. Rand McNally has made many acquisitions over

2856-520: Was published annually as a single volume through 1906, expanding to 3 volumes in 1907, but would not cover the full United States until 1915. In 1906 the American Automobile Association (AAA), of which Gillette was Secretary, officially sponsored the book, dramatically increasing its circulation as the book was sold to association members at a discount. The 1907 edition was the first to include maps of cities and routes, while also removing

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2912-413: Was published in 1923. It became a standard text for high school and college geography curricula. Later retitled Goode's World Atlas , it is now in its 22nd edition. The first Rand McNally Travel Store was opened in New York City in 1937. In the 1990s it became a chain with 29 locations, but by 2005 all were closed as a cost-saving measure. While Rand McNally is mainly known for its maps, in 1955 it published

2968-561: Was published in 1929. Book series Reprint series of public domain fiction (and sometimes nonfiction) books appeared as early as the 18th century, with the series The Poets of Great Britain Complete from Chaucer to Churchill (founded by British publisher John Bell in 1777). In 1841 the German Tauchnitz publishing firm launched the Collection of British and American Authors ,

3024-588: Was published in 2022. Random number books have been rendered obsolete for most purposes by the ready availability of random number generators running on electronic computers. However they still have niche uses, particularly in the performance of experimental music pieces that call for them, such as Vision (1959) and Poem (1960) by La Monte Young. Rand McNally moved its headquarters from Chicago to suburban Skokie, Illinois in 1952. The company opened its Versailles, Kentucky , book publishing plant in 1962 with 300,000 square feet (28,000 m ) and 23 employees. In 1994,

3080-551: Was sold piecemeal; in January 1997, the company announced it was selling its Book Services Group, which employed 1,700 people in Versailles, Kentucky , and Taunton, Massachusetts , to World Color Press for $ 155 million. In February 1997, the DocuSystems Group, which printed airline tickets and luggage tags at its Nashville facility, was sold to Code Hennessy & Simmons , a Chicago-based private equity firm. In April 1997,

3136-567: Was the first major map publisher to embrace a system of numbered highways. One of its cartographers , John Brink, invented a system that was first published in 1917 on a map of Peoria, Illinois . In addition to creating maps with numbered roads, Rand McNally also erected many of the actual roadside highway signs. This system was subsequently adopted by state and federal highway authorities. The oil industry quickly developed an interest in road maps, enticing Americans to explore and consume more gasoline. In 1920, Rand McNally began publishing road maps for

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