“Books are the weapons in the battle of ideas.” These were the words of William Warder Norton, who 90 years ago launched the firm that bears his name. Today, the three-person company he once ran from his living room has become the oldest and largest publishing house owned entirely by its employees.

In 1923, Norton and his wife, Mary Dows Herter Norton, hired a stenographer and began transcribing and publishing the lectures delivered at the People’s Institute, the adult division of Cooper Union in New York City. While initially modest in scope, this enterprise embodied Norton’s progressive vision that leaders in their fields—not mere popularizers—should “bring to the public the knowledge of our time.”