Editing Western Publishing (section)

===1940s===

Georges Duplaix replaced Sam Lowe as head of the Artists and Writers Guild in 1940 when Lowe left the company. [[Richard L. Simon|Dick Simon]], then head of Simon & Schuster, mentioned to Duplaix that he was interested in any new ideas for children's books.<ref name="NPate">{{cite news |last1=Pate |first1=Nancy |title=Golden Books - America's Bedtime Tales |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/698309088 |work=The Wichita Eagle |date=August 22, 1982 |language=en}}</ref> Duplaix had the idea to produce a colorful, more durable and affordable children's book than those being published at that time which sold for $2 to $3. With the help of Lucile Ogle, also working at the Guild, Duplaix contacted Albert Leventhal, a vice president and sales manager at Simon & Schuster, and [[Leon Shimkin]], also at Simon & Schuster, with his idea. The group decided to publish twelve titles for simultaneous release in what was to be called the [[Little Golden Books]] Series. Each book would have forty-two pages, twenty-eight printed in two-color, and fourteen in four-color. The books would be staple-bound. The group originally discussed a 50-cent price for the books, but Western did not want to compete with other 50-cent books already on the market. The group calculated that if the print run for each title was 50,000 copies instead of 25,000, the books could be sold for 25 cents each. In September 1942, the first 12 titles were printed and released to stores in October.<ref name="Antique" /> Three editions totaling 1.5 million books sold out within five months of publication in 1942.<ref name="NPate" />

During [[World War II]], Western had a contract with the [[U.S. Army Map Service]] to produce maps for soldiers in the field and it also manufactured books and [[playing card]]s which were sent overseas.<ref name="Antique" /> In 1945, Western acquired another major printing plant, Wolff Printing Company of St. Louis.<ref name="WPGHistory" />