G.K. Hall

About G.K. Hall

G. K. Hall & Co. was an American publisher, headquartered in Boston, known first for printed library catalogues and reference works and later as an early specialist in large-print editions of bestselling fiction and non-fiction.

Garrison Kent Hall, a former accountant, started the business in the late 1950s, and it was incorporated in Massachusetts in December 1962. Its early output was catalogues of library collections in print and microform, the New York Public Library's among them, and during the 1960s it moved into reference publishing across the sciences, humanities, fine arts and music.

From 1971 it issued large-print editions of popular books, and it added Gregg Press (1972), Twayne Publishers (1973), the art slide publisher Sandak (1989) and its large-print rival Thorndike Press (1990).

Ownership changed several times: ITT bought the firm in 1969 and Macmillan Inc. in 1985, and the Boston office closed in 1991. Gale (then Thomson Gale) took over Macmillan's library reference business in 1999, and G. K. Hall continued as a Gale imprint. Gale has been part of Cengage since 2007.

For collectors, the bestselling novels found under the G. K. Hall name, are generally its large-print editions rather than the original trade first editions.