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Edward William Bok (born Eduard Willem Gerard Cesar Hidde Bok) (October 9, 1863 – January 9, 1930) was a Dutch-born American editor and Pulitzer Prize-winning author. He was editor of the Ladies' Home Journal for 30 years (1889–1919). He also distributed popular homebuilding plans and created Bok Tower Gardens in central Florida.

Life and career

Bok was born in Den Helder, Netherlands to an at-the-time wealthy, prominent family. After his father lost most of his wealth due to bad investment decisions, the family immigrated to Brooklyn, New York, when Edward was six years old. In Brooklyn, he washed the windows of a bakery shop after school to help support his family, in addition, he would also go into the street with a basket every day and collect stray bits of coal that had fallen in the gutter where the coal wagons had delivered fuel. By the time Bok was in his early teens, he was required to quit school to aid his family with financial support. His first full-time job, in 1876, was as an office boy with the Western Union Telegraph company.

In 1882, Bok began work with Henry Holt and Company as a stenographer while also taking classes in the evenings. In 1884, he accepted an offer from Charles Scribner's Sons to became its advertising manager. From 1884 until 1887, Bok was the editor of The Brooklyn Magazine, and in 1886, he founded the Bok Syndicate Press, "the country's third syndicate with 137 newspapers subscribed".

After moving to Philadelphia in 1889, he obtained the editorship of Ladies' Home Journal when its founder and editor Louisa Knapp Curtis stepped down to a less intense role at the popular, nationally circulated publication. It was published by Cyrus Curtis, who had an established publishing empire that included many newspapers and magazines.

In 1896, Bok married Mary L. Curtis, the daughter of Louisa and Cyrus Curtis. She shared her family's interest in music, cultural activities, and philanthropy and was very active in social circles. Shortly before his marriage, he published an advice book for young men. He noted among other things, that "A man who truly loves his mother, wife, sister or sweetheart never tells a story which lowers her sex in the eyes of others." During his editorship, the Journal became the first magazine in the world to have one million subscribers and it became very influential among readers by featuring informative and progressive ideas in its articles. The magazine focused upon the social issues of the day. When Bok's autobiography, The Americanization of Edward Bok, appeared in 1920, and later received a Pulitzer Prize, the writer H. L. Mencken reviewed it with an interest based on long acquaintance with the magazine. Mencken observed that Bok showed an irrepressible interest in things artistic:

When he looked at the houses in which his subscribers lived, their drab hideousness made him sick. When he went inside and contemplated the lambrequins, the gilded cattails, the Rogers groups, the wax fruit under glass domes, the emblazoned seashells from Asbury Park, the family Bible on the marble-topped center-table, the crayon enlargements of Uncle Richard and Aunt Sue, the square pianos, the Brussels carpets, the grained woodwork—when his eyes alighted upon such things, his soul revolted, and at once his moral enthusiasm incited him to attempt a reform. The result was a long series of Ladies' Home Journal crusades against the hideousness of the national scene—in domestic architecture, in house furnishing, in dress, in town buildings, in advertising. Bok flung himself headlong into his campaigns, and practically every one of them succeeded. ... If there were gratitude in the land, there would be a monument to him in every town in the Republic. He has been, aesthetically, probably the most useful citizen that ever breathed its muggy air.

The Journal also became the first magazine to refuse patent medicine advertisements.

In 1919, Bok retired from publishing.

In 1923, Bok proposed the American Peace Award. Bok also established a number of awards including the $100,000 American Peace Award in 1923, given for the "best practicable plan for U.S. cooperation in world peace".

In 1924, Mary Louise Bok founded the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, which she dedicated to her father, Cyrus Curtis, and in 1927, the Boks embarked upon the construction of Bok Tower Gardens, near their winter home in Mountain Lake Estates, Lake Wales, Florida, which was dedicated on February 1, 1929, by the president of the United States, Calvin Coolidge. Bok Tower is sometimes called a sanctuary and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark. Bok is used as an example in Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People.

Bok died after a heart attack on January 9, 1930, in Lake Wales, within sight of his beloved Singing Tower and was buried at the tower's base. Two of his grandsons are folk singer Gordon Bok and former Harvard University President Derek Bok.

Edward Bok and American domestic architecture

In 1895, Bok began publishing in Ladies' Home Journal plans for building houses which were affordable for the American middle class – from $1,500 to $5,000 – and made full specifications with regional prices available by mail for $5. Later, Bok and the Journal became a major force in promoting the "bungalow", a style of residence which derived from India. Plans for these houses cost as little as a dollar, and the 1+1⁄2-story dwelling, some as small as 800 square feet, soon became a dominant form of new domestic architecture in the country.