Noah Webster died in debt, having sold only 2,500 copies of his massive dictionary, yet his unfinished dream became the foundation of the most influential reference work in American history. In 1806, Webster published his first dictionary, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language, but he was not satisfied with the existing state of American speech. He believed that the United States needed its own linguistic identity, distinct from the British Empire, and he set out to create a dictionary that would standardize American spelling and vocabulary. To achieve this, he learned 26 languages, a feat that allowed him to trace the etymology of words with unprecedented depth. His goal was to replace British spellings like colour, waggon, and centre with American versions such as color, wagon, and center, and to introduce words like skunk and squash that had no place in British dictionaries. By 1828, at the age of 70, he published An American Dictionary of the English Language, which contained 70,000 words, 12,000 of which had never before appeared in a dictionary. Despite its scholarly brilliance, the book was a commercial failure, leaving Webster in financial ruin. However, his vision would be resurrected by two brothers who saw the potential in his work.
The Brothers Who Saved Webster
In 1843, George and Charles Merriam purchased the rights to Noah Webster's dictionary from his estate, transforming a commercial flop into the cornerstone of American publishing. The brothers, who founded G & C Merriam Co. in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1831, did not merely reprint Webster's work; they expanded it, revised it, and eventually overhauled it to meet the needs of a growing nation. Their first major revision in 1847 added new sections without altering the main text, but by 1864, they published a greatly expanded edition that changed Webster's original text, retaining only the title and many of the definitions. By 1884, their dictionary contained 118,000 words, three thousand more than any other English dictionary of the time. They continued to innovate, publishing Webster's International in 1890 and introducing the Collegiate Dictionary in 1898, which would eventually become the most widely used dictionary in American schools. Their business acumen ensured that Webster's linguistic vision survived his death, and their company would go on to publish editions that would define American English for generations.The Controversial Third Edition
In 1961, the publication of Webster's Third New International Dictionary, edited by Philip B. Gove, ignited a firestorm of public controversy that would redefine the role of a dictionary in American culture. Gove's revisions were not merely cosmetic; they represented a fundamental shift from prescriptivism to descriptivism, meaning the dictionary would describe how language was actually used rather than dictate how it should be used. He omitted needless punctuation, avoided complete sentences when a phrase was sufficient, and included words like ain't and lay that had previously been excluded. The linguistic community was divided, with some praising the dictionary's accuracy and others condemning it as a degradation of the English language. Despite the backlash, the Third Edition became a landmark in lexicography, influencing how dictionaries would be written for decades to come. The company, now a subsidiary of Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. since 1964, continued to evolve, and in 1983, it adopted the name Merriam-Webster, Incorporated, reflecting its independence from the Webster name after losing the exclusive right to use it.