Editor Eleanor Friede died 14 July 2008 at the age of 87, according to her stepdaughter, Kennedy Friede Golden. She may be best known as the Macmillan editor who bought Richard Bach’s Jonathan Livingston Seagull.
Born Eleanor Kask in Rochester, New York, she grew up on Long Island, and got her first job in publishing in the publicity department of World Publishing weeks after she graduated from Hofstra University. In 1951, she married Donald Friede, who was an editor at World. He died in 1965.
In 1968, she had moved to Macmillan and was the marketing director when the company’s president, Jeremiah Kaplan, convinced her to move to the editorial side of the business. Friede was an amateur pilot and published aviation books. In 1969, she received Bach’s proposal, which had been rejected a number of times. But she was convinced the fable, about a seagull learning about life and flight while seeking freedom and flying perfection, would be a hit. Bach’s $2,000 advance was apparently a good business bet. Since the book was published in 1970, it’s sold more than three million copies in hardcover.
Following that success, Delacorte Press gave Friede her own imprint in 1974. After Doubleday acquired Delacorte in the 1980s, Friede started the Eleanor Friede Books literary agency. But throughout it all, she remained tied to Bach’s little book. The New York Times quotes Friede as being “very fond of the little creature.” In a 1981 interview, she said “I have done and am doing other things. It’s really O.K. to be the seagull lady.”
Wikipedia has a nice description of the book here.