Ian Ballantine

Ian Keith Ballantine (February 15, 1916 – March 9, 1995) was a pioneering American publisher who founded and published the innovative paperback line of Ballantine Books from 1952 to 1974 with his wife, Betty Ballantine. The Ballantines were both inducted by the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2008, with a shared citation.

Born in New York City, the son of Stella Commins Ballantine (niece of anarchist Emma Goldman), Ian Ballantine received his undergraduate degree from Columbia College and his graduate degree from the London School of Economics. His Master's thesis featured the possibilities of paperback printing.

In 1939, the year of his marriage, he initiated the distribution of Penguin Books in the United States. As a team, the Ballantines were involved in the formation of Bantam Books in 1945, and he was the first president of Bantam from 1945 to 1952.

Ballantine Books was one of the earliest publishers of science fiction paperback originals, with writers including Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl. During the 1960s, they published the first authorized paperback edition of J. R. R. Tolkien's books. Lin Carter edited their Ballantine Adult Fantasy series of classics by H. P. Lovecraft and others in the 1970s.

From 1968 through 1975 Ballantine Books published a series of 156 paperbook books under the series title "Ballantine's Illustrated History of World War II", later retitled "Ballantine's Illustrated History of the Violent Century". These were printed in both the United States and United Kingdom.

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