Maturin Murray Ballou was a writer and publisher in nineteenth-century Boston, Massachusetts. He co-founded Gleason's Pictorial, served as the first editor of the Boston Daily Globe, and wrote a number of travel books and works of fiction. Ballou was born in Boston in 1820 to Hosea Ballou and Ruth Washburn. He attended The English High School and, although passing the Harvard College entrance exam, he did not enroll. On September 15, 1839, he married Mary Anne Roberts, and their offspring included Murray Roberts Ballou. Beginning in 1838, Ballou wrote for the Olive Branch, a weekly newspaper published in Boston. In 1851, Ballou and Frederick Gleason founded Gleason's Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion, a weekly newspaper. It was inspired by the Illustrated London News. The first issue, published on May 3, 1851, stated: "The purpose of this paper is to give, in the most elegant and accessible style, a weekly literary melange of noteworthy events of the day. Its columns feature unique stories, sketches, and poetry by the best American authors, as well as the best of domestic and foreign news, all seasoned with wit and humor." In November 1854, Ballou bought out Gleason and renamed the periodical Ballou's Pictorial Drawing-Room Companion.
