Josiah J. LeCount was one of the most important figures in the emergent printing industry of San Francisco during the 1850s.

Shortly after arriving in 1849, LeCount founded a lithography business with William B. Cooke. This was dissolved a few years later (1852), and LeCount then set up his own company ‘Josiah J. LeCount, Manufacturer & Importer: Stationary, Law, School, Medical, & Miscellaneous Books.’ The business was located on Montgomery Street, in the heart of the city’s printers’ district.

While engaged primarily in the sale of books and stationery, LeCount also produced several important early maps of San Francisco, including an 1852 city plan with Alfred Wheeler and a smaller map for the San Francisco City Directory in 1854.

From around 1858, LeCount established a close working relationship with Britton & Rey, producing, among other things, a seminal map of San Francisco in 1859, which shows the city just before its explosive growth in the early 1860s.