Josephus Nelson Larned (May 11, 1836 – August 15, 1913)[1][2][3] was an American newspaper editor, author, librarian, and historian.

Larned produced political editorials for the Express and his opinions were generally Republican and pro-Union.

[1] In 1869, author Mark Twain purchased one-third of the Express with $25,000 borrowed from his future father-in-law, Jervis Langdon.

On one occasion, Larned was at the state Republican convention, leaving Twain in charge of the Express.

The paper reported the names of the nominees but Twain added in the accompanying editorial "comment on the ticket will have to be postponed till the other young man gets home."

[4][6] The Young Men's Association of the City of Buffalo was founded on February 22, 1836 (the year of Larned's birth) "for mutual improvement in literature and science.

Adopting the new system and presenting his experiences introduced him to other professionals and the new American Library Association, which he later served as president of for the 1893-1894 term.

[1][2][6] In 1886, to avoid confusion with the Young Men's Christian Association, the institution was renamed the Buffalo Library.

He continted to be active in librarianship, writing articles for the Library Journal and creating an annotated bibliography of American history, completing it in 1902.

He wrote for a series of articles criticizing government corruption and socialism in the Atlantic Monthly and published the two volume history Seventy Centuries of the Life of Mankind (1907).