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Description area
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History
George Routledge set up in business as a retail bookseller with his brother-in-law W H Warne as assistant, and in 1836 published his first (unsuccessful) book, The Beauties of Gilsand (a guidebook), moving to no 36 Soho Square in 1843. W H Warne was taken into partnership and the Railway Library of cheap reprints of works of fiction begun in 1848. Frederick Warne, W H Warne's brother, was taken into partnership and the firm of George Routledge and Co was founded in 1851, removing to no 2 Farringdon Street in 1852, when the firm published Uncle Tom's Cabin. Founded on the success of cheap editions of works of fiction, the firm rapidly expanded into the reprint market, catering for the growing literate population of the Victorian age. Routledge and Co opened a New York branch in 1854. Robert Warne Routledge, George Routledge's son, entered the partnership in 1858 and the firm was restyled Routledge, Warne & Routledge. W H Warne died in 1859. In 1862 Every Boy's Magazine, edited by Edmund Routledge (George Routledge's son), was started. The firm entered a contract with Lord Tennyson in 1863. Frederick Warne left the firm, Edmund Routledge became a partner, and the firm was renamed George Routledge and Sons, removing to no 7 The Broadway, Ludgate, in 1865. Routledge and Sons' publications included Kate Greenaway's Under the Window (1878), her first Almanack (1883), and Morley's Universal Library (1883). George Routledge died in 1888. Routledge and Sons was reconstructed under Arthur E Franklin of Keyser & Co banking house, in collaboration with William Sonnenschein and Laurie Magnus, in 1902. The firm of J C Nimmo Ltd, founded in 1879 by John C Nimmo (d 1899) and publisher of fine scholarly editions, was taken over by Routledge & Sons in 1903. Cecil A Franklin, son of Arthur Franklin, entered Routledge & Sons in 1906.
The firm of H S King & Co was formed in 1868 and Henry S King introduced the International Scientific Series in 1871. His business was purchased by Charles Kegan Paul (King's literary adviser since 1874) in 1877, when Alfred Trench joined as a partner. Kegan Paul, Trench and Co, formed in 1878, continued to publish the list begun by King, who died in 1879. Kegan Paul published R L Stevenson's An Inland Voyage (1878), signed up George Meredith in 1879, and published Sir James Knowles' 19th Century Review the same year, its other publications including Henry George's Progress and Poverty (1880), Last Journals of General Gordon (1885), and The Silence of Dean Maitland by Maxwell Gray (Miss Tuttiett).
Nicholas Trübner started his business in 1851, its publications including Bibliographical Guide to American Literature (1855), the Record (started in 1865), Samuel Butler's Erewhon (1872), the Oriental Series (started in 1872), Catalogue of Dictionaries and Grammars of the Principal Languages of the World (1872), and Sir Edwin Arnold's Light of Asia (1879). Trübner died in 1884 and in 1889 Messrs Trübner & Co and also George Redway joined Kegan Paul, Trench & Co, amalgamated and converted by Horatio Bottomley into Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co Ltd, although Alfred Trench fell ill and resigned that same year. The firm removed to Paternoster House, Charing Cross Road, in 1891. In 1895 Kegan Paul's profits fell and its directors resigned, whereupon Arthur Waugh took over management of the firm. Charles Kegan Paul retired in 1899 and died in 1902.
Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co were incorporated with Routledge and Sons to form Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd, with Cecil Franklin and Sir William Crookes among the directors, in 1912.