 Chambers Street in Edinburgh |
William Chambers of Glenormiston lived from 16 April 1800 to 20 May 1883. He was a publisher who became Lord Provost of Edinburgh. The wider picture in Scotland at the time is set out in our Historical Timeline.
William Chambers was born in Peebles, the son of a successful cotton manufacturer. In 1813 William's father was bankrupted after cloth he had supplied to French prisoners of war was not paid for. The family moved to Edinburgh, where William became an apprentice bookseller. In 1819 he set up his own bookshop and also established himself as a printer, using an old press to publish pamphlets. In 1820, William joined forces with his younger brother Robert and launched a weekly magazine. They also published a number of books and gained the support of Sir Walter Scott. Their first success came after they printed and bound 750 copies of The Songs of Robert Burns, with which they turned their first real profit.
Before long William and Robert founded W&R Chambers. William tended to lead on the technical and financial aspects of the business, while Robert led on the writing. They rapidly became a highly active publishing house. In 1832 they launched the weekly Chambers' Edinburgh Journal which grew to achieve sales of 90,000 copies every week. Later in the 1830s they turned their attention to educational books, publishing 100 titles in their Chambers' Educational Course. In 1859 they published the first (of 520) weekly part of the Chambers' Encyclopedia, which was completed in 1868. 1872 saw the appearance of the Chambers' English Dictionary. By the end of the 1800s, W&R Chambers was one of the largest English-language publishers in the world. It continues in being today, now known as Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd.
Between 1865 and 1869 William Chambers became Lord Provost of Edinburgh. He oversaw the passing of the 1867 Improvement Act, which paved the way for extensive slum clearance in Edinburgh's Old Town. During the 1870s he was largely responsible for (and largely paid for) the extensive refurbishment of St Giles Cathedral that returned it to its pre-Reformation glory. Work on the Cathedral was complete in 1883, just in time for William Chambers' funeral. A statue of him stands in the centre of Chambers Street, which is named after him, close to the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh's Old Town.
