 | |
| Parent company | HarperCollins |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1819 |
| Founder | William Collins |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Headquarters location | Townhead,Glasgow, Scotland |
| Publication types | Books |
| Official website | collins |
William Collins, Sons & Co., often referred to asCollins, was aScottish printing and publishing company founded by aPresbyterian schoolmaster,William Collins, inGlasgow in 1819, in partnership with Charles Chalmers, the younger brother ofThomas Chalmers, the minister ofTron Church in Glasgow.[1]
Collins merged withHarper & Row in 1990, forming a new publisher namedHarperCollins.
The firm published its first dictionary,Greek and English Lexicon, in 1824. The company had to overcome many early obstacles, and Charles Chalmers left the business in 1825. The first series of Collins Illustrated Dictionaries appeared in 1840, including theSixpenny Pocket Pronouncing Dictionary, which sold approximately 1 million copies.[2] By 1841 Collins was established as a printer of Bibles. In 1846, Collins retired and his sonSir William Collins took over.
In 1848, the firm developed as a publishing venture, specialising inreligious and educational books. In 1856, the first Collinsatlas was published. The company was renamed William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd. in 1868.[3] (TheLibrary of Congress reports W. Collins & Co., or William Collins & Company, Collins & Co., etc., before "sometime in the 1860s", then "William Collins Sons and Co."[4])
Although the early emphasis of the company had been on religion and education, Collins also published more widely. In 1917, withSir Godfrey Collins in charge, the firm started publishing fiction.Collins Crime Club (1930–94)[5] published all but the first six ofAgatha Christie's novels, starting in 1926, as well as the British editions ofRex Stout'sNero Wolfe books and many others from theGolden Age of Detective Fiction. Upon purchasing the rights to the works ofC. S. Lewis, Fount was established as Collins's religion imprint.
Between 1941 and 1949, Collins publishedBritain in Pictures, a series of social history books which were designed to boost morale during the Second World War. Authors includedGeorge Orwell,John Piper,Neville Cardus,Cecil Beaton,Vita Sackville-West,David Low,Francis Meynell,Edith Sitwell,Graham Greene andJohn Betjeman.[6][7][8]
Collins ultimately became a diverse and prolific company, publishing a wide range of titles, including many aimed at a juvenile audience, such as the books ofDr. Seuss (inthe Commonwealth) andRacey Helps in the 1950s. Collins founded itsNew Naturalist series of nature books relevant to theBritish Isles in 1945, withButterflies byE. B. Ford. Three volumes appeared in the summer of 2015.[9]
In 1953, Collins launched its Fontana Books series.[10] Later Fontana Books became a Collins imprint complete with its own series, including the Fontana Monarchs, the Fontana African Fiction series[11] and, from 1970, theFontana Modern Masters,[12] a series of pocket guides to influential writers, philosophers and other thinkers and theorists of the twentieth century. Other William Collins, Sons, imprints included Fontana Lions and Fontana Young Lions, which published books for children and teenagers, andGrafton Books.[13]
In 1965, Collins began publication of The Companion Guides, a series of illustrated travel guides to France, the Mediterranean lands and the British Isles.[14]
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In the mid 1970s, Collins moved all of its operations out of its historic site in theTownhead area of Glasgow, to a new factory inBishopbriggs. The land and buildings were purchased by theUniversity of Strathclyde who demolished much of the site, with the exception of the Montgomery Building - an office block built in 1953 - which is now the Lord Hope Building, and the giant warehouse building at the corner of Cathedral Street and St James's Road which is now the Curran Building andAndersonian Library. 181 St James's Road was also retained by the university and is used as a workshop and base for the Estates Management group.
By the late 1970s, Collins was also responsible for publishing the long-running American Children'sHardy Boys andNancy Drew series in theUnited Kingdom. These were firstly published in a series ofdigest size hardbacks akin to their American style. Paperbacks soon followed from Collins'Armada Books imprint, although the series as published inGreat Britain follow a different numbering system to the accepted American one. Collins's Armada Books imprint also published similar series, such as theThree Investigators, alongside such British stalwarts asBiggles,Billy Bunter, andPaddington Bear, and such well-loved authors asEnid Blyton,Malcolm Saville, andDiana Pullein-Thompson.
News Corporation acquired a 40% stake in 1981. In 1983, Collins acquired the publishing operations ofGranada. News Corporation became sole owner in 1989. In 1990, the company was merged with US publisherHarper & Row to formHarperCollins.[15] Collins became an imprint of HarperCollins.
On 8 February 2013, it was announced that some parts of the Collins non-fiction imprint would be merged with the HarperPress imprint to form a new William Collins imprint.[16]
Collins Education, an imprint ofHarperCollins Publishers, is the third-largest educational publishing house in theUnited Kingdom.
It publishes print and interactive digital products for primary and secondary teachers in the United Kingdom and internationally.
In 2010, Collins Education acquired three publishers, Belair Creative, a British publisher specialising in art and design resources for British primary students,Letts and Lonsdale,[17] a major UK publisher of revision guides, and Leckie & Leckie, a Scottish educational publisher.[18]
In 2011, Collins Education launched Collins Online Learning, an online learning platform for students and teachers.[19]
