William Chambers

William Chambers of Glenormiston (; 16 April 180020 May 1883) was a Scottish publisher and politician, the brother (and business partner) of Robert Chambers. The brothers were influential in the mid-19th century, in both scientific and political circles. Biography Chambers was born in Peebles the son of James Chambers a cotton mill owner, said to have 100 looms in his factory, and his wife, Jean Gibson. William was educated locally, but well, being trained in the Classics. The family moved to Edinburgh in 1814 to work in the book-selling trade. William was apprenticed to a John Sutherland, a bookseller with a circulating library based a 9 Calton Street at the base of Calton Hill. William was paid 4/- per week from which he paid 1/6 per week for lodgings at Boak's Land off the West Port at the west end of the Grassmarket. William opened his own bookshop in 1819 on Broughton Street, an ancient sloping and winding street absorbed by Edinburgh's New Town. In 1820 he began printing his own works. In 1832 he founded the publishing firm of W. & R. Chambers Publishers with his younger brother Robert. They were keen advocates of popular education and his firm pioneered the use of industrial technologies within publishing to make books and newspapers available cheaply. They produced books and periodicals of Scottish interest, such as Gazetteer of Scotland. They also made money in promulgating the many new science discoveries as the modern world emerged from prior modes of thinking in such periodicals as the Edinburgh Journal.