The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Bohn, Henry George

BOHN, bōn, Henry George, English publisher, of German parentage: b. London, 4 Jan. 1796; d. Twickenham, 22 Aug. 1884. On completing his education he worked for a time under his father, but about 1831 started business on his own account as a second-hand bookseller, and in 1846 began the issue of his famous libraries, the first of a solid and instructive kind published in England at a popular price. The first of these was the Standard, succeeded in the following year by the Scientific and the Antiquarian, in 1848 by the Classical, and from then till 1853 by the Illustrated, the Shilling, the Ecclesiastical, the Philological and the British Classics libraries. The whole number of volumes contained in these series exceeded 600. In 1864 and subsequent years he sold all his copyrights and other business properties, thus realizing a sum of nearly $500,000. Among his own works were ‘The Origin and Progress of Printing’ (1857); ‘Biography and Bibliography of Shakespeare’ (1863); ‘Dictionary of Quotations’ (1867): ‘Handbook of Proverbs’; ‘Handbook of Games’; ‘Guide to the Knowledge of Pottery and Porcelain’; and editions of Lownde's ‘Bibliographer's Manual’ and Addison's Works.