Albert Edwin Reed (1846–1920) was the founder of
Reed Elsevier
RELX plc (pronounced "Rel-ex") is a British multinational information and analytics company headquartered in London, England. Its businesses provide scientific, technical and medical information and analytics; legal information and analytics; ...
, formerly Reed International, one the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
's largest professional publishing businesses. Reed was also a Weslian preacher.
His twin sons
Albert Ralph Reed —Sir Albert Ralph Reed—and
Edward Percy Reed, born in 1884,
inherited A.E. Reed and Co in 1920 when their father died.
Early life
Albert Edwin Reed was born in 1846 in Devon.
Career
Entering the paper industry as a boy, Albert Reed first managed or part-owned paper businesses before he acquired a fire-damaged building,
Upper Tovil Mill
The Loose Stream sometimes called the River Loose or Langley Stream is a tributary of the River Medway notable for the number of watermills that it powered in its short length. It rises in Langley, Kent, Langley, flows through Boughton Mon ...
, near
Maidstone
Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies 32 miles (51 km) east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the c ...
in
Kent
Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...
in 1894.
He established a newsprint manufacturing company in this mill, specializing in the production of paper suitable for
halftone
Halftone is the reprographic
Reprography (a portmanteau of ''reproduction'' and ''photography'') is the reproduction of graphics through mechanical or electrical means, such as photography or xerography. Reprography is commonly used in catal ...
blocks
for which there was considerable demand at the time. Under his leadership the business expanded rapidly securing an order to supply
newsprint
Newsprint is a low-cost, non-archival paper consisting mainly of wood pulp and most commonly used to print newspapers and other publications and advertising material. Invented in 1844 by Charles Fenerty of Nova Scotia, Canada, it usually has an ...
for the ''
Daily Mirror
The ''Daily Mirror'' is a British national daily tabloid. Founded in 1903, it is owned by parent company Reach plc. From 1985 to 1987, and from 1997 to 2002, the title on its masthead was simply ''The Mirror''. It had an average daily print ...
'' in 1904.
By 1904, Reed had five paper mills in Britain and was supplying "super calendared newsprint" that contributed to the success of the Harmsworth brothers'—
Harold
Harold may refer to:
People
* Harold (given name), including a list of persons and fictional characters with the name
* Harold (surname), surname in the English language
* András Arató, known in meme culture as "Hide the Pain Harold"
Arts a ...
and
Alfred Harmsworth
Alfred Charles William Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe (15 July 1865 – 14 August 1922), was a British newspaper and publishing magnate. As owner of the ''Daily Mail'' and the ''Daily Mirror'', he was an early developer of popular journal ...
—illustrated ''Daily Mirror''.
Reed also owned an "interest in a pulp mill on the Miramichi River in New Brunswick, Canada.
By 1905, Reed's company, A.E. Reed and Co owned "five paper mills in Britain."
In 1905, Reed began to investigate the possibility of establishing a pulp and paper mill in
Bishop's Falls, Newfoundland
Bishop's Falls is a town in the north-central part of the island of Newfoundland in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, with a population of 3,082 at the 2021 census.
Geography
It is in Division No. 6, on the Exploits River, nea ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
.
out of concerns about the price of woodpulp.
Newfoundland's "national policy" under then Premier
Robert Bond
Sir Robert Bond (25 February 1857 – 16 March 1927) was the last Premier of Newfoundland Colony from 1900 to 1907 and the first prime minister of the Dominion of Newfoundland from 1907 to 1909 after the 1907 Imperial Conference conferred do ...
was to develop a pulp and paper industry following the construction of the railway in the late nineteenth century.
Reed negotiated with
Robert Gillespie Reid
Sir Robert Gillespie Reid (12 October 1842 – 3 June 1908) was a Scottish railway contractor most famous for building large railway bridges in Canada and the United States. Founder of Reid Newfoundland Company, from 1889 until his death ...
, director of the
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadi ...
, and the
Bank of Montreal
The Bank of Montreal (BMO; french: Banque de Montréal, link=no) is a Canadian multinational investment bank and financial services company.
The bank was founded in Montreal, Quebec, in 1817 as Montreal Bank; while its head office remains in ...
, and owner of the
Reid Newfoundland Company
The Reid Newfoundland Company was incorporated in September 1901 and was the operator of the Newfoundland Railway across the island from 1901 to 1923. For a time it was the largest landowner in the Dominion of Newfoundland, today the modern Canad ...
and the
Newfoundland Railway
The Newfoundland Railway operated on the island of Newfoundland from 1898 to 1988. With a total track length of , it was the longest narrow-gauge railway system in North America.
Early construction
]
In 1880, a committee of the Newfoundland Leg ...
and the government of Newfoundland to obtain the rights to hydroelectric power on the Exploits River in Bishop's Falls. He also negotiated with the holder of timber rights in the Bishop's Falls area. The Bishop's Fall's mill was constructed in 1907 and the dam was completed in 1908.
By 2011, ground wood pulp produced from the Bishop Fall's mill, which employed 500 men, was exported to England.
He died in 1920, leaving the management of the business to his twin sons.
Legacy company
The year 1894, is considered to be the beginning of what would become the Albert E. Reed & Company Ltd. (incorporated in 1903), Reed Paper Group (1950s), Reed International (1970), Reed Paper Ltd. (Reed Inc) (1980s), Reed Elvisier (1993), and currently,
RELX
RELX plc (pronounced "Rel-ex") is a British multinational information and analytics company headquartered in London, England. Its businesses provide scientific, technical and medical information and analytics; legal information and analytics; ...
.
By 1952, the Reed group included the Albert E. Reed and Co, Medway Corrugated Paper Co, Brookgate Industries, Reed Flong, Powell, Lane Manufacturing Co, London Paper Mills Co, Medway Paper, Sacks, National Corrugated Paper Co, Reed Paper Sales, and E. R. Freeman and Wescott.
By 1953, Reed Paper Group consisted of London Paper Mills Co, Medway Corrugated Paper Co, Empire Paper Mills, Medway Paper Sacks, National Corrugated Paper Co, Brookgate Industries, Powell, Lane Manufacturing Co, E. R. Freeman and Wescott.
In the 1950s Reed Group acquired Thompson and Norris Manufacturing Co, Holoplast Ltd on Reed's Aylesford site.
Albert Edwin Reed's son, Sir (Albert) Ralph Reed (1884-1958)
[ Photo by Elliott & Fry donated by Bassano & Vandyk Studios, 1974 in the Photographs Collection NPG x100051] worked at Reed Paper Group until his retirement in 1954.
With his retirement from the company, it ended the era of Reed family control.
In 1960, the Reed Paper Group's "largest shareholder"
Cecil King (1901 – 1987) transferred all of the ''Daily Mirror'' Newspapers and the ''Sunday Pictorial'' Newspapers' pulp and paper mills to Reed Paper Group, thereby obtaining voting control over Reed.
King named himself as chairman of Reed, and Don Ryder—one of his senior managers—as Reed's managing director.
In the 1960s, King was Chairman of ''Daily Mirror'', ''Sunday Pictorial'', the
International Publishing Corporation
TI Media (formerly International Publishing Company, IPC Magazines Ltd, IPC Media and Time Inc. UK) was a consumer magazine and digital publisher in the United Kingdom, with a portfolio selling over 350 million copies each year. Most of its tit ...
, and a
Bank of England
The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the English Government's banker, and still one of the bankers for the Government of ...
director.
In the 1960s Reed Group formed a joint venture partnership with Aerlan and acquired L&P Plastics, Spicers, Wall Paper Manufacturers.
In 1970, Reed Group purchased International Publishing Corporation and changed its name to Reed International.
In the 1970s, as Reed International PLC, the company "reorganised its portfolio in order to concentrate on its publishing and information businesses."
In 1980, Reed Paper Ltd. was privatized and its name was changed to Reed Inc. in 1981.
In 1993 it merged to become Reed Elsivier.
By 1988 the Reed Group had sold off all of its "manufacturing operations".
In 1993, Reed International PLC and Elsevier NV merged to form
Reed Elsevier
RELX plc (pronounced "Rel-ex") is a British multinational information and analytics company headquartered in London, England. Its businesses provide scientific, technical and medical information and analytics; legal information and analytics; ...
. Reed Elsevier operates the
Reed Elsevier Group plc
Reed or Reeds may refer to:
Science, technology, biology, and medicine
* Reed bird (disambiguation)
* Reed pen, writing implement in use since ancient times
* Reed (plant), one of several tall, grass-like wetland plants of the order Poales
* R ...
—its publishing and information businesses, and
Elsevier Reed Finance BV
Elsevier () is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, '' Trends'', th ...
—the financing arm.
The company once known as Reed Elsevier, now known as
RELX
RELX plc (pronounced "Rel-ex") is a British multinational information and analytics company headquartered in London, England. Its businesses provide scientific, technical and medical information and analytics; legal information and analytics; ...
is a London, United Kingdom-headquartered-
multinational corporation
A multinational company (MNC), also referred to as a multinational enterprise (MNE), a transnational enterprise (TNE), a transnational corporation (TNC), an international corporation or a stateless corporation with subtle but contrasting senses, i ...
, that includes businesses that provide scientific, legal, technical, and medical information and analytics among other services and has operations in 40 countries.
RELX employed about 33,000 in 2019.
Personal life
Reed, who was born in Devonshire, Cullompton married Emma, who was born in Somerset, Langford. They lived at Devonshire House on Pelham Road. They had three daughters —Rosaline Emma (b.1877), Florence Beatrice (b.1879), and Dora Gertrude (b.1883), and twin sons Albert Ralph and Edward Percy born in 1885.
Reed died in Woking in 1920.
Other interests
Reed was a Weslian preacher,
a staunch
Methodist
Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's b ...
, and a
philanthropist
Philanthropy is a form of altruism that consists of "private initiatives, for the Public good (economics), public good, focusing on quality of life". Philanthropy contrasts with business initiatives, which are private initiatives for private goo ...
.
References
Further reading
*
*
*
1846 births
1920 deaths
British businesspeople
{{UK-business-bio-stub