The ''Thacker's Bengal Directory'' was published from 1864 to 1884 by Thacker, Spink & Company, a well-known

Kolkata Kolkata, also known as Calcutta ( its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary ...

publishing company. It covered the

Bengal Presidency The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal until 1937, later the Bengal Province, was the largest of all three presidencies of British India during Company rule in India, Company rule and later a Provinces o ...

– which included the present day

Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

and

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

. From 1885 the ''Directory'' covered the whole of

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...

and was renamed ''Thacker's Indian Directory''. It was later owned by Maharaja of Darbhanga.{{cite book, title=Appendices, date=1982, publisher=India. Second Press Commissior Controller of Publications, pages=266, 343, url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tBwuAAAAMAAJ&q=darbhanga+Thacker+Spink It continued to be published until 1960. The directory was essentially an

almanac An almanac (also spelled almanack and almanach) is a regularly published listing of a set of current information about one or multiple subjects. It includes information like weather forecasting, weather forecasts, farmers' sowing, planting dates ...

which listed British and Foreign Merchants and Manufacturers, Commercial Industries, Army, railway and government departments and office holders, European residents, and separately, prominent non-European residents. Earlier editions of ''Thacker'' had street directories of major cities, such as Kolkata and

Yangon Yangon, formerly romanized as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar. Yangon was the List of capitals of Myanmar, capital of Myanmar until 2005 and served as such until 2006, when the State Peace and Dev ...

, together with the name of the residents of each house. Similar directories published included: *''Thacker's Bombay Directory, city and island... (Together with a directory of the chief industries of Bombay, etc.)'' *''Thacker's Medical Directory of India, Burma and Ceylon. (Thacker's Indian Medical Directory.)'' *''Thacker's Directory of the Chief Industries of India, Burma and Ceylon''.

References

Almanacs Directories Books about British India Bengal Presidency