Alexander MacMillan ( gd, Alasdair MacMhaolain; 3 October 1818 – 25 January 1896), born in

Irvine, Ayrshire Irvine ( ; sco, Irvin,
gd, Irbhinn, IPA: Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...

, was a cofounder, in 1843, with his brother

Daniel Daniel is a masculine given name and a surname of Hebrew origin. It means "God is my judge"Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 68. (cf. Gabriel—"God is my strength"), ...

, of

Macmillan Publishers Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publi ...

in London. His family were

crofters A croft is a fenced or enclosed area of land, usually small and arable, and usually, but not always, with a crofter's dwelling thereon. A crofter is one who has tenure and use of the land, typically as a tenant farmer, especially in rural a ...

from the

Isle of Arran The Isle of Arran (; sco, Isle o Arran; gd, Eilean Arainn) or simply Arran is an island off the west coast of Scotland. It is the largest island in the Firth of Clyde and the seventh-largest Scottish island, at . Historically part of Buteshi ...

. Alexander was the partner who developed the literary reputation of the company while Daniel took charge of the business and commercial side. Originally called ''Macmillan & Co.'', the firm started as a successful bookshop in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. The brothers soon started publishing books as well as selling them. After Daniel's death in 1857, Alexander continued to run the firm. He expanded the company into a worldwide organization and also started publishing magazines, including the prestigious scientific journal ''

Nature Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...

''. Macmillan assigned

George Edward Brett George Edward Brett (1829–1890) opened the first American office of Macmillan Publishing called Macmillan & Co. of New York. Career Brett was assigned by Alexander Macmillan (publisher) to create the New York Office in August 1869. Brett was ...

to create the New York office in August 1869 and hired American firm Messrs. Pott & Amery to assist in the marketing and distribution of Macmillan's books. Alexander's brother Daniel was grandfather of

Harold Macmillan Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative statesman and politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Caricatured as " Supermac", ...

, who became

Prime Minister of the United Kingdom The prime minister of the United Kingdom is the head of government of the United Kingdom. The prime minister advises the sovereign on the exercise of much of the royal prerogative, chairs the Cabinet and selects its ministers. As modern p ...

See also

References

Further reading