An History of Birmingham: The Second Edition, with Considerable Additions

The energetic and eccentric William Hutton (1723–1815), almost completely self-educated, was apprenticed in a Derby silk-mill, but taught himself book-binding, determined to set up in the young and thriving city of Birmingham, to which he moved in 1750. From selling second-hand books, he moved on to new books and then acquired a paper warehouse. Investment in land as well as the book trade brought in a comfortable living, and in 1782 he published his first work, of which the second, enlarge...