Arthur William Knapp

Arthur William Knapp was a British scientist and author associated with the chocolate trade. In Cocoa and Chocolate: Their History from Plantation to Consumer (1920), he identified himself as a B.Sc., Fellow of the Institute of Chemistry, and research chemist to Cadbury Bros., Ltd., which helps place him close to the industry he was describing.

His best-known book set out to give non-specialist readers a compact but accurate guide to cacao: its history, cultivation, and manufacture. In the preface, he explained that he wanted to cover the whole subject lightly but carefully, and the result is a book that mixes food history, industrial process, and practical explanation in a very readable way.

Some library and audiobook sources list his dates as 1880–1939, but that detail was not consistently confirmed in the sources reviewed here. What is clear is that his writing became a lasting reference for readers curious about how chocolate moves from plantation to consumer, and it still circulates widely in reprints, digital editions, and audiobook form.