author

Edward Edwards

1812–1886

A key early champion of free public libraries in Britain, he combined practical library work with a deep love of history and biography. His books helped shape how libraries were understood in the nineteenth century and after.

2 Audiobooks

Lives of the Founders of the British Museum, Part 2 of 2 With Notices of Its Chief Augmentors and Other Benefactors, 1570-1870.

Lives of the Founders of the British Museum, Part 2 of 2 With Notices of Its Chief Augmentors and Other Benefactors, 1570-1870.

by Edward Edwards

Lives of the Founders of the British Museum, Part 1 of 2 With Notices of Its Chief Augmentors and Other Benefactors, 1570-1870.

Lives of the Founders of the British Museum, Part 1 of 2 With Notices of Its Chief Augmentors and Other Benefactors, 1570-1870.

by Edward Edwards

About the author

Born in 1812, he became a British librarian, library historian, and biographer, and is remembered as an important figure in the movement for free public libraries in the United Kingdom. His career linked scholarship with public service, and he wrote extensively about libraries, museums, archives, and notable historical figures.

Among his best-known works are Memoirs of Libraries and Lives of the Founders of the British Museum. Those books reflect the interests that run through his career: how knowledge is collected, preserved, and shared, and how institutions can serve a wider public.

He died in 1886 and was buried at Niton on the Isle of Wight. Although he is not a household name today, he remains an important part of the story of modern librarianship in Britain.