The Edinburgh publishing firm W. and R. Chambers was founded following the successful publication by brothers William and Robert Chambers in 1832 of Chamber's Edinburgh Journal. In the nineteenth century, the firm published instructive literature in affordable editions, in reference works such as encyclopaedias and dictionaries, some published in parts, and in a range of popular journals which published original writing, much of it written by the brothers. It also published editions of standard authors in reprint.
Chambers continued to be a force in the publication of reference and educational books in the twentieth century. It was also recognised as a publisher of children's readers and text-books.
Chambers remained a family company until 1989, when it was purchased by Group de la Cite PLC, the group that owned Larousse. It continued as a leader in reference publishing, in the combined imprint Larousse Kingfisher Chambers (LKC), then as an imprint of Houghton Mifflin after that firm took over LKC in 2002.
