William Henry Smith's parents established a newsagency in London in 1792. W. H. Smith carried on the business in his own name from 1828, and as W. H. Smith and Son after he was joined by his son in 1846.
On opening a railway bookshop in 1848, Smith became aware of the need for cheap, portable reading material for travellers. He bought the rights to popular novels, then commonly published in three-volume editions, and though not overtly a publisher himself, arranged to have them republished in single volumes. Published in the series Select Library of Fiction, the books were bound in yellow covers, and known as 'yellowbacks'. Smith's provision of cheap, accessible reading material is credited with changing the face of popular publishing in the long term.
W. H. Smith and Son developed into a retailing empire which continues into the twenty-first century with more than 650 bookshops, newsagencies, stationers and travel stores in the United Kingdom alone.
