Albert Edwin Reed

Albert Edwin Reed (1846–1920) was the founder of Reed Elsevier, formerly Reed International, one the United Kingdom's largest professional publishing businesses.

Entering the paper industry as a boy, Albert Reed first managed or part-owned paper businesses before he acquired a fire-damaged building, Upper Tovil Mill, near Maidstone in Kent in 1894. Albert Reed specialised in the production of paper suitable for halftone blocks for which there was considerable demand at the time and by 1903 he owned seven mills. Under his leadership the business expanded rapidly securing an order to supply newsprint for the Daily Mirror in 1904. Reed was importing paper from a mill in Canada by 1911.

He died in 1920, leaving the management of the business to his twin sons.

Reed was a staunch Methodist and a philanthropist.

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