[1] He was born Franklin Thomas Grant Richards in University Hall, Hillhead, Partick, Lanarkshire on 21 October 1872.

[3] In 1897, Richards launched his first eponymous publishing house based at 9 Henrietta Street in Covent Garden, London.

With their tiny size, charming stories and poems and coloured illustrations, the series was an instant success.

In 1898, he published books by major authors including the collection Plays: Pleasant and Unpleasant by George Bernard Shaw[7] and a new edition of A Shropshire Lad by A. E. Housman.

In 1900 he published G. K. Chesterton's first book, The Wild Knight and Other Poems,[8] Saki's The Rise of the Russian Empire and Ernest Bramah's The Wallet of Kai Lung.

[9] Unfortunately, when the series experienced a great success with the reading public, the undercapitalized firm went into heavy debt to meet the unexpected demand.

This, along with firm's move to larger premises at 48 Leicester Square, led to bankruptcy and liquidation of the business in 1905.

He published Love's Wild Geese (1924) and several other books by Jack Kahane, who would later establish the Parisian Obelisk Press in 1929.

On 2 July 1915, he married Maria Magdalena de Csanády (later known as Marie Madeleine Agnes Richards, born 1889/90).