H. W. Fowler

After an Oxford education, Fowler was a schoolmaster until his middle age and then worked in London as a freelance writer and journalist, but was not very successful.

In partnership with his brother Francis, beginning in 1906, he began publishing seminal grammar, style and lexicography books.

At the time of Henry's birth he was teaching mathematics at Tonbridge School, but the family soon moved to nearby Tunbridge Wells.

Henry was the eldest child of eight, and his father's early death in 1879 left him to assume a leading role in caring for his younger brothers and sister (Charles, Alexander, [Edward] Seymour, Edith, Arthur, Francis and [Herbert] Samuel).

Although he participated little in Oxford sport, he did begin a practice that he was to continue for the rest of his life: a daily morning run followed by a swim in the nearest body of water.

[5] After spending two terms there, he moved south again to Yorkshire (present-day Cumbria) to begin a mastership at Sedbergh School in 1882.

He was a respected but uninspiring teacher, earning the nickname "Joey Stinker" owing to his propensity for tobacco smoking.

Samuel, the troublesome youngest brother, was sent to Sedbergh, probably to be taken care of by Henry and Arthur, but he stayed only a year before leaving the school, and of him nothing further is known.

The third offer was accompanied by a long discussion with the headmaster, Henry Hart, about the religious requirements for the post, which included preparing the boys for confirmation in the Church of England.

[11] In "Outdoor London", published a year later in the short-lived Anglo-Saxon Review, Fowler describes the sights and sounds of his new home, praising its plants, its Cockney inhabitants, and its magical night scenes.

[14] Their next work was The King's English (1906), a book meant to encourage writers to be stylistically simple and direct and not to misuse words.

[13] Fowler collected some of his journalistic articles into volumes and published them pseudonymously, including More Popular Fallacies (1904) by "Quillet", and Si mihi —!

[22][23] On the death of its original editor in 1922, Fowler helped complete the first edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, under the editorship of C.T.

[13] On 26 December 1933, Fowler died at his home, "Sunnyside", Hinton St George, England, aged 75.