William Foyle

In 1903 he opened his first bookshop with his brother Gilbert and by the late 1920s the business had grown so rapidly that their bookstore in Charing Cross Road held a stock of four million volumes on over thirty miles of bookshelves, and the name of Foyle had become synonymous with bookselling in London.

His inspiration was James Lackington's late 18th century "Temple of Muses" at Chiswell Street, London.

Foyle and his daughter Christina undertook to organize it, and the Right Book Club was launched at a luncheon at the Grosvenor House Hotel in April 1937, with Lord Stonehaven, the recently-retired Chairman of the Conservative Party, presiding.

[1] During the Second World War, Foyle bought Beeleigh Abbey, a 12th-century monastery on the River Chelmer at Maldon, Essex.

The three day sale realised some £12,000,000, the most expensive item, a Medieval French work, selling for £883,750.