Walter Hutchinson

Walter Hutchinson was born in 1887, the same year that his father, Sir George Thompson Hutchinson, founded the famous Hutchinson Publishing company. Walter was educated at Highgate, Haileybury and St. Johns College, Oxford. He was called to the Bar in 1911 but never practiced, because he decided to join the family business instead in 1909. During World War I he was honorary private secretary to the Secretary of the War Office and was also in charge of publicity, and publications, for the coalition government.

As the Hutchinson publishing empire grew, it was Walter who decided they should do their own printing, and he formed the Hutchinson Printing Trust, and this resulted in mergers with many small companies. In 1948, the company published the first edition of its famous Encyclopedia, then called Hutchinson’s Twentieth Century Encyclopedia.

Hutchinson had many diverse business interests including owning 10 farms, a cosmetics manufacturing company, and a baked meat factory. He was also a fan of the Turf, and his colt Happy Landing finished third in the 1944 Derby. He was also a notable collector of fine art, and had a collection of over 3,000 pictures, including Constable’s Flatford Mill. Amongst his collection of books was the first English sporting book, The Book of Hawking, Hunting and Heraldry. Published in 1486, it was the first example of colour printing in England.

Hutchinson was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, the Royal Anthropological Institute, Royal Society of Arts, and the Zoological Society. The year before his death, he opened the National Gallery of British Sports and Pastimes in London but it was short-lived, and closed the year after Hutchinson’s passing.