Editing WHSmith (section)

===Formation===
[[File:WHSmith1.png|thumb|The WHSmith logo until the early 1990s, featuring the then-familiar cube of letters. This was briefly revived on special bags and merchandise to mark the firm's 225th anniversary in 2017.]]
In 1792, [[Henry Walton Smith]] and his wife Anna established the business as a news vendor in Little Grosvenor Street, London.<ref name="history3">{{cite web|url=http://www.whsmithplc.co.uk/about_whsmith/history_of_whsmith/|title=History of WHSmith|work=whsmithplc.co.uk|access-date=3 April 2015}}</ref> After their deaths, the business — valued in 1812 at £1,280 ({{Inflation|UK|1280|1812|fmt=eq|cursign=£}}) — was taken over by their youngest son [[William Henry Smith (1792–1865)|William Henry Smith]], and in 1846 the firm became '''W. H. Smith & Son''' when his only son, also named [[William Henry Smith (1825–1891)|William Henry]], became a partner.<ref name=history1>{{cite journal |author= Richard Cavendish |title= The First W H Smith Railway Bookstall |journal= History Today |volume= 48 |issue= 11 |date= November 1998 |url= https://www.historytoday.com/archive/months-past/first-wh-smith-railway-bookstall |access-date= 2025-05-19 }}</ref> The firm took advantage of the [[History of rail transport in Great Britain#1830–1922: Early development|railway boom]] by opening news-stands on [[railway station]]s, beginning with [[Euston Station|Euston]] in 1848.<ref name=history1/> In 1850, the firm opened depots in [[Birmingham]], [[Manchester]] and [[Liverpool]].<ref>Walbank, Alan. 1960. "Railway Reading."''[[The Book Collector]]''. 9 no.3 (Autumn): 285-291.</ref><ref name=history1/> It also ran a [[lending library|circulating library]] service, from 1860 to 1961, and a publishing business based at the Steam Press, [[Cirencester]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lange |first1=Ernst Philipp K. |title=The madman of St. James', tr. from the Germ. of Philip Galen, by T.H. |date=1861 |publisher=C. H. Clarke |location=London |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G8wNAAAAQAAJ |access-date=27 April 2018 |chapter=W. H. Smith & Son's Subscription Library (advert) |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=G8wNAAAAQAAJ&pg=PP3}}</ref><ref>{{Citation |publisher = John Murray |location = London |title = Handbook to London as It Is |date = 1879 |chapter=Circulating and Lending Libraries |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ugEWAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA63 }}</ref> The younger W. H. Smith used the success of the firm as a springboard into politics, becoming a [[Member of Parliament (United Kingdom)|Member of Parliament]] (MP) in 1868<ref name=history1/> and serving as a minister in several [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative]] governments.<ref name=history1/>

After the death of W. H. Smith the younger in 1891,<ref>{{cite DNB|last=Maxwell|first=Herbert Eustace|wstitle=Smith, William Henry (1825-1891)|display=Smith, William Henry (1825–1891) |volume=53 |pages=157–160 |short=x}}</ref> his widow was created [[Viscount Hambleden|Viscountess Hambleden]] in her own right;<ref name=history1/> their son inherited the business from his father and the [[viscount]]cy from his mother. After the death of the second Viscount in 1928, the business was reconstituted as a [[limited company]], in which his son, the third Viscount, owned all the ordinary shares.<ref name="history3"/> On the death of the third Viscount in 1948, the death duties were so large that a public holding company had to be formed and shares sold to WH Smith staff and the public.<ref name="history3"/> A younger brother of the third Viscount remained chairman until 1972, but the Smith family's control slipped away, and the last family member left the board in 1996.<ref name="history3"/>

[[File:Horsted keynes station W H Smiths stall.jpg|thumb|Stall on [[Horsted Keynes railway station|Horsted Keynes station]] platform, Sussex, preserved by the [[Bluebell Railway]]]]
[[File:WH Smith, Huntingdon (geograph 3723249).jpg|thumb|right|WHSmith bearing the former logo in Huntingdon, England, in 1986]]
In 1966, WHSmith originated a nine-digit code for uniquely referencing books, called Standard Book Numbering or SBN. It was adopted as international standard [[ISO 2108]] in 1970, and was used until 1974, when it became the [[ISBN]] scheme.<ref name="Book identifier">{{cite web|url=http://www.isbn.org/ISBN_history|title=History|publisher=ISBN|access-date=3 April 2015}}</ref>