Dear Richard,
A few years ago we needed to trace if anyone owned the copyright to a W & AK Johnston map, published in the 1940s, and after a long haul (see below), discovered a little on this subject, that may be useful. This below is loosely copied and pasted from various sources, and I can't swear at all to its accuracy...
As you say, W & A K Johnston amalgamated to become W & A K Johnston & G W Bacon in 1953 and eventually became part of Morrison and Gibb. Morrison and Gibb was still in existence in 1979, but after losses of over £160,000 they sold their publishing assets to Geoffrey Chapman (a wholly owned subsidiary of Crowell Collier MacMillan Co. - on which, see below) including the stock of Johnston and Bacon. Morrison and Gibb retained the specialized cartographic printing services of their Johnston and Bacon Division. In 1979 the firm was described as part of the Oxley Group (who were calling in a receiver too in 1981). Morrison & Gibb went into receivership in August 1981, and again in 1982.
The Macmillan Company, which was incorporated in 1896 as a successor to Macmillan & Company, merged with Crowell-Collier Publishing Company in 1960 and became a subsidiary. Both names continued in use until 1965 when the name of the Crowell-Collier Publishing Company was changed to Crowell, Collier and Macmillan. In 1973 the name of Crowell, Collier and Macmillan was changed to Macmillan, inc., and the name of the subsidiary Macmillan Company was changed to Macmillan Publishing Company. In 1991 they were acquired by Thomson.
Of less relevance still (but I've started now, so I'll finish!) I contacted Macmillan to ask if they were indeed the copyright holders of our Johnston map. They replied, very helpfully to say:
a) they didn't know if they own the copyright, but if they did, then they gave permission
b) the copyright could belong to someone else...
"We are pleased to grant you permission to use this material free of charge provided you have checked our publication's acknowledgements to ensure that the material in question does not belong to a third party, if it does you must apply to them for Permission. If the material does belong to us please acknowledge as follows: "author/editor, title, year of publication, publisher (as it appear on our copyright page) reproduced with permission of Palgrave Macmillan" in your work".
!
Hope this is a little help.
Chris
Chris Fleet
Deputy Map Curator
National Library of Scotland
33 Salisbury Place
EDINBURGH
EH9 1SL
United Kingdom.
Tel. 0131 623 3973
Fax. 0131 623 3971
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
View maps website: http://www.nls.uk/maps
-----Original Message-----
From: A forum for issues related to map & spatial data librarianship
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Alan Cooper
Sent: 19 January 2007 16:25
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Johnston and Bacon - what happened?
Taken over by Bartholomew?
Richard Oliver wrote:
> There were formerly two well-known map publishing houses, W. & A.K.
> Johnston of Edinburgh and G.W. Bacon of London. In about 1944 these two
> firms joined forces, as Johnston & Bacon. In this form they seem to
> have carried on until about 1970 but then seem to disappear.
>
> Can anyone tell me what happened? Did the firm just close down and
> cease to exist, or was it taken over by someone else - or what?
>
> All information gratefully received...
>
> Richard Oliver
>
> -------------------
> Richard Oliver, B.A., D.Phil., F.B.Cart.S.,
> School of Geography, Archaeology & Earth Resources
> University of Exeter
> Exeter, EX4 4RJ
>
>
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