John Francis (publisher)
John C. Francis (1811–1882) was an English publisher. He was known particularly as an activist and campaigner against the taxes on knowledge. Life Francis was born in Bermondsey on 18 July 1811, the son of James Parker Francis (died 1850), from Saffron Walden and secretary of the Leather-dressers' Trades Union, and his wife Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Perkins of Ware. The family was nonconformist, in the congregation of the Independent minister James Knight at Collier's Rents in Southwark from 1791. Francis was educated at a dame school in Long Lane, Southwark then by F. Painter in Bermondsey, and at the nonconformist school in Unicorn Yard, Tooley Street; where in 1823 he had help from John Cooper the school secretary in finding an apprenticeship with E. Marlborough, a City of London newspaper agent at 4 Ave Maria Lane. At 14 he taught in the Sunday school of John Rippon's chapel, Carter Lane, Southwark, and was later superintendent when Rippon moved to New Park Street Chapel in 1833. Having served his time with Marlborough, in September 1831 Francis joined the staff of the Athenæum magazine as a junior clerk; by October he was its business manager and publisher. Early in his business