John Timbs

John Timbs (1801–1875) was an English journalist and antiquary, one of the great compilers of Victorian popular knowledge. Born in London and apprenticed to a printer, he edited The Mirror of Literature, Amusement and Instruction for eleven years and then the Illustrated London News, while producing more than 150 volumes of miscellany, among them Things Not Generally Known, Curiosities of London, Club Life of London, Lives of Wits and Humourists and English Eccentrics and Eccentricities (1866). He wrote for readers who liked facts in short pieces, and his books remain quarries of anecdote about London and English life. He died poor despite his industry.