Phyllis Pearsall
Encyclopedia
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(25 September 1906, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
– 28 August 1996, West Sussex
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in the south of England, bordering onto East Sussex , Hampshire and Surrey. The county of Sussex has been divided into East and West since the 12th century, and obtained separate county councils in 1888, but it remained a single ceremonial county until 1974 and the coming...
) was a painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
and writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
, and the creator of the A to Z map of London.
Early years
She was born Phyllis Isobella Gross in East DulwichEast Dulwich
East Dulwich is a district of South London, England in the London Borough of Southwark. It forms the eastern one third of Dulwich, with the Dulwich Wood area, Dulwich Village and West Dulwich to its South and West making up the remaining two thirds...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
on 25 September 1906. Her father, Alexander Gross, was a Hungarian
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
Jewish immigrant and her mother was an Irish
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
Roman Catholic suffragette, whose parents disapproved of the match. Phyllis Gross was baptized a Roman Catholic.
She grew up with her older brother, Anthony Gross, CBE
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
, RA
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
, in London but found herself travelling all over Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
from an early age. Her father founded the cartographic company Geographia Ltd, which, although successful, eventually went bankrupt for lack of careful management; this company - again under the leadership of Gross - was re-launched in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
as the Geographia Map Company
Geographia Map Company
The Geographia Map Company is an independently-owned U.S. publisher of road maps. The company is currently based in Hackensack, New Jersey....
a few years later.
Her parents had a very tense marriage which soon dissolved. Her mother re-married but died some years later in an asylum.
Phyllis Gross was educated at Roedean School
Roedean School
-Roedeanians in fiction:* Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward * Dawn Drummond-Clayton * Emily James...
, a private boarding school
Boarding school
A boarding school is a school where some or all pupils study and live during the school year with their fellow students and possibly teachers and/or administrators. The word 'boarding' is used in the sense of "bed and board," i.e., lodging and meals...
near Brighton
Brighton
Brighton is the major part of the city of Brighton and Hove in East Sussex, England on the south coast of Great Britain...
, which she had to leave when her father went bankrupt. She then became an English tutor in a small school in Fécamp, Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
. Later, she studied at the Sorbonne
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...
, spending her first few months in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
sleeping rough before moving to a bedsit (small studio) where she met writer Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...
. She started working as a shop assistant in a big department store, selling gloves.
She married Richard Pearsall, an artist friend of her brother, at the age of 16. They were together for eight years, travelling in Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and living in Paris, when she left him in Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
while he was asleep, without telling him anything. She did not remarry.
The start of mapping
By 1935, she had become a portrait painter. While on her way to a party, she tried to follow the best available map of the time (a 1919 Ordnance SurveyOrdnance Survey
Ordnance Survey , an executive agency and non-ministerial government department of the Government of the United Kingdom, is the national mapping agency for Great Britain, producing maps of Great Britain , and one of the world's largest producers of maps.The name reflects its creation together with...
map). She discovered that this map was not up to the task, and ended up getting lost on her way there. Following a conversation during this party, she conceived the idea of mapping London.
The next day, she started mapping London. This involved walking the 3,000 miles of the 23,000 streets of London, waking up at 5 am every day, and not going to bed until after an 18-hour working day (although not everyone agrees the reality of this story).
Throughout the walking, she was also drawing up the first A to Z map. Phyllis did all of the proofreading and design work herself, and drew up the map with the help of a single draftsman. Close to publication, they founded the Geographer's Map Company, to publish under.
In 1936, a year after the project begin, 10,000 copies of the first A to Z were printed. Initially, it proved hard to sell. Finally, WH Smith agreed to take 250 copies of her oeuvre, which she delivered in a wheelbarrow. It was a runaway success.
During the Second World War, while selling maps to the public was forbidden, she worked for the Ministry of Information drawing women in factories. There was also limited production of maps of the War Fronts, but this was a hard time for her fledgling company.
In 1945, she was involved in a plane crash which left her with lifelong scars.
Later years
In 1966, she turned her company, the Geographers' A–Z Map Co, into a trust to ensure that it was never bought out. This secured the future of her company and its employees. Through her donation of her shares to the trust, she was able to enshrine her desired standards and behaviours for the company into its statutes.A respected typographer, although not credited with the design of any typeface
Typeface
In typography, a typeface is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks. Each type is designed and there are thousands of different typefaces in existence, with new ones being developed constantly....
s, her arrangement of type is considered one of the most interesting of her age. The 'A to Z' type-style is a classic piece of typography
Typography
Typography is the art and technique of arranging type in order to make language visible. The arrangement of type involves the selection of typefaces, point size, line length, leading , adjusting the spaces between groups of letters and adjusting the space between pairs of letters...
by Eric Gill
Eric Gill
Arthur Eric Rowton Gill was a British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement...
. She designed the type for a few children's encyclopedias and some other titles, though her slant was always toward publishing
Publishing
Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of literature or information—the activity of making information available to the general public...
.
She wrote about her early days in From Bedsitter to Household Name, published by her own company. She was awarded an MBE
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
, and in 2005 Southwark
Southwark
Southwark is a district of south London, England, and the administrative headquarters of the London Borough of Southwark. Situated east of Charing Cross, it forms one of the oldest parts of London and fronts the River Thames to the north...
Council placed a blue plaque
Blue plaque
A blue plaque is a permanent sign installed in a public place to commemorate a link between that location and a famous person or event, serving as a historical marker....
in the house where she was born in Court Lane Gardens, Dulwich. She was involved with the company she founded, as well as painting prolifically, up until her death.
In her later years, she lived in Shoreham-by-Sea
Shoreham-by-Sea
Shoreham-by-Sea is a small town, port and seaside resort in West Sussex, England. Shoreham-by-Sea railway station is located less than a mile from the town centre and London Gatwick Airport is away...
, West Sussex
West Sussex
West Sussex is a county in the south of England, bordering onto East Sussex , Hampshire and Surrey. The county of Sussex has been divided into East and West since the 12th century, and obtained separate county councils in 1888, but it remained a single ceremonial county until 1974 and the coming...
, and died of cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...
on 28 August 1996, a month before her 90th birthday.
External links
- Geographers' A–Z Map Co
- Phyllis Pearsall — Map Designer
- From Aaron Hill to Zoffany St, BBC NewsBBC NewsBBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...