Thomson, Roy Thomson, 1st Baron

Thomson (of Fleet), Roy (Herbert) Thomson, 1st Baron

(born June 5, 1894, Toronto, Ont., Can.—died Aug. 4, 1976, London, Eng.) Canadian-British publisher. Thomson began acquiring radio stations and newspapers in Ontario in the 1930s; later he expanded his interests to Britain and the U.S. and added television holdings. In 1952 he bought The Scotsman newspaper and went to Edinburgh to run it. In 1959 he purchased the Kemsley group of newspapers, the largest in Britain, which included the Sunday Times. In 1967 he made his most important purchase, The Times of London, and thereafter made a major investment in it, providing it with financial stability. In the 1970s Thomson joined a consortium that was successful in discovering two oil fields. It sold The Times in 1981 and divested interests in U.K. newspapers in 1995. The acquisition of various publishing and other interests continued into the 21st century, and the Thomson Corp. is today one of the largest publishing conglomerates in the world.