Once upon a time before Twitter and TikTok, libraries and bookshops were the starting points for social movements. Housmans opened at its current location on Caledonian Road in 1959, but its origins date back to 1936 when it started life as a temporary shop run by the Peace Pledge Union, which hosted regular talks by pacifists and activists.
Today the shop specialises in books, magazines, and journals in progressive politics including feminism, racial justice, environmental activism and anarchism, and it boasts the largest range of printed literature in progressive politics of any shop in the UK. It is also the publisher of the Housmans World Peace Database, a listing of peace organisations around the world.
