Shortly after the move James Bowden was brought into the partnership. In 1882 an office was opened in New York, America and in 1884 a further office was opened in Melbourne, Australia.

From 1891 until 1893 the company was known as Ward Lock, Bowden & Company and in 1893 it became Ward Lock and Bowden Ltd. In the mid 1890's the Company opened an office in Toronto, Canada, however this was closed in 1919.

Edward Liveing wrote that "it was in 1896 that Ward Lock and Bowden Ltd introduced their series of Guide books to the British Isles. The early guides were issued in green paper boards-not as we know them today in their familar red cloth covers- and were priced at a shilling." James Bowden retired in 1897 and the company was renamed Ward Lock & Co., Limited.

The preceding history by Edward Liveing is interesting but as we will see later it is not totally accurate.

The first Travel Guides were issued in Green paper boards and then in the familar red cloth. The links on the left show the changing style of the front covers and so it is possible to get an approximate issue date from the style of the front cover. There are other less obvious ways which can be used to ascertain an approximate date of issue and these are discussed later on

What Eward Liveing does not mention is that the guides were published both in the cloth format and in a hard back version. The cloth guides are the more interesting because they have a large number of advertisements which the hard back versions lack. The cloth guides can usually be dated because there is a �series date� at the bottom of an advertisement page. The date can be found in the advertisements at the front or the back of the book.