Elsie Bertram

Elsie Bertram ( Hacking; 6 June 1912 – 26 October 2003) was an English wholesale publishers' bookseller and philanthropist who co-founded the Bertrams books wholesaler in 1968. She became wholesale distributor for Pan Paperbacks in East Anglia in 1965 before going on to obtain a contract to accommodate a children's book list from Hamlyn three years later. Bertram setup Bertrams with her oldest son that same year and she was credited with significantly helping improve the distribution of books across the United Kingdom. She established the Norfolk Diabetes Appeal in 1987 and did a significant amount of fundraising for the appeal, funding a diabetic unit for West Norwich Hospital and a specialist eye clinic centre. The annual Elsie Bertram Memorial Lecture is named in her memory.

Early life On 6 June 1912, Bertram was born in Norton on Tees in County Durham, England. She was the daughter of a Lancastrian cattle medicine seller. Bertram's father sent her to a private school, earning a scholarship to go on and study at Stockton-on-Tees High School. She did not excel at school, She married fellow ICI employee Edward Bertram in 1935 and relocated to King's Lynn in Norfolk, East Anglia before the start of the Second World War. two other children born to them died in the early stages of infancy. She held a half-price sale of damage books every six months at the Norwich warehouse and proceeds were donated to the Norfolk Diabetes Appeal. She later sold a sprout given to her by Charles at the opening of the diabetes centre in 1991 for £1,000 and gave it to the appeal. The Elsie Bertram Award to the Sales Person of the Year was presented at the British Book Awards just once in 2004.