William Henry Fowler was born in July 1853 in Oldham. When he was 14 years old, he began engineering training at the Oldham firm of Platt Brothers, textile machinery manufacturers, and later became a draughtsman. At the age of 20, he won a Whitworth Scholarship and studied for four years at Owens College in Manchester. He was then appointed as Assistant Engineer to the Steam Users' Association and, in 1888, became General Manager of the Chadderton Iron Works. In 1891, Fowler's career took a different turn and he became Editor of The Practical Engineer, a weekly journal published in Manchester. In 1898, he set up the Scientific Publishing Company on Corporation Street, Manchester. His son Harold joined the Scientific Publishing Company in 1905 and started to design circular calculators. William Henry Fowler financed his son’s work, enabling the establishment of a workshop for the manufacture of calculators in 1908, under the new company name Fowler & Co. Between 1908 and 1912, William Henry Fowler took out three patents on pocket calculators, starting with the double-sided Long Scale or Pocket calculator that was to be the mainstay of production for the next 30 years. Around 1920, Fowler & Co introduced the Universal Calculator and four years later Fowler and his son took out a joint patent for its further development. Fowler died in April 1932 and his son became owner of Fowler & Co.

William Henry Fowler established the Scientific Publishing Company in 1898 on Corporation Street, Manchester. It soon moved to New Bailey Street in Salford and published Fowler's Mechanical Engineer's Pocket Book, the first of a series of annual pocket books for a variety of trades. The company moved to premises in West Timperley, near Altrincham, in the early 1940s and again, in the early 1960s, to the Rochdale Road, and was in business until about 1976. The Scientific Publishing Company also sold circular calculators from 1898. This eventually led to Fowler’s son Harold, who joined the Scientific Publishing Company in 1905, designing and manufacturing circular calculators through the family’s new company Fowler & Co established in 1908. The two companies remained separate until the early 1960s, when Fowler & Co, renamed Fowlers (Calculators) Ltd in 1938, took over as proprietors of the Scientific Publishing Company. The Scientific Publishing Company ceased trading in around 1976.