The First Adman reveals the untold story of how modern advertising was pioneered 200 years ago by the entrepreneur, self-publicist and dodgy Member of Parliament, Thomas Bish. Royalty and politicians courted this early media star and society figure, who was one of the best-known men in the land and allegedly more famous than the prime minister himself.
Drawing on previously inaccessible contemporary sources, Gary Hicks resurrects the Bish brand, as famous in its day as Coca-Cola is today, and explains how it started a publicity revolution. This is an entertaining and rollicking tale of an eccentric marketing genius whose extraordinary legacy survives in modern mass media.

Gary Hicks, born in Tredegar, worked on the 'South Wales Echo' and 'Western Mail', before becoming a Westminster lobby correspondent. He later spun for global corporations and the UK government, travelling worldwide with prime ministers from Harold Wilson to Margaret Thatcher.
His two previous books were 'Fate's Bookie: How the Lottery Shaped the World' (History Press, 2009) and 'The First Adman: Thomas Bish and the Birth of Modern Advertising' (Victorian Secrets, 2012).
He completed 'Girl in a Green Gown: the History and Mystery of the Arnolfini Portrait' which his wife, the Cambridge art historian Carola Hicks, had been writing at the time of her death. This unravelling of the secrets of van Eyck's enigmatic double portrait in London's National Gallery was published in 2011 (Chatto and Windus).
This is Gary's first novel. He lives in London.