Beatrix Potter, tired of rejection, self-publishes her first book, The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

Potter liked this idea, and expanded the story she had written into a book called The Tale of Peter Rabbit and Mr. McGregor's Garden, complete with black and white illustrations and a colored frontispiece. She submitted it to six publishers, but it was rejected by all of them. "From a book editor's point of view," wrote biographer Linda Lear, "her story was too long, her narrative lacked proper pacing, there were no colored illustrations, and the black and white outline pictures were too different from the familiar ones."

Undeterred (and unwilling to compromise) Potter decided to publish the story herself, ordering 250 copies from Strangeways & Sons, a printer in London, along with 500 copies of the frontispiece. It cost about £11, and soon after, she began distributing the copies to family and friends, and even selling a few-including to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who bought a copy for his grandchildren. By February 1902, she had to print 200 more copies, and these too quickly sold out.