Two decades on, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, and its sequels, have lost none of their magic.
Instead, the exploits of Harry and his friends were transformed into films, a stage play, theme parks and branded goods, becoming a multi-million dollar industry.
Yet the be-speckled wizard hero started life in the imagination of writer Joanne Rowling as she made a train journey between London and Northern England.
With storylines fixed in her mind, she scribbled away in cafe’s in Edinburgh as her baby slept nearby in a pram.
After a number of publishers rejected the story, something magical happened and the very first edition of her book was released on June 26, 1997, with a print run numbering in hundreds.
