William Gershom Collingwood was a writer, academic and artist. He was a pupil of John Ruskin, at Oxford, and moved to Lanehead, near Ruskin's home at Brantwood, and worked as his old master's secretary from 1881 until Ruskin's death in 1900.

He set up an exhibition, now known as the Ruskin Museum (which includes a number of Ransome-related exhibits) and wrote Thorstein of the Mere, a Viking saga which features Peel Island and Coniston Water, and was a book much loved by Arthur Ransome. His family nickname was The Skald.

Arthur Ransome became very close friends of Collingwood and his family; his son Robin, and his daughters Barbara and Dora (both of whom Arthur proposed to).