The prize money for the first Booker Prize, awarded in 1969, was £5,000.
The inaugural winner was P. H. Newby, whose novel Something to Answer For beat a shortlist that included works by Iris Murdoch and Muriel Spark. The award was sponsored by Booker McConnell, the food-wholesaling company whose name became permanently associated with the prize.
The original £5,000 was a substantial literary award for its time, helping the new prize attract attention despite its unfamiliar name and uncertain future. Newby’s victory also launched a tradition of recognizing a single best work of sustained fiction written in English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland, though the eligibility rules later changed.
The value of the award increased substantially over the following decades. It doubled to £10,000 in 1978 and rose to £50,000 in 2002, when the prize was sponsored by the Man Group. The £5,000 figure therefore applies specifically to the inaugural 1969 award, not to the modern Booker Prize.