ncrease, their squalor.
It was not just the men who worked. Their wives and children, too, spent most of their waking hours toiling in miserable, often dangerous, conditions; dying of new industrial diseases as well as exhaustion and lack of good food.
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Posted in Arts and Crafts, Historical articles, History, Industry on Friday, 14 February 2014
This edited article about Josiah Wedgwood first appeared in Look and Learn issue number 552 published on 12 August 1972.
When Josiah Wedgwood was born at Burslem in Staffordshire in 1730, the thirteenth child of Thomas and Mary Wedgwood, his family had been potters in the town for well over a century. His years at school were very few for when he was 9 years old his father died and it became necessary for him to earn his own living. He went to work for his eldest brother, Thomas, and when he was 14 became one of his apprentices. Josiah became skilful as a “thrower,” which meant that it was his job to shape the clay on a turn-table which he kept spinning with a foot treadle. An attack of smallpox left him with a weak right knee which gave him trouble for many years until the leg was eventually amputated in 1768. He might have remained a thrower but for his disability which made it impossible for him to continue this work. He therefore set about widening his knowledge and skill in the pottery trade.
Josiah’s great enthusiasm for improving his craft was not shared by his brother Thomas who considered his experiments to make clay resemble various natural stones such as onyx and agate an unprofitable waste of time and materials. Neither was he interested in Josiah’s efforts to improve the quality of the everyday ware produced by the pottery. In 1749 when his apprenticeship was at an end Josiah was turned down by Thomas when he requested a partnership.
After a brief, unsuccessful partnership in a business near Stoke, Josiah entered into partnership with a master potter named Whieldon. This man loved experimenting as much as Wedgwood and both men were keen to improve the potter’s craft. They produced a wide variety of different types of pottery including a ware developed by Wedgwood to resemble tortoise-shell and a green glaze ware used for making pottery “Leaves.”
After five happy and profitable years with Whieldon, Wedgwood decided to set up in a “pot bank” (pottery) of his own. He first leased modest premises at Burslem known as Ivy House but soon his business had grown to such an extent that he had to move to the Bell Works where he had more space.
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Posted in Famous Inventors, Historical articles, History, Industry, Inventions, Weapons on Thursday, 6 February 2014
This edited article about Henry Bessemer first appeared in Look and Learn issue number 546 published on 1 July 1972.
Henry Bessemer, inventor of the Bessemer process
Henry Bessemer’s fertile mind was always busy with inventions. Born in Hertfordshire in 1813 he was the son of a successful inventor and it was in a type-foundry on the family estate that young Henry gained his first experience in engineering.
The family settled in London, when he was 17, and Bessemer began to produce many new ideas. Among these were a speedier method of type-setting; a cheaper way of making lead pencils; a forerunner of the modern franking machine; and a perforating machine to put the date on stamps so that they could not be re-used. However, he had not a very good head for business and he made little or no money from these ideas, although he received a knighthood for the inventions of the perforating machine 46 years after the Stamp Office had begun using it.
Not until he devised a process for making the “gold powder”, used for lettering book covers, to retail at a lower price than that imported from Germany did he achieve commercial success. Bessemer’s powder was made from brass as was that from Germany. Brass cost sixpence a pound and the German product made from it sold at £5.12s. while Bessemer sold his at £4 a pound.
The money he made from this enterprise enabled him to devel