Saw identification

[whiskywill]

At this morning's boot sale I picked up a tenon/dovetail saw with an open handle and split nuts for £1. The steel spine is stamped T.SUFFOLK & CO. SHEFFIELD.
I have had a look on line and found very little except that a Turner Thomas & Co were at Suffolk Works in Sheffield. Google did find a reference to one for sale on eBay but it doesn't appear when opened up. I assume it must be something from the past.
Anybody heard of them?

 

[AndyT]

There was a really useful article by Simon Barley in the TATHS Newsletter 106, Autumn 2009, about identifying sawmakers. He has found many more names marked on saws than were ever recorded as saw makers in trade directories. His explanation is that extra brand names were made up - often by a simple method, such as using part of the address as if it was a surname.

He lists T Suffolk and Co as one such made up brand and mentions it as an example, saying that he has no doubt that the real maker was indeed Thomas Turner.

 

[whiskywill]

Thanks for the information.

I thought it might be some kind of marketing ploy. Any idea of its age?

 

[AndyT]

Thanks for the information.

I thought it might be some kind of marketing ploy. Any idea of its age?

The list at backsaw.net confirms that Thomas Turner were listed at Suffolk works in trade directories in 1841, 1852 and 1925. I don't have any more info than that. Old styles and names tended to continue to be offered for quite a long time after they were introduced, making standard tools rather difficult to date.

 

[Harbo]

My Mansell saw was probably badged by a tool dealer based at the The Wallace Steel Works in Sheffield but who actually made it??

Rod

 

[AndyT]

My Mansell saw was probably badged by a tool dealer based at the The Wallace Steel Works in Sheffield but who actually made it??

Rod

I don't mean to be flippant, but the answer is a Sheffield saw maker!

Just as with supermarket own brands, where we know that Sainsbury or Tesco don't have their own factories, a brand is generally just a mark of guaranteed quality, not a statement about the origin.

Sheffield in its heyday was a mass of little workshops where work could be 'factored' or subcontracted to specialists before being branded.

Even where there was some vertical integration - as with say, Ward and Payne making chisels, there is evidence in old company accounts to prove that if they got a big order, bigger than they had capacity for, they would subcontract to another maker (eg Littlewoods) who would make the chisels, marking them with the W&P mark, then deliver them to W&P's warehouse to be 'looked over'. Any 'cuckoos' which were not 'up to the mark' would be rejected and not paid for.

(For more on this, there's a good article by Ken Hawley in TATHS Journal no 7, published 1992.)