78 



THE INDIA RUBBER ^^'ORLD 



[December i, 1902. 



ber mixings. From its habitat it is a safe assumption that it 

 has long been known to us as a component of inferior grades 

 of Gutta-percha, it being notorious that intermixture of vege 

 table juices goes on largely among the Guttapercha collectors 

 of the Malay peninsula. 



It is with great regret that I record the sudden death from 

 pneumonia of Mr. Harry Heaton, until quite recently known 

 as the Junior. Mr. Heaton, who was educated at 

 Rossall school, started and worked with great suc- 

 cess for many years the rubber manufacturing business of 

 Capon Heaton & Co. at Stirchley Mills, near Uirmingham, 

 and on retiring therefrom a year or two ago started the old 

 Seddon Tyre Co. works at Gorton, Manchester, as the Gorton 

 Rubber Co., Limited, being the largest holder of shares and 

 acting as managing director. It is only doing bare justice to 

 Mr. Heaton's business capacity and long experience to say that 

 it was mainly by his efforts that the shareholders of the Gorton 

 Rubber Co., have found themselves in a much more favorable 

 financial position than was the case before the reconstruction 

 was effected. A man of somewhat retiring disposition, 

 amounting almost to brusqueness at times, in his dealings with 

 strangers, Mr. Heaton will be much missed by those with 

 whom he was on intimate terms and who had opportunities 

 afforded them of estimating his social qualities. The English 

 rubber trade and the Rubber Manufacturers' Association, of 

 which he was this year a member of the committee, have real 

 cause to mourn the loss of one whose personal interests were 

 so closely bound up with the welfare and development of the 

 trade generally. == I have, with regret, also to mention the re- 

 cent death of Mr. T. M. Bleachley, who, first at Manchester 

 and afterwards at London, had looked after the business inter- 

 ests of Messrs. Charles Macintosh & Co., Limited, for about 

 thirty-seven years. From personal acquaintance I can testify 

 to the general esteem in which both his general customers and 

 those who worked under his supervision held the deceased ; his 

 unfailing courtesy to all who had dealings with him being a 

 prominent trait of his character.== Another painfully sudden 

 death was that of Mr. G. H. Scott, on October 27. Succeed- 

 ing to the position of his late brother, Samuel Scott, seventeen 

 years ago, he had been prominently associated with the well 

 known rubber substitute firm of New Mills, near Stockport. 

 Recently Mr. Scott had acted as works manager under the 

 board which controls the destiny of the limited company 

 formed in the beginning of the present year to work the busi. 

 ness. Mr. Scott was formerly in the calico printing business. 



It is understood that this company has absorbed Capon 



Heaton & Co., Limited, of the Stirchley Mills, Kings, Norton, 



and the Midland Rubber Co., of Birmingham. 



„.,'i^'!'!^°r„ These two firms, after commencing well, have 



RUBBER CO. ° 



passed through troublous times since they partici- 

 pated in the tire " boom," and recently both have been under 

 the jurisdiction of an official receiver. The rubber trade of 

 Birmingham and district will now be entirely in the hands of 

 one firm, though of course the local agents for other British 

 firms will see to it that they do not possess a monopoly. Mr. 

 Boardman, for some time manager of the spreading depart- 

 ment and temporary manager of the rubber works, is among 

 those who have lately severed their connection with the Dun- 

 lop company. 



As foreshadowed in my last notes the call on the sharehold- 

 ers has not produced the desired result, and the scheme has 

 therefore been decided in the Manchester 

 chancery court to be at an end. The property 



poor in the extreme. The property and connection, however, 

 being of decided value, the sale is pretty certain to result in 

 the premises being carried on as a rubber works, and if the 

 capitalization is on a sound basis the future may be looked to 

 with confidence. Mr. William Laidlaw, who was for some 

 time cashier at the works, is now the manager of the London 

 depot. 



Mr. Patterson, formerly of the Noith British Rubber Co., 

 and latterly manager ol the Gorton Rubber Co., has recently 

 gone to the Standard Rubber Co., at West Gor- 

 ton, the property, as recently stated in these 



CHANGES IN 

 PERSONNEL. 



HYDE IMPERIAL 

 RUBBER CO. 



will now probably be sold to pay ofl the bank 

 and other creditors, the outlook for the shareholders being 



notes, of Messrs. Littlewoods, of Birmingham. 

 =^Mr. Thomas Warren, a son of Mr. Bruce Warren, the well 

 known chemist to the Silvertown company, has been appointed 

 works manager of Messrs. G. H. Scott & Co., Limited. Mr. 

 Warren was for some years manager of the Globe Chemical 

 Co. at Widnes, worked in conjunction with the substitute busi- 

 ness at New Mills. Mr. Frank Robinson has been appointed 

 general manager of G. H. Scott & Co. to act under the board. 

 =^=Mr. Corbishley, for many years at Messrs. Capon Heaton 

 & Co.. has been appointed works manager at the Gorton Rub- 

 ber Co.=^The chief management of the Leyland and Bir- 

 mingham Rubber Co. at present devolves upon Mr. Whitehead, 

 a member of the board. This, however, is only for the time 

 being, during the somewhat prolonged tour which Mr. J. E. 

 Baxter is taking in South Africa. 



A MARKED difference exists between the owners of works 

 and factories in Great Britain, and Ithink 1 may say the Con- 

 tinent generally, and the proprietors of American 



^'*'^* works with regard to affording strangers oppor- 

 TO WORKS. ^ ^ ,^ ^ ^^ 



tunities of having a look round. Here it is quite 



the exception to show any one round unless he happens to be 

 a distinguished visitor having no connection with trade. In 

 America I understand the case is quite the reverse. A visitor 

 from the States recently applied at one of the large Man- 

 chester engineering works for permission to view, and on be- 

 ing told that the idea could not possibly be entertained, he 

 replied : " Oh, then, I guess you have nothing to show me." 

 This reply caused a certain amount of irritation and surprise, 

 but the fact is that any stranger preferring such a request 

 in Great Britain is always apt to excite a suspicion that he is 

 not quite fit to be at large. The subject is much too wide 

 and complicated to be discussed here, and I shall not go beyond 

 a mere record of existing conditions. 



The shares of the Palmer Tyre Co., Limited, have been pur- 

 chased by the India Rubber, Gutta Percha, and Telegraph 

 Works Co., Limited, who held a controlling interest in the 

 former company and for several years had manufactured their 

 tires. The Palmer were ainong the most successful companies 

 in the tire trade, having paid dividends regularly, and one year 

 as high as 40 per cent. The arrangement under which the Sil- 

 vertown works manufactured the Palmer tires would have ex- 

 pired within two years, and as the Palmer company had no 

 plant, their shareholders concluded to accept a very favorable 

 offer made by the Silvertown company. 



The amalgamation of The British Insulated Wire Co., 

 Limited, and The Telegraph Manufacturing Co.. Limited, has 

 been referred to already in these pages. The title adopted for 

 the joint companies is the British Insulated and Helsby Cables, 

 Limited. Their works are at Prescot, Helsby, and Liverpool. 

 On leaving London to assume the management of the consoli- 

 dated business at Prescot, Mr. Dane Sinclair was the recipient, 

 on the evening of October 24, of a testimonial in the shape of 

 a dinner from a number of members of the trade, at Prince 'g 

 restaurant, Piccadilly. 



