I heard recently from a lady in the USA. She has a vintage cabinet which still has the original 1910 receipt showing it had been bought from Frank Tyler. She had been researching the company, found my blog and contacted me to ask if I had any more information.
A search on Google showed various retail outlets at 91 to 105 Newington Butts (now SE1, not SE11 as shown in the Frank Tyler letterheads). I then took myself off to the site and found Sherston Court, a six storey building with commercial premises at ground level and apartments above. I would guess it is of late 1950s or early 1960s origin. Judging by the scaffolding, some sort of rennovation work is under way. I could not find 107-111, but William Hill is at 105 and the entrance to the apartments is immediately adjacent. It is apparent that the shops within Sherston Court have re-used the numbers of previous buildings, so caution must be exercised about saying I have found the precise location of Frank Tyler's premises. Here is what I found:
The letterheads had given the location as "exactly opposite the clock tower". Across the road is park on the site of St. Mary's churchyard. A plaque there tells that the clock tower was demolished in 1971 and a memorial stone (which I did not manage to find) now marks the site.
A walk to Kennington Lane found that numbers 14-16 which housed the upholstery and cabinet works are gone and the site is now occupied by a builders' merchant.
As a footnote, a Google search revealed a WikiPatents entry showing that a Dennis Guy Farnsworth, then of 14 Kennington Lane, had lodged a patent in 1950 for "Apparatus for determining the position of pistons in an internal-combustion engine". (He later moved to Chingford and lodged another patent for towing apparatus.)
1 comment:
I have an old receipt which I think is for a desk which my grand parents bought in 1948 stating the address as Newington Butts and also Kennington Lane.
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