Context

Historic context

Victoria has developed exponentially since European settlement. Originally timber huts housed a small but growing population. A legacy of the gold rush of the 1850s was an oversupply of underemployed miners. The extensive basalt plains of Victoria were a fertile ground for stonemasons who built the magnificent cities we see in Victoria today. These masons could not keep up with the demand as working basalt is a slow process. Brick makers then filled this gap and brick works popped up all over the colony as the population grew more affluent and wanted a better standard of housing.

This cultural and industrial heritage has largely been lost. The brick kilns are now gone. But the bricks remain. They are everywhere. Australia is now, as has been for a long time, the world’s largest per capita consumer of bricks. Nobody gives them a second thought. Many new arrivals in post-war Australia worked making bricks. Maybe one of your relatives was such a person. Almost nothing has been done in Victoria by the State Government to record this history, except a half-hearted attempt in the early 1980s by the Victoria State Archaeological Survey to record a few brick that came their way at a few sites. What ever became of them? Although some good came of it because a paper on “The Analysis of Bricks from Archaeological Sites in Australia; IAIN STUART” was produced. See it at http://www.jcis.net.au/data/23-04-Stuart.pdf

Even half the bricks we use today smash like China tea-pots if you drop them from any sort of height. Not like the old Victorian bricks. Oh no, they knew how to build houses in those days.

“Blue Collar”, P16, Danny King

What I want to do here is to show pictures of some of the bricks I have come across in my travels and give a short story about their maker. If you have anything to add, please let me know. PS: I do not collect bricks, only photographs of bricks. If you have some old bricks, let me know and I may come and photograph them and maybe find a story about them.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Charles Butler and Son

Charles Butler was born in Hampshire, England in 1829. He trained as a bricklayer before migrating to Victoria in 1856. He began work as a builder and contractor and was responsible for building some of Melbourne’s best known early buildings, such as the “Victoria Coffee Palace” later the Victoria Hotel and the Methodist Ladies College, among others.

In 1886 he later opened the South Brunswick Brick Company Limited at 9 to 23 Albion Street near the corner of Albion Street and Henderson Street, at what is now Jones Park Brunswick East, Moreland City. The bricks bear the frog impressions of either "SOUTH BRUNSWICK", "S.B.B.C." or "C.BUTLER". Charles had three sons, Charlie, Alf and Bert. Charlie was the son who followed dad into the business.

In 1896, Charles Butler and Son became a member of the Co-operative Brick Company Limited This company was formed by agreement between the Hoffman Patent Steam Brick Co., Northcote Brick Co. Ltd., New Northcote Brick Co. Ltd., Chas. Butler & Son and Fritsch, Holzer and Co., and registered on 10 September 1896. Authorized capital was £50,000 in 50,000 shares of £1. The word ‘proprietary’ was added and registered on 11 February 1897. Authorized capital was increased to £150,000 on 17 July 1927. During its 70 years of business the Oakleigh Brick Co., Clifton Brick Co., Blackburn Brick Co., City Brick Co., and the Standard Brick Co. (Box Hill) became associated. The company was taken over by Brick and Pipe Industries Pty. Ltd., William Street, Melbourne, in 1966.

The brick works operated until 1972. All that is left now are brick footings and remnants of the kilns made of bricks with the stamp "SBBC" on the long east- west wall and "C BUTLER" bricks in remnants of 1950s buildings.

Charles died at his home, 51 Fitzgibbon Street Parkville on the 11^th of December 1901. His wife Elepsaba also died there ten tears later in April 1911.