Mewburn, Thomas

By his own admission, Thomas Mewburn was the earliest brick maker in Ballarat.  Little information is available about him other than him operating in Inkerman Gully (Ballarat North).  It is likely, although not certain that his brickworks was in Simpson Street on the site of the Inkerman Gully Playground and reserve.  At the time, he would have made bricks by hand.  I have seen one example that is hand made and stamped with a metal brand “T Mewburn” on one face.  This was most likely made in a Scotch Kiln, like many other makers of the day. 

Thomas, a brick maker (1816 - 1902) was born in Huxworth on Tees, County Durham.  He married Jane Hurst on the 21^st of August 1837 at Deanne Bolton, Lancashire.  They had 9 children, including a son, also named Thomas   Thomas (Snr) died in 1902 in Ballarat, Australia at 86 years of age.  He is buried in the Old Ballarat Cemetery, Area Private D Section 13 Graves 16 & 17.    His son George (1846-1918) was also a Brickmaker in Ballarat.

He advertised his bricks often and invited people to visit his brickworks to see the quality of his bricks compared to other makers.  He says the brick works was the “top brick yard Inkerman Gully.”  In 1858, he began making fire bricks, advertising them as being “tested in five successive meltings of a blast furnace; the result is in every way, satisfactory.”  The number of blast furnaces in use in Ballarat at that time would not have been large.

Glenthompson Brick Company

If you were in Victoria from about 4.5 million years ago until as recently as 7,200 years ago, you would have seen hundreds of active volcanoes that were a part of Western Victoria’s landscape forming one of the World’s largest basalt plains; with more than 400 volcanoes mapped. 

This basalt plain stretches from Melbourne to Portland and is as wide as from Colac to Beaufort.  It consists mainly of vast open areas of grasslands, large, shallow lakes, small patches of woodland and stony rises from the once hot lava flows. The low peaks of dormant and extinct volcanoes dot the landscape. 

Glenthompson is a town on this plain on the Glenelg Highway between Ballarat and Hamilton, close to the Grampians mountain range.  The population of the town is now less than 150.  The only real landmark in the town is the Welsh style chimney of the local brickworks.  Once the main industry in the town and now rarely operational, it supplied bricks for many regional buildings built in the post war era.   Originally, a small town named Yuppekiar was built about 5 kilometres away, but it moved when the railway was built linking Ballarat and Hamilton.  Their post office opened in 1866 and the town was known as Yuppekiar before reverting to Glenthompson.

During pastoral settlement of the volcanic plains in the 19^th Century, this stone was used to construct hundreds of kilometres of dry-stone-walls and has become a characteristic feature of the Western District landscape.  These eruptions left vast, deep deposits of basalt, or bluestone as it is known.  From the 1830s, this olivine basalt was quarried in Melbourne as a building material from pits in what are now the Fitzroy Gardens and the suburbs of Carlton and Clifton Hill.  Later, quarries began in Williamstown, Footscray and Brunswick, as well as Coburg and Preston. 

The gold rush of the 1850s saw the population of Victoria explode as a wave of migration flooded the fledgling colony.  Many major buildings in Melbourne were made from this local bluestone, as well as warehouses, bridges, Streets, curbing and laneways.  For example, when the old Newmarket Sale yards were redeveloped, over 1.6 million bluestone “pitchers” were removed.  Councils used around 480,000, another 480,000 were re used on the site and 700,000 were sold for $2.50 each. 

In part, because of the expense of transporting bluestone, bricks gradually came to replace stone as the preferred building material.  Hoffman Brick & Potteries Ltd in Brunswick, one of Melbourne's first brickworks (1870), was quickly followed by Butler's Brickworks (1879), Fritsch Holtzer & Co. (1880) and the Northcote Brick Co. (1882). The first brick clay pits were located in the inner suburbs, close to the areas of greatest building activity.  Small brick works had sprung up all over the State by this time.

The main soil type overlaying the brick duplex clay area of Glenthompson are bleached sodic, brown chromosol.   The term “duplex” is used in Australia to describe soils with contrasting texture between soil horizons, they are also referred to as “texture contrast soils.”  The topsoil is strongly acidic greyish brown fine clay sandy loam. Subsoil is yellowish brown heavy clay.  It is a free-draining soil, usually requiring fertilizing for horticulture.  The underlying shale quarried for brick making is Silurian mudstone.  The Silurian period is the third period of the Paleozoic era that began at the end of the Ordovician period around 440 million years until around 419 million years.  Melting icecaps during the Silurian period contributed to these sediments overlying the Ordovician layers. Extensive erosion occurred during this period because of the lack of plants and a large part of Victoria was formed by sedimentation during the Silurian period.

Mudstone is hardened mud made up of a fine-grained sedimentary rock. (Originally clay with grains too fine to be seen without a microscope).  It also contains other minerals such as calcite.  Some mudstone becomes shale, (or laminated and fissile mudstone).  Shale is characterized by compaction into laminations, or layers about one centimeter thick.  “Fissile” means that the shale easily splits along the laminations.  Historically, the terms “shale” and “Slate” were interchangeable.  Shale can be crushed and mixed with water to form clays for brick making.

Shale is thinly stratified, consolidated, sedimentary clay with well-marked cleavage parallel to the bedding.  Very early in the days of European settlement, large quantities of this fine and even grained mudstone shale were discovered close to the surface in and around Glenthompson.

The current site of the brickworks, located on the corner of Donald Forbes Street and the Glenelg Highway, was originally part of 245 acres purchased on the 8^th of September 1873 by Samuel Fielding.  The area was already producing clay for bricks, usually on-site, sometimes from excavations for dams and used for small building works.   There had been a brick works in Glenthompson since the 1860s.   At the time, many settlers wanted large, imposing red bricks homes like those back in the UK.  These were produced in primitive kilns known as “clamps”.  Other methods involved burning 3-4 foot lengths of wood placed between rows of bricks in open stacks.  This had the added advantage of helping to clear the land as it required around a ton of wood to fire 1000 bricks.

Put simply, bricks are man-made rocks.  We take sedimentary material and turn it into a metamorphic one by applying heat.  They are small individually moulded rectangular blocks of clay of uniform size that are baked in a kiln until hard and used as a building or paving material.  The first attempt to standardize the size of a brick in England was in 1477.   Much later, Queen Elizabeth 1st granted a charter to brick and tile makers, after which a standard size of 9” x 41/4” x 2 ¼ inches became common, although variations in size continued.  In 1849 the Statute Brick was required to be this size.  Today, they are produced in a standard size; 2 ¼ inches by 3 ¾ inches by 9 inches, or 75mm by 115mm by 230mm. Whatever size, the ratio of 4:2:1 is standard.

The problem for many early brick works was that they were operated by a sole brick maker who needed to be there twenty-four hours a day to set up, load, fire, unload and remove the bricks.  It was hard, dangerous, physical work demanding long hours and hard work for little return, except for volume production.  A single kiln with a single operator could take around two weeks to make a batch, and then set up ready for the next one.  If a fire went out, it was hard to re-start and a batch of bricks could be ruined.  Many batches of under fired bricks (or doughboys) were made during this period.  Although the workers were paid little and generally considered to be from a lower socio-economic group, the work needed skill and judgment and expert timing to be done properly.  Because competition was fierce and margins were tight, a sole proprietor also needed to have the optimum number of firing cycles from each kiln to maximize output and profit.

Significant deposits of suitable shale/clay were exploited to manufacture bricks and the forests that previously existed were used to fire the brick making kilns.  Little now remains in the area of this now vanished industry, and what does remain receives little, if any recognition.  Throughout Australia, historic brickworks sites generally exist now only through neglect. 

The Thompson brothers, George and Joseph, formerly of Ballarat and the new owners of Yallum Park, about 12 miles north of Glenthompson where they began making bricks.  A building in Glenthompson, believed to be 90 years old and originally owned by the Scott family was demolished in 1959.  The chimney bricks were some of the original hand-made Thompson brothers bricks and were still in excellent condition.  They later established the Glenthompson Brickworks in the town of Glenthompson in 1900.  It was a small yard in a paddock east of the primary school, near the railway line.  The street running past it is named Thompson Street in their honour.  The business prospered and consolidated with the increasing demand for the red bricks that it could produce using traditional manual methods. They then moved to the present site on the Glenelg Highway because of the availability of red clay for the red bricks fashionable at the time.  Their kilns were making around 60 to 70,000 bricks a month.

Clay was brought up from the pit (weather permitting) each day in a wheeled car on a tram-line pulled by a horse, known as a “whim-horse”. The horse pulled a bar similar to the hand of a clock round and round, winding the cable on a spindle until the car reached the top.  A “whim”, also known as a whim gin or horse capstan is a device used in mining for hauling materials to the surface.  It comprises a capstan or a wide drum with a vertical axle.  A rope or cable is wound around the drum with both ends traversing several pulleys and hanging down the pit face.  As the drum is turned around, a wheeled bin is pulled up a narrow gauge rail track laid on the side of the pit leading to the works. 

James Gunn a carpenter from Dunkeld made their wooden brick moulds.  Moulds could be either single or double.  Bricks were made by hand by Alfred Abrahams who could select the right amount of clay for each brick and made it into an automatic, rhythmic operation.  His two sons Ray and Thor were also employed at the brickworks for many years.  

The bricks were stacked into rows for drying and covered with thatch, made from rushes cut from local swamps.  They were then stacked into the kilns for burning.  After firing, they were cooled and sorted before being carted to the station by horse and dray for dispatch.  A single horse could pull a load of 500 bricks that would have been loaded by hand, two at a time.  The old horse was so used to the trip from yard to station that the driver had only to set the horse on the road and it would walk there by itself on the road, while the driver took a short cut.  The price of bricks in those days (1905) was 30/- per thousand.  Today the price of a brick is around $1.00 each.

Clay Preparation

Before bricks are made, clay has to be extracted and prepared.  This process consists of the following steps.

Tempering

The process of Tempering is adding water to the clay to make it more workable. Too much or too little water added to the clay mix will decrease quality, though.

Disintegration and Crushing

An alternative to tempering is disintegration or weathering, this involves allowing clay to dry in the sun and absorb moisture from rain and dew. The repeated drying and moistening of clay will bring clay to a plasticity and workability appropriate for brick making.  Crushing will make the mixture more homogeneous.  In the days of the whim horse, clay was brought up each day.  When the plant was mechanized, a years worth of clay was extracted over a period of 4 to 5 days.  This was left to weather and was used over an extended period.

Mixing

Mixing is done to make the clay homogeneous and smooth. There are different techniques that can be used to do this, including using animal power or letting humans mix the clay with their feet. Different admixtures such as coal or sawdust can be added to the clay for two beneficial reasons:

1)     reduce cracking during drying and

2)     reduce fuel usage during firing.

Moulding

Importance of Standardizing the Brickmaking Process

Bricks should have standard characteristics if they are to be used in construction. For example, builders or contractors may buy bricks from several different sources for one project: the bricks must be the same size or there will be problems matching the construction of different sections of the building.  Moreover, a standard brick size will allow a builder or contractor to more accurately determine how many bricks will be needed for a project.  A new brick maker therefore, should follow local standards, checking with other brick makers in the area or with local authorities or building and construction contractors.

Shrinkage

When determining the size of a mould for brick making a necessary consideration must be shrinkage.  Bricks will shrink when drying, so the mould size must be larger than the intended finished brick.

Slop Moulding

In slop moulding, a wet clay mixture is used.  The mix is put into a rectangular form without a top or bottom.  A problem with this technique is that because the mix is so wet, the brick may deform under its own weight and the surface can be marked easily.

Sand Moulding

Sand moulding utilizes a drier clay mix, formed into a wedge and thrown into a mould. A bow cutter can be used to smooth the top of the brick, and the form is released because of a hinged bottom. Since the clay is drier, the brick can be moved with wooden palettes that can reduce the amount of surface marks. There are multiple benefits to using sand moulding instead of slop moulding, such as:

Less water is used, so there is less cracking and the bricks are stronger.

Fewer moulds are needed because they can be removed from the brick right away.

Work spaces are cleaner because of less splashing of the drier mix.

Workers stand up instead of squatting down, so they are more comfortable.

Bricks are more regular because they don't deform like slop moulded bricks, so a better product is produced therefore, better construction and more attractive buildings will be possible.  Slop moulded bricks can be imprinted with the brick maker's name, inside a "frog," on the flat side of the brick. This helps the brick dry and fire well, and is a good form of advertising.

Drying

Water was added during clay preparation to increase workability of the mixture, but in drying it is removed for several reasons.  First, there will be less cracking in fired bricks with less water content. Secondly, additional fuel is needed, beyond what is used for firing, to dry the bricks in the kiln.  Proper drying of bricks will involved rotating the bricks for different exposures to ensure even drying rates.  For best results, drying should be done slowly.  This will help with more even drying.  Also, the best drying technique may change from location to location, so the brick makers must gain experience to determine the best way to dry bricks for each production process.

A typical drying shed, this one was in Dandenong.

The First World War caused demand to drop and production tapered off, sometimes stopping altogether.  By the end of the Second World War there was no more demand for hand-made bricks.  With the decline of that demand, the Thompson family sold the business to Donald Forbes, a local pastoralist and Reg Williams, a master builder from Hamilton in 1947. They made immediate improvements to the plant and, in 1949, sold out to Glenthompson Brickworks Pty Ltd, with Forbes remaining as Managing Director.  They had installed a small crusher, one brick press and built four Scotch Kilns.  Shortly after, four rectangular downdraught kilns were also built.  Three of these kilns are still at the brickworks.  These were downdraught kilns and the smoke was removed through a new 96 foot square tapered chimney as well as a machinery house, resulting in 18,000 bricks a day capacity.  The re-opening of the brickworks after the Second World War in 1946 by Forbes and Williams was instrumental in bringing an electricity supply to the town. Traditionally, square chimneys are usually made by Welshmen, circular ones by Cornish.  

When someone came to an area that had sufficient clay, a small kiln, usually made of mud or unfired clay (and known as a “Clamp”) would be built to hold the “green” bricks.   The Brick Maker stacked the bricks appropriately to ensure sufficient space around them to conduct the heat.  When the bricks were suitably “fired” they could be used.  The brick maker would eventually make enough bricks to build a simple Scotch kiln or rectangular downdraught kiln.  This type of kiln was popular at the time and generally had sufficient capacity to hold up to forty to sixty thousand bricks.  This meant that the kiln had sufficient thermal mass and volume to produce commercial quantities of bricks necessary to ensure that the kiln cooled slowly and less heat was lost during firing.  The vast woodlands around Glenthompson were quickly used up by this process and by the many farmers moving into the area.

This is a photograph of John Thompson and his son George (no relation as far as I know).  They are in front of a clamp broken open for unloading.

Brick kilns first started in pits then walls were added.  These are known as “Clamps.” that were ventilated at the top, rather than have a chimney.  Building a tall chimney stack, allowed the fire to burn more efficiently by improving air flow or “draw” through the kiln.  The bricks produced by Clamps were not of high quality.   Variations of the different kilns have been invented over the years with varying degrees of efficiency and cost, but all kilns fall into one, or both, of two categories: Downdraught and Tunnel.

In the English-speaking world, the term for a kiln used to make a smaller supply of bricks is known as the Scotch kiln.  It is also known as a Dutch Kiln or a Scove Kiln.  It is the type of kiln most commonly used in the manufacture of bricks. Scoving is the process of covering the kiln in wet clay to seal any openings.  A Scotch Kiln is often used to make the quantity of bricks needed on site for a Hoffman Kiln.  This can be around 400-500,000 bricks.  It is a roughly rectangular building, open at the top, and having wide doorways at the ends. The sidewalls are built of old or poorly made bricks set in clay.  There are several openings called fire-holes, or " eyes," made of firebricks and fire clay, opposite one another. 

This is a picture of three Scotch kilns built at the State Brickworks at Wonthaggi.  Note the large stacks of wood for firing the kilns.  Note the stacks of firewood.  The dried raw bricks are arranged in the kilns so as to form flues connecting the fire-holes or eyes, and they are packed (crowded) in such a way to leave small spaces between the bricks from bottom to top and front to back and side to side through which the fire can find its way to and around every brick. A modification of the Scotch Kiln is sometimes to have openings in the floor like latticework, through which the heat ascends from arched furnaces underneath.

After the dried bricks are loaded into the kiln, the ends (or wickets) are built up, and plastered over with clay. At first the fires are kept low, simply to drive off the moisture.  After about three days the steam ceases to rise and the fires are allowed to burn up briskly.  The draught is regulated by partially stopping the fire-holes with clay, and by covering the top of the kiln with old bricks, boards, or earth, so as to keep in the heat.  It takes between 48 to 60 hours for the bricks to be sufficiently fired, and they will have shrunk to the appropriate size.  The fire-holes are then completely sealed with clay and all air excluded.  The kiln is then allowed to cool gradually.

A convenient size for a Scotch kiln is about 60 feet by 11 feet internal dimensions, and 12 feet high. This will contain about 80,000 bricks. The fire-holes are 3 feet apart. These kilns are often made 12 feet wide, but 11 feet is enough to burn through properly.  A kiln takes on an average a week to burn, and, including the time required for crowding and emptying, it may be burnt about once every three weeks, or ten times in an average season. This will produce about 800,000 bricks that is about as many as would be turned out by two moulders in full work.  The bricks in the centre of the kiln are generally well burnt. Those at the bottom are likely to be very hard, some clinkered. Those at the top are often badly burnt, soft, and unfit for exterior work.

A Scotch Kiln is of a type known as an intermittent kiln.  A Hoffman Kiln is known as a continuous kiln.  In a continuous kiln bricks remain stationary and the fire moves through the kiln with assistance or help of a chimney or by a suction fan.  Most brick works in Victoria ended up using the “Hoffman” kilns of this type, but not at Glenthompson.

Why did some brick makers continue to use downdraught kiln when most other brickworks used “Hoffman” kilns?  The answer is quality and control and colour matching.  They were well fired, free from cracks and distortion with sharp well-defined edges.  Some makers, like Glenthompson also made a variety of custom brick and tile to suit special jobs. 

Pipes were sometimes made in beehive kilns; an intermittent kiln, circular in plan, with fireboxes arranged around the circumference.  Pipes were stacked in the arched chamber to retain greater heat and create more durable pipes.  Although called “beehives” because of their distinctive shape, they look more like a yert.  An old beehive kiln is still at the Bendigo Pottery.

It took one week to stack and arrange the bricks in a downdraught kiln.  It took another week to fire the bricks, consisting of three days to dry out the bricks and four days at 2000 degrees Celsius.  It took another week to unpack. 

The kilns had metal bracing to prevent them from falling apart during firing because of the heat expansion.  This sometimes consisted of pieces of old steel railway track buried vertically about one and a half metres into the ground at regular intervals around the kilns.  These posts went to roof height and metal strapping or bars were fixed horizontally around the kiln to brace the brickwork. 

Bricks

Clay bricks come in several basic types;

Hand Made or Moulded

These are very costly to produce, as they are quite labour intensive.  It is only a specialist or boutique company that could or would make them today.  They are made by throwing a lump of clay into a mould and then cutting off any excess.  Sometimes machine-made bricks are treated to give them a rough or irregular appearance to imitate a hand-made brick.  These bricks are made from clay that has been mixed (pugged) with water.  This process is known as “tempering” to make the clay workable.  Too much or too little water changes the quality of the bricks.  These types of bricks were produced at the Glenthompson Brick Company.  Over time, they came in two types;

Machine Pressed Bricks

Semi-dry plastic.  The clay is mixed with up to 12% water depending on the clay.  The mix has to be sufficiently dry to fall into a mould using its own weight.  The clay is then formed under pressure into a frogged brick.  These bricks have smooth faces and sharp edges.  Dry pressed bricks have a cork-like appearance.

Stiff plastic.  The clay for these bricks has slightly higher water content (up to 17%).  The clay is forced under pressure from an auger into a mould.  The rough brick is then put into a second mould for a final pressing.  The texture of these bricks is rougher than a semi-plastic brick.  Wet-pressed bricks are very strong bricks, with a smoother, denser surface.

Brick Making Equipment

What did the equipment look like and how did it work?  Fortunately, most of the brick making equipment at Glenthompson is still in place.  The brick press is of the Bradley and Craven type. William Craven and Richard Bradley were two young engineers who produced revolutionary machinery for automating the production of bricks.  By 1853 the company’s Stiff Plastic Brick making machines were being sold throughout the UK and to many oversees markets, including South Africa, Germany and Australia.  The process was later powered by a powerful electric motor.  Originally, a steam engine, powered by a boiler was used.

The depression of the late 1920s and 1930s hit brick makers hard.  Production declined in line with falling sales.  It was not until the late 1930s that sales picked up again, however price controls introduced during the Second-World-War meant a constant battle with bureaucracy to keep brickworks financially viable.

These price controls lasted into the 1950s and improved pay and conditions for workers during this period meant further strain on the business.  Costs were continuing to rise and many other brick-works did not reopen after the war because of these increased costs and their inability to attract enough workers. 

Donald Forbes grew up at Cherry Mount near Glenthompson and purchased a property “Wintoc” from Arthur Thacker in 1919, running Hereford sheep and cattle.  He built a new home, the existing house, on the property in the interwar years.  After his accidental death in 1953, his successor Frank Borbiro began to explore alternative fuels for firing the kilns.

Frank was an Hungarian refugee who arrived in Australia in 1949.  He began working there in 1950 as a labourer.  He became the Managing Director in 1956 and served on the Shire of Mount Rouse council for 12 years and was a member of the Portland District Development Committee, Glenelg’s Regional Planning Authority and Willaura Hospital Board.  Frank was awarded an MBE for community service in 1979.

Reg Williams was an important master builder who was responsible for building the finest commercial buildings in Hamilton in the mid 20^th Century, many of them being designed by the leading Modernist architects, Seebrook and Fildes of Melbourne. 

The company prospered with the post World War Two boom. Again, it invested in substantial plant and equipment resulting in a production of 18,000 bricks a day. Forbes died in 1953, and his successor, Frank Borbiro began to explore alternative fuels for firing the kilns. Oil can be problematic for use when firing bricks.  A residue forms on the outside layer of bricks.  In 1956 the Brickworks became the first in Victoria to make the transition to oil firing. Borbiro, a Hungarian refugee, served on the Shire of Mount Rouse Council, the Portland District Development Committee, Glenelg's Regional Planning Authority and Willaura Hospital Board. Borbiro was awarded an MBE for community service in 1979.  Countless buildings have been constructed throughout the region using Glenthompson bricks, including many of great architectural significance.

Angora Banner Pty Ltd purchased the Brickworks in 1988 and is the current owner. The Brickworks, the most important supplier of bricks in the Western District outside Ballarat, is of particular interest because of its traditional method of firing in single kilns rather than the Hoffman process of continuous firing in circular kilns used in Melbourne. The Brickworks are in full working order and retain an excellent degree of integrity.  Production today is limited and considerable cost would be involved in bringing the plant up to date.

Special thanks to Heather Lynch for notes on much of the information here and to Dave Veccio, a worker at the brickworks for showing me around and giving me a lot more information.

Also, the "Hamilto Spectator"of Saturday July 10, 2010.

George Marks (Ballarat Pottery Pty Ltd)

This is the first part of a three part story of a business that continues today, first as the "Ballarat Pottery Works Pty Ltd" run by George Marks.  The second was Martins Stoneware Pipes, and finally, the third incarnation, Vitclay. 

This photograph of the Ballarat Pottery Works was taken shortly after Martin's takeover in 1921.  The buildings in the picture were destroyed by fire in 1922.  You can just make out Martins sign to the left of the door.

George Marks was one of the early potters in Ballarat.  Unlike so many others, he had not made his way to the goldfields in search of riches.  He arrived in Victoria aboard the SS Norfolk in 1858 from London.  Like so many others, fortune did not happen, although he did become a shareholder in the Windsor Gold Mining Company in August 1864 and the Nairnshire Gold Mining Company in 1871.  He had accepted an offer to work at a works in Brunswick, Victoria as a potter.  Although a Londoner, George had trained at the Doulton and Sons pottery in Staffordshire.

In 1861, George Marks established his first Ballarat Pottery Works on Creswick Road in Ballarat, near the Old Cemetery. There with the help of four boys he produced salt-glazed drain pipes, chimney pots and tiles for Ballarat builders as well as a quantity of wheel-thrown jars, flower pots and saucers, water monkeys, bread pans, butter pots, ginger beer bottles, etc. The business flourished and the building of the railway through his property gave him the opportunity to relocate closer to town at 306 Creswick Road.    Principally, the reason was that he could not obtain title to the land near the cemetery.  Clay was obtained from a number of sites around Ballarat.   

The first building on the new site was a two-storey timber framed construction of 47 feet by 90 feet.  The triple fronted timber building with the square chimney was later built.  (Square chimneys are usually of Welsh manufacture whereas circular chimneys are usually Cornish.)  Another chimney was built on top of a circular two-storey kiln containing three furnaces.  This wood and coal kiln was used to fire flower pots and chimney ornaments.  A second coal only fired kiln nearby was lined with firebricks made by Taylors Brickworks at Black Hill.

A ten horsepower horizontal steam engine was also installed to operate the machinery at the plant.   The initial processing of the clay was carried out at the rear of the property by a horse drawn pug mill.  Different products required different grades of clay.   The pug mill worked the clay to a proper consistency that was then moved in large lumps into sheds ready to be converted into various articles.  The clay that is now pretty solid and “stiff” is then placed in a small press with a perforated bottom.  The press was worked by hand, and after the clay had passed through the perforated bottom it was almost free from stones and fit to be made into the rougher articles, such as flower-pots and tiles.  The clay from which ginger-beer bottles, water monkeys, preserve pots etcetera, were made was all carefully washed in tubs and worked up by hand before it was put upon the potter’s lathe.

The following comes from a newspaper article from “The Star”.  “but by far the most interesting of the work is that done by Mr Marks on the potters lathe or wheel.  The potter’s wheel is a small iron table made to revolve by means of cog-wheels upon a handle like that of a windlass being turned.  Upon this wheel, or revolving table, the potter makes flower pots and saucers, water monkeys, bread pans, butter pots, ginger beer bottles, and various other things.  The potter from practice knows the size of the piece of clay he will require for any particular article.  He takes this lump of clay, puts it on the wheel, dips his hands in water, and the boy in attendance sets the table revolving rapidly.  In a few seconds the operator, using only his hands and a small piece of tin for a scraper will turn out such small articles such as ginger-beer bottles, blacking pots, and small jars of all shapes and so quickly does he do it that the operation appears like a sort of magic to one who knows nothing of the work.

 The larger articles, such as 6 and 7 gallon butter jars, or large bread pans capable of holding five or six loaves, are more difficult and take longer to make, but Mr Marks turns out any of these out, perfectly formed, in less than five minutes.  The trueness of curve and shape generally in all these things seems wonderful, for the potter does his work with great speed and has only his hands and eyes to guide him.  Chimney pots of all sizes and shapes are made by Mr Marks.  The plain round ones are made with the press in the same manner as the pipes, but the octagonal pots, moulded in the ordinary way with wooded moulds, and the sectional pieces are afterwards joined together.  Some of the designs here for chimney pots are very pretty, and there were all kinds of wonderful inventions for doing away with the smoky chimneys.  Some of the Ballarat builders deal largely with Mr Marks for chimney pots, and he turns out a large number weekly. 

The clay for the manufacture of the rougher kinds of wares, such as pipes and chimney pots does not need to be very fine, and after a very slight preparation it is ready for use.  Great care, however, has to be taken in the preparation of the clay for the manufacture of such things as preserve jars, water monkeys &c.  The clay for these things is put through the pug-mill, then puddled in a tub, and when it is of proper consistency it is placed on a wooded table and worked up like dough only much more carefully.  Every little stone is picked out and the clay is worked for hours before it is fit for the potter’s wheel.  After all the smaller articles are made on the wheel they can be removed by hand, but the larger vessels being soft cannot be handles.  Before they are made, therefore a piece of wood is fixed in the wheel and the vessel after it is made, are removed together.

The next process is the drying.  Drainpipes, tiles, bottles and jars, are all stacked, and allowed to dry for a certain time until they are ready for baking in the kiln.  The drain pipes and chimney pots are burned in a kiln by themselves.  This kiln holds about 8000 drain pipes, and a large number of chimney pots, and if the  pottery was in full work two kilns per week of these articles could be baked.  This kiln has six fire holes, and costs £8 per week for fuel, both coal and wood.  A glaze is put on the pots and pipes by a large quantity of common salt being thrown in the kiln at the top.  The flower pots and other small articles are baked in a separate kiln, as they are of a frail and delicate nature, and will not stand rough handling.  The kiln set apart for them is a small one, and is divided into small compartments, made with large, flat, clay tiles.  The flower pots are not glazed, but the jam jars and ginger-beer bottles are glazed in the same manner as the drain pipes. 

The small sized drain pipes are sold in large quantities to farmers and others in the district, and there is a good demand for flower pots among the gardeners and nurserymen.  Mr Marks says he can manufacture drain pipes, flower pots, plain and ornamental chimney pots, and jars of all kinds at a much lower rate than these articles can be imported for.  The Lextonshire and Avica shire councils purchase large numbers of the 26-inch drain pipes for culverts.  Mr Marks’ chief difficulty is the want of good clay for the making of the finer sorts of pottery ware, and he is at present experimenting with various kinds of clay obtained from different parts of the district.  Most of the finer articles he has made up to the present time have been made more by way of experiment than with the hope of immediate profit, although Mr Marks is confident that the proper material he can turn out wares that will be cheaper and of as good quality as imported wares.” 

He was also making pipes too.  From small “aggie” pipes, 2” in diameter to water pipes up to 18” diameter.  Output of pipes was restricted by the space available to dry them, leading to delay in filling orders.  As the town expanded, sewage pipes were also made in increasing numbers.

When these were made, the clay was put in the press,  but the perforated bottom is removed, and in its place a mould was fixed, according to the size of the pipes to be made.  The press was raised from the ground about three feet, and after the clay had been put in, a wooden table, running with weighted cords placed over pulleys in the roof of the shed, was allowed to run up close to the bottom of the press.  Then the operator set the press in motion and as the pipe was forced through the mould, its weight forced the table down.  When the pipe was long enough it was cut off with a piece of string and removed, and the weights caused the table to rise up ready to receive another pipe.  This was carried on until all the clay in the press was exhausted; and the press having been refilled with clay the operation was repeated, the moulds being altered as pipes of different sizes were required.  The making of these pipes was the chief business carried on at the pottery,

In 1869, George won a prize of 2 for his display of “Colonial made pottery (adapted to domestic purposes and ornament)” at the ninth Annual Spring Show of the Smeaton, Spring Hill and Bullarook Agricultural Society.

In 1878, George left to work at the Adelaide Pottery and Drainpipe Works, at Brompton and Caversham, leaving the running of the Ballarat Pottery mostly to his new partner Samuel Coyte.  The owner of this company was William Martin who would later buy out the Ballarat Pottery Company in 1921.  There had been a huge expansion of the sewage system in Adelaide and George was in the position to satisfy this demand.  Martins were a well known family in Adelaide, as James Martin had been a major manufacturer of farm machinery.  George died in Hindmarsh, Adelaide in 1918 at the ripe old age of 79

Within a few years the Ballarat Pottery had ceased to produce domestic wares although it continued making pipes and fittings until 1921, when it was taken over by William Martin and became Martin Stoneware Pipe Pty Ltd.  It is impossible to accurately identify the pottery output of this pottery because so few pieces were ever marked.  This appears to be a common element amongst the makers in and around Ballarat.

In 1922, the old works were destroyed by fire and Martin’s rebuilt.

The site of Martin's in 1981

Aspinall, Elijah

Name	Elijah Aspinall
Address	Peel Street Ballarat East
Occupation	Brickmaker
Born	1817, Bolton, Lancashire, England
Parents	Thomas and Elizabeth
Died	1877 Age 60
Burial
Occupation	Brick Maker
Period Active	1857 -1877
Married	Elizabeth Margaret Radcliffe, Bolton
Children	Elizabeth (Betsy) 1846-1914 Thomas  1851-1918 Maria 1859-1859 Sarah Ann 1862-1951
Arrived	In Melbourne, February  1855 on board the “Shalimar”

At a meeting of the Eastern Municipal Council on Tuesday the 8^th of July 1862, the Town Clerk read a letter “from Elijah Aspinall stating that he had seen in the Star that Mr John Hurst of Mopoke Gully had made application to have the present surveyed street (Peel Street) and that a very little deviation would take it over a better course, &c.  If such deviation should be agreed (contended the writer) all of the brick clay used by him and five or six other persons who followed the avocation of brick makers would be interfered with as well as some twenty ratepayers who had registered frontages on the new line of the street.  He protested on anything of the kind being done, as it would ruin him and the rest of the brick makers.  He was struck dumb with astonishment at the utter selfishness and ingratitude of Mr Hurst’s application.  As it was he who had showed him where to set down to brick making in 1857 and it was all nonsense for Mr Hurst to say that he had expended £500 in plant &c, when £10 would start any brick makers in the business, and his business could be removed to the line of Peel Street for £20.” 

In August 1864, Elijah advertised 5,000 bricks for sale at £1 per thousand.

On Friday, the 7^th of October 1864, Elijah was charged with “threatening behavior and obscene language.”  He was fined 20/- or 48 hours imprisonment.  Against whom is not known.

On Tuesday the 18^th of October 1864, C.W.Sherard, Commissioner for Crown Lands forwarded an application from Elijah for the granting of a license for brick making near Brougham Street, Ballarat East.  The application was referred to the Engineer.

On Friday the 15^th of February 1867, he was charged and convicted of failing to take out his license as a brick maker.  He was fined 40/- with costs.

Darley Firebrick Company Pty Ltd

Firebricks, comparitively have never been produced in quantity in Victoria.  Only a few companies produced them.  Other than Darley, there were the Ordish Fire Brick Company in Dandenong, the Australian Gas Retort & Fire Brick Manufacturing Co of South Yarra and Hoffman Brick & Potteries in Northcote.

A firebrick is made to withstand high temperatures.  They are fired at a higher temperature than ordinary bricks and are used in areas where an ordinary brick would not endure, such as inside kilns and furnaces, potteries, foundaries and smelting furnaces.  They also have greater insulating properties.  They are also used where exposure to chemicals is also a factor.  

Darley is now a suburb about 2 miles (3.2km) north of Bacchus Marsh, now a feeder area for Melbourne.  In the early 1900s, it was well out into the country west of Melbourne and had been a stopping point on the way to Ballarat.  The area is geologically divers, having deposits of coal, as well as clay deposits, suitable for brick making.  First recorded brick makers there were Thomas Akers (1848-1928) and William Thomas Wittick.  In partnership, they established the Darley Firebrick Company in 1893 on Bald Hill, Darley.  Thomas had arrived from Coventry in England.  He married Mary Ann Worthy in 1873 and they went on to have 15 children.  William Thomas Wittick (1857-1939) was born in Richmond, Victoria.  He married Hannah Barton in 1876.  They had 10 children.  William died in Sunshine and is buried at Bacchus Marsh.  William’s grand son later became the Manager at Darley.

The Darley Fire Brick Company had a second part in the outer Melbourne area of Montrose.  This began in 1904 when David Mitchell, (1829-1916) father of Dame Nellie Melba purchased 10 acres of land from James Walker, a brick maker who began making bricks, including firebricks in Montrose in 1898.   James Walker had been making fire bricks at Montrose, as well as ordinary house bricks.  David took a controlling interest in the Darley Fire Brick Company in 1898.  They used rectangular downdraught kilns to make their bricks.  Among many other notable Melbourne buildings, David built the Exhibition Buildings in the Carlton Gardens, the only surviving example of 19^th C exhibition buildings in the world.

  

This land was on the corner of Montrose and Cambridge roads, (Lots 35b & C).  The works were situated on a small creek that flowed parallel to Cambridge Road and eventually into Olinda Creek.  David arrived in Melbourne aboard the ship “Anna” on the 6^th of April 1852.  He worked as a mason and builder as well as spending time on the Bendigo goldfields.  In 1856 he married Isabella Dow, daughter of James Dow, an engineer at Langlands foundry, South Melbourne.  (A Fitter at Langlands, Herbert Austin, later returned to England to begin the Austin car company.) 

David was quite a businessman.  In 1859 he had a brick making company in Burnley Street and in 1874 and later became a shareholder in the Builders Lime and Cement Company.  In 1890, he and his partner R.D. Langley began a Portland Cement factory at Burnley using kaolin from Lilydale.  In 1878 he purchased Cave Hill Farm at Lilydale and started excavating limestone from the property.  The “Darley Firebrick Company Pty Ltd” was formally begun on the 9^th of May 1898.  David Mitchell was the majority shareholder.

The works then had an output capacity of 82,000 bricks per week produced in a bottle kiln and three downdraught kilns.  They would go on to produce over 100 different shapes and sizes of refractory bricks and tiles.

This article from the local newspaper at the time, describes the works much better than I could.

The large 2-storey wooden -buildings, and iron and brick chimney shaft, erected by the above company about 2 miles to the north of Bacchus Marsh, fill a conspicuous place in the landscape, and when the lengthy brick-drying sheds are roofed in the " factory" appearance will be very marked. In addition, there will be 1 or 2 large kilns. It will be 2 or 3 months yet before everything is in working order to make bricks.  Wonderful progress has been made in a short time under the practical supervision of Mr. William Emslie, a right trusty manager for many years for Mr. David Mitchell, of Cave hill, Lilydale, the well-known agriculturalist, dairy farmer, cement manufacturer, contractor, &c., and famed also as being the father of Madame Melba.  A great quantity of cement concrete and brick foundation work has been put in, which is not very noticeable now that the wooden buildings cover them. The principal building is 34ft. x 24ft, and 20ft. high, and it has an upper floor to receive the pulverized clay. The lower floor will contain the pug mill and brick-making machinery, very little of which is yet on the ground. At the upper side of this building, to wards the clay pit, and with a floor 4ft. higher, is the Chillean mill shed, 23 x 19, and 16ft. high. Here a very massive Chillean mill, 9ft. in diameter, and with 2 iron rollers weighing 2 tons each, will pulverize the blended material (the proportions of which are a trade secret) of which the bricks will be composed. The clay will be received above the mill in a hopper, to the mouth of which trucks will run on an up and down tramway from the clay pit, part of the distance being bridged by a timber staging, or viaduct. The bed-plate for the Chillean mill is in position, on a substantial concrete foundation, and all the working parts are lying round ready for erecting. The mill will dry crush', all the material put into it, and the product will be taken by elevators to the upper floor above the pug mill, where 90 tons can be stored, under cover, the object being to keep the stuff dry until it is." tempered" in the pug mill, and otherwise prepared for the brick moulding, and pressing.  Elevated water tanks will supply the sprinklers, or whatever methods of applying the water is used,and a shaft is being sunk to obtain this indispensable fluid. It is down 106ft, in very hard conglomerate, and water has not yet been got, but the work will be persevered with. The shaft is substantially slabbed all the way down. At right angles to the 2 sheds (which are practically 1 shed) containing the machinery, are the engine house and boiler house, side by side. The engine is a horizontal one, 25 h.p, and the boiler is 20 ft. long by 54-ft. diameter. The boiler, with a 55ft. chimney, is built in and all ready for work. The engine bed is ready, but the engine it self is lying outside the building. The boiler house is 30 x 10, and 11ft. high. The engine house 24 x 13, and 13ft. high. A brick drying shed, 180ft. long, and 34ft. wide, joins end on to the boiler house.  At the further end of this shedthe brick-burning kilons will be erected. The first 1 is to have 5 fires, and will be 32ft. x 40ft., and 20ft. high. The plant is capable of turning out 15,000 bricks per day, and a large number of men will be employed. It is said that the demand for fire bricks in Melbourne amounts to about 50,000 per week, half of which are imported at present, but it is claimed for the Darley bricks that they will supersede the imported ones. They have given tests, with imperfect puddling, 40 per cent, better than expected. The supply of clay is believed to be what is termed "practically unlimited."  The company, which consists of 5 shareholders, of whom Mr. David Mitchell is chairman, has an area of 15 acres, all of which is believed to contain the very purest and best fire clay. At the pit or quarry opened up by Mr. W. T. Wittick, one of the shareholders, there is a " face" showing 7ft of ordinary brick-making clay and gravel, then 10 ft. of the best and purest fire-clay. A shaft underfoot has disclosed 2 more seams-3,ft. and 2,ft., with gravel clays in between, and the shaft sunk further away from the hill side to get water has gone through a 35ft. seam of fireclay. Such immense seams are seldom met with. Mr. Wittick has burnt about 100,000 firebricks from the clay, all of which found ready sale. He has now got capitalists to take up the venture, and the amount of money they have spent upon developing it, and the still larger amount yet to be spent, be sides the working capital required, all give agreeable proof to this district, at any rate, that they have every faith in their good works.  If the output is as extensive and as profitable as everyone hopes it will be, there is every prospect of the Railway Department running a light line from the Bacchus Marsh station yard to the boundary of the Company's property. The surveyed line is there now, having been surveyed as part of the projected railway to Coimadai and Bullengarook.  We repeat what we have frequently stated-namely, that the best hopes for Bacchus Marsh development lie in this northerly direction, and it is very gratifying to find such a man as Mr. David Mitchell putting his ability, energy, and capital into what may be called the head debouchure of that large and much undervalued region.

Bacchus Marsh Express, 18 January 1902. P3

In 1982, the company changed its name to Darley Refractories Pty Ltd following its purchase of the South Yarra Firebrick Company, making it the sole producer of firebricks in Victoria.