INTRODUCTION TO KNITTING TECHNOLOGY
HENRY JOHNSON
r2d
ABHISHEK PUBLICATIONS CHANDIGARH (INDIA)
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher/copyri~ht owner.
ISBN : 978-81-8247-114-6 ISBN: 81-8247-114-1
© Reserved Edition ~
2008
Published by Bharat Bhushan Abhishek Publications 57-59, Sector 17-C, Chandigarh-17 Ph. :5003768. Fax: 2707562 Email:
[email protected] W'NW.abhishekpublications.net Concept, Design & Text: XACT AD N ART STUDIO, DELHI Printed at: Balaji Offset Pres's, Naveen Shahdra, Delhi
Preface Knitting is the art of using yarn or thread to make fabric from interlocking loops. Its origin has been traced as far back as the fourth or fifth century B. C. In the past, knitting has been the occupation of shepherds who kept on knitting while watching their flocks, sailors also used to pass their time in the same way while whiling away the hours of long voyages during the age of exploration, apprentices who studied it in 13th and 14th Century knitting guilds and royal knitters in the court of England at the time of King Henry VIII. At certain times in history, only members of royalty were allowed to wear knitted items. One of the knitted garments on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London is a handsome handknitted silk shirt, which King Charles I wore on the day of his beheading. Handknitting is a popular pastime, producing items that are functional, economical, fashionable and fun to make. In addition, knitting offers an opportunity for creative selection of colour and style and allows you to fashion garments that really fit. For all these reasons and more, this book has been introduced. It deals with all pros and cons of the knitting, starting from the primary level.
"This page is Intentionally Left Blank"
Contents 1. Knitting and its Origin ...................................................... 7 2. Five Centuries of Knitting ............................................... 84 3. Knitting for Beginners ..................................................... 99 4. Practice Knitting Patterns .............................................. 153 5. Knitting Hints ............................................................... 197
"This page is Intentionally Left Blank"
~HAPIER 1 Knitting and its Origin Defining knitting Knitting is a way of interlocking a series of loops that creates hand and machine knitted fabric. The loops (stitches) are interlocked using a needle to hold the existing loop while a new loop is formed in front of the old loop. The old loop is then brought over the new loop to form the fabric. Knitting differs from weaving in that a single piece of yarn can be used to create fabric. The fabric consists of horiwntal rows known as courses and venical columns of loops known as wales. Knitted fabric has useful propenies that make it suitable for a range of garments including tights, gloves, underwear and other close-fitting garments. The loop structure of knitted fabric stretches and moulds to fit body shapes. The air trapped by the loops keeps the wearer warm.
Fashioning, loops and ladders When knitting, increasing or decreasing the nwnber of stitches in a row widens or narrows the garment being created. Increasing is achieved by moving outer loops sideways on a franle and creating e:\.1:ra loops. This process leaves a small eyelet hole in the fabric known as a fashioning mark. When decreasing, the process is reversed and the loops move inwards.
II This time the fashioning mark appears where two loops are compressed into one new loop. Garments shaped in this way are fully-fashioned and regarded as high quality. Occasionally some firms used fake fashioning marks to make garments appear to be fully-fashioned. If yarn in a traditional knitted fabric breaks, the loops unravel and a run or ladder forms. To overcome the problem and to sell more goods, knitters worked to design new fabric structures that were less dependent on individual loops for their strength and unlikely to run if a thread broke. Hexagonal meshes, micromesh, non-run, run-proof and similar fabrics were introduced and appreciated by consmners.
Origin of knitting The earliest looped fabrics may have been produced in the Middle East. Socks recovered from fourth century tombs in Egypt were rp.ade using a form oflooping known as nalbinding. N albinding uses a single sewing needle to make the loops instead of two knitting needles. Further examples from Egypt date from the seventh century and show loop patterns that suggest they were knitted in the traditional hand-knitting manner with two needles. In Spain, knitted cushions have been found in tombs dating from the thirteenth century. Purses for holding religious relics, gloves worn du(ing religioUS-ceremonies and knitted girCij~s are also known from this period. Peasant knitting ofsimilar ~te has. been recovered from a Polish cemetery. Fdur '-surv~g paintings from the fourteenth century show the Virgin j!~ knitting, suggesting that the craft was a familiar activity for womel1. A rising demand for knitted caps led to the development of the English hand knitting industry. References to Coventry cappers were first recorded in 1424. In 1488, the Cappers' Act was passed by Parliament to fix the prices of caps ,and prevent cappers making excessive profits.
\\ Knitting and its Origin
9\\
By Tudor times, caps were flat with a narrow brim. In the sixteenth century, an almost insatiable demand for knitted stockings further stimulated the young industry.
The industry (1589-1750) Fashionable stockings The Tudor court
Hand knitting in England expanded as an industry in Tudor times (1485-1603). Knitted caps and stockings were highly fashionable. From the time of Henry VIII, fine knitted silk stockings imported from Spain were part of court fashion. Previously, a piece of cloth was cut to the shape of a leg and the edges sewn together to create a stocking. By the time of Elizabeth I, knowledge of how to hand knit stockings had spread around England and documents refer to the industry in places as far apart as London, Kingston (Surrey) and Richmond (Yorkshire). The first knitting frame
The increasing popularity of knitted stockings at court and beyond created opportunities for entrepreneurs to make money. In 1589, \Villiam Lee of Calverton, Nottinghamshire, successfully converted the actions of hand knitting with two needles into a mechanised process. This was the first knitting fr" me. Like the hand knitting process, the knitting frame produced a shaped piece of fabric that was then sewn together to (:reate a garment. Failure to get a patent
Lee wanted to protect his invention by obtaining a patent from Queen Elizabeth. Lord Hunsdon, a courtier, promoted the case for the knitting frame to the Queen, but without success.
II The woollen fabric produced by the early frame was considered coarse compared with fme silk stockings. The frame was also seen as a threat to the hand knitting industry, which might lead to many people losing work. Lee responded to the Queen's comments and improved the frame by increasing the number of needles per inch from eight to twenty. This knitted a finer fabric. Unfortunately, for Lee, his supporter, Lord Hunsdon, died in 1596, dashing any hopes of securing a patent for the frame. French tribulations
Convinced of the value of his machine, Lee crossed the Channel to France where Henry IV promoted religious tolerance and actively encouraged the development of industry. Lee's brother James, nine workmen and nine frames, accompanied Lee on the journey. From a base in the town of Rouen, Lee began to establish his business. A contract was drawn up with Pierre de Caux to supply frames and train apprentices so that production of garments could commence by 26 March 1610. The business seemed to be progressing well, but unfortunately, for Lee, the political scene changed rapidly when Henry IV was assassinated in 1610. In the uncertainty, Lee travelled to Paris and died a broken man around 1614. London and Nottingham
Mter Lee's death, James Lee returned from France with eight frames and seven of the workmen. James promptly disposed of the remaining frames in London, returned to N ottinghamshire where Lee's apprentice, Aston, had continued to work on the frame and made a number of improvements. The route of James Lee's return resulted in the establishment of two knitting centres, one based in London with the older frames and one in Nottingham using the newer frames.
II Knitting atul its Origin The Midlands woollen industry Introduction to England
The English woollen industry- predates the arrival of the Romans. The Norman invasion in the eleventh century encouraged the industry to expand and fleeces and cloth were exported across Europe. In many areas, land previously used to grow corn was turned over to provide grazing for sheep. By the time of James I, demand for wool in England was so high that an export ban was introduced. This aimed to provide a plentiful supply of fleeces for manufacturers in the various divisions of the textile industry. For the East Midlands region, the worsted sector of the woollen industry was significant. The worsted industry developed an early centre in East Anglia and the town ofWorstead in Norfolk gave its name to the yarn. The arrival of Protestants in East Anglia from the Low Countries in the sixteenth century brought worsted production skills to England. This prompted expansion of worsted production and the introduction of new goods. Making of worsted yarn
The East Midlands region, like East Anglia, had traditionally reared sheep that produced fleeces with long fibres. Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire and Lincolnshire sheep were reputed to have some of the finest quality fleeces in the country. Fleeces with long fibres or 'staple' were preferred in worsted production. First, the fleeces were combed to place the fibres in line with each other and remove the shorter fibres and dirt. After combing, the fibres were SplU1 to create the worsted yarn. The yarn was finer and stronger than yarn processed by the wool spinning system. Woollen yarns were more bulky as the fibres were not combed and they kept more of their natural tangled characteristics.
II In the knitting industry, worsted yarn became one of the main fibres used, the others being linen, silk and cotton. Worsted provided a cheaper alternative to silk and cotton and produced garments that were more affordable for the wider population. The Leicester knitting industry developed to specialise in the production of worsted products while Nottingham was best known for cotton hosiery and Derby for silk.
Foundation of the knitting industry Investing in frames
During the early seventeenth century, knitting frames remained an expensive investment and few were built. Even in the 1660s, frames could cost as much as £20 to £30 each, more than a worker's yearly wage. The hand knitters did not have to pay such high costs and could knit as long as they had a pair of knitting needles. Demand for the output of hand knitters and framework knitters allowed both branches to expand during the two centuries after Lee's invention. To make the knitting frame profitable, framework knitters generally only produced high value, fme-gauge garments using silk and fme worsted yarns. The frame could also be used for long runs of standardised products. In comparison with framework knitting, hand knitting had low set up costs, new knitters could be taken on without the need to buy or rent expensive frames. Hand knitting was also cost effective in that it used women, old people and children during the winter months when agricultural work was at its lowest. It often provided a second income for the knitter and lower rates of pay were acceptable. The work was also undertaken during the evenings by artificial light, unlike framework knitting which needed daylight to operate the fine mechanisms of the frame. With framework knitters focusing on high value products, the lower value market was left open for hand knitters to supply.
\\ Knitting and its Origin
13\\
Hand knitting was also able to compete with the frame by being more versatile in the creation of bespoke tailored garments. The early framework knitting industry still maintained its centre in London with four or tlve hundred frames employed there in 1664. Outside London, the East Midlands had built on the work of William and James Lee. Around one hundred frames were in use in Nottingham and fifty in Leicester. A further fifty frames were located in Hertfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Surrey and Hampshire. Industry moves to the East Midlands
Involvement in the knitting industry from this early period started to generate considerable profits for its workers. A petition by London framework knitters in 1655 noted that raw materials cost only about 15 percent of the retail price of silk stockings. The balance of between eight shillings and sixteen shillings a pair was retained by the framework knitters, hosiers and retailers. The worsted stockings, more commonly knitted in the East Midlands at that time, were less favourably priced at between one shilling and six pence and two shillings and six pence. East Midlands framework knitters benefited from lower house rents and food prices than framework knitters in London. These factors together with the lower wages and freedom from guild regulation were important in moving the industry away from London to the East Midlands. Fancy stockings in Leicester
A historian recorded that around the middle of the eighteenth century 'The manufacture in Leicester chiefly consisted in making pink stockings for the lower orders, and, for the higher, pearl-coloured with scarlet clocks. In the dress of men, the waistcoat flaps came down nearly as low as the knee and the stockings made long enough to reach the top of the thigh
II were gartered on the outside and the top rolled down as far as the leg. The chief (export) article was white and brown thread hose for Spain, Portugal and the West Indies.'
Origin of the Derby silk industry Silk from Europe
Silk stockings that copied the Italian fashion leaders were highly prized from their introduction in England in Tudor times. Worsted knitting had located itself in the East Midlands by the start of the eighteenth cenrury, but the silk industry remained in London a little longer. Imported silk from the Continent came iJ.?to London where it was processed for use in we~ving and knitting. Waste from the weaving process was often recycled and turned into silk yarn for knitting. This link between the two industries allowed London to compete with the East Midlands on price. The London industry-also benefited from being located close to the main market for tailor-made garments. The first mill
Early attempts to relocate the silk industry to the East Midlands were made by Thomas Cotchett in 1704 when he tried to establish a silk mill in the region. Described as a 'citizen and merchant tailor of London', Cotchett leased Little Island in the River Derwent from the Derby Corporation. Mter spending £2,000 building the mill, a particularly high price for a mill at that time, he went bankrupt in 1713. In 1715 John Lombe, a friend of Cotchett and silk merchant from London, visited the mill and saw its decayed state. Lombe - promptly bought the mill for £200 and began to rebuild on the site based upon designs he saw on a visit he made in 1716 to Leghorn, Italy. John Lombe died soon after he had returned from Italy and left his brother Thomas to carry on the work.
II Knitmvl llntl iu Origin
15 11
The mill on Little Island was well positioned to supply silk yarn to the knitting industry centred near Nottingham. Ideally, such a mill would have been located in Nottingham to avoid the problem of transporting yarn to hosiers' warehouses, but the Trent was considered too slow moving a river to power a mill. The Derwent was seen as a fast moving river with enough force to drive the mill's waterwheels. This early choice of , Jocation by Cotchett and Lombe led to the development of a focus for silk knitting around Derby, while Nottingham mainly used cotton after Arkwright and Hargreaves set up their factories and Leicester used worsted. The remains of the silk mill now form part of Derby Industrial Museum. The development of the cotton industry in Nottingham Yarn problems
The use of cotton for weaving had been established in seventeenth century Lancashire. At this time, cotton yarn was irregular in thickness and tended to break at thin, weak points. The yarn was unsuitable for knitting on frames and produced poor quality stockings that laddered easily. Henson reported that the first pair of cotton stockings was knitted in Nottingham in 1730. To overcome problems with cotton, framework knitters needed a suitable yarn with uniform thickness and strength. Yarn from India had the required qualities but London framework knitters found it difficult to work and rejected it. After this, a sample of the cotton was sent to Draper, a stockinger from Bellar Gate in Nottingham. Draper successfully knitted stockings on a twenty-gauge silk frame. The pure white cotton stockings soon became popular with customers and were sometimes preferred to silk stockings.
IP6
11
The spread of cotton
The rising popularity of cotton encouraged workers across England to experiment with cotton and cotton yarns. Spinners experienced in working with short-staple wool in the west of England were able to twist two threads of cotton together to produce a cotton yarn suitable for knitting, although this was not as fme as Indian yarn. A knitting industry developed around Tewkesbury using this local yarn, which W~~ alleged by the competing Nottingham hosiers to be inferior, the yarn used by the Nottingham trade having 4-5 finer threads. The inferiority of the Tewkesbury product was, however, difficult to detect from appearance. To deal with this threat the Nottingham hosiers petitioned Parliament for protection. The result of the action was an act passed in 1766, commonly referred to as the Tewkesbury Act. The Act required that eyelet holes should be knitted into the stocking equivalent to the number of threads used in the yarn. However, the effectiveness of the Act is thought to have been limited. It was not until the 1780s that the Notta.ngham industry transferred its focus from the production of silk stockings to cotton as the Arkwright mills brought down the price ofyarns. Dyeing As hosiery was a fashion industry, colours and patterning were of vital importance from its earliest years. The largest fortune in the eighteenth century industry was made by William Elliot (1707-1792) of Brewhouse Yard, Nottingham, who developed a technique to produce a superior black for men's stockings. Black hosiery was high fashion for the sober middle class for many years. Elliot served most the merchant hosiers of both Nottingham and Leicester. He later invested part of his large capital in new methods of bleaching linen and cotton (i.e., producing a superior white) that were brought from Holland via Scotland. Elliot moved on to invest in three silk
II Knitting and its Origin
1711
mills in Nottingham and cotton mills on the Arkwright model in the Leen Valley (Bulwell to Papplewick). His enterprise is commemorated in the Brewhouse Yard Museum, Nottingham.
Company of framework knitters Establishing control
James Lee returned to London in 1612. He brought seven framework knitters and eight frames with him and set up a small industry. Workers and their apprentices gradually created rules by which the industry and the prices charged could be controlled. The quality of knitted goods produced by framework knitters was widely recognised and by 1655, more of their stockings were sold abroad than in London. A charter from Cromwell
Concerned at the threat of overseas competition, the group petitioned Oliver Cromwell for a chaner of incorporation to regulate and protect the trade. In 1657, the Company received its chaner. A Company seal indicated the quality of goods produced by members and prevented members from taking foreign apprentices. To avoid conflict with the East Midlands industry, the chaner applied specifically to the silk knitting industry within London and the four miles around the City. Membership of the Company was, however, open to framework knitters beyond the four-mile zone. A new charter and powers
A new charter was obtained from Charles II in 1663. Framework knitters from all branches, not just silk, were now required to register with the Company within three months of entering the trade, if they lived within 20 miles of London or within six months if they lived beyond 20 miles. Failure to
register incurred a fme of £5 for every week beyond the limit. Individuals could not enter the trade unless they had served a seven-year apprenticeship with an authorised master. Masters were only allowed to take on a maximum of two apprentices atone time. Export of knitting machines was a particular concern of the Company because it provided overseas competition with access to English technology and potentially jeopardised the future of the English knitting industry. To deal with the matter, the Company secured the power to seize machines they thought were being prepared for export. Deputies were appointed by the Company in knitting districts such as Nottingham, Hinckley and Leicester to police the industry and ensure that its byelaws were enforced. Quarterly courts of representatives were held in districts to admit apprentices and to prosecute those breaking the Company's laws. Rejecting the company
The Company's powers were met with a mixed response. Whilst it protected those already in the trade from further people entering the industry, it did not help hosiers looking to expand and find more workers. Gradually complaints built up from members who resented expenditure on ceremonial items and the Company's hall whilst some members struggled to make a living. The payment of fees to register apprentices became another issue of conflict. Provincial hosiers began to boycott the Company and ignore the apprenticeship control system. In 1730, two dozen Nottingham hosiers came together to challenge the authority of the Company. A case was eventually brought by the Company against John CartWright, aNottingham hosier, who refused to pay the eightshilling charge for each indenturing of an apprentice. The Company lost the case. Following this disastrous outcome for the Company, the deputies in Nottingham, Leicester and
" Knitting and its Origin
1911
Hinckley resigned from their posts realising that the Company had no power to enforce its rules. An attempt was made in 1745 to revive the Company, but without success and its role became purely social.
Enterprise and innovation (1750-1810) Early cotton spinners ~achWnesp~g
Securing a reliable supply of quality cotton yarn was crucial to the development and success of the cotton knitting industry in the East Midlands. Lewis Paul made early attempts to machine-spin cotton in order to increase the supply of yarn. In 1738 he patented a machine for spinning cotton by drawing threads with rollers, but this was not a commercial success as the quality of yarn produced was still inferior to hand spun yarn. Success with the spinning jenny Around 1764 a Blackburn weaver, James Hargreaves, produced his 'spinning jenny'. The jenny took the principle of the spinning wheel and enabled the operator to spin several yarns at the same time. At first, Hargreaves kept the invention secret and used the jenny_at home, but in 1767, he produced further machines and made them available for sale. Soon, individuals who felt their jobs threatened by the new technology broke into Hargreaves' home and smashed his machines. To escape machine breakers in Lancashire, Hargreaves moved to Nottingham. Supported by a partnership of Nottingham hosiers, he set up a mill in Hockley and began to provide local hosiers with a reliable cotton yarn for knitting. The jenny was patented in 1770 and produced for sale to other spinners and
II hosiers. Demand for the jenny increased and manufacturers produced copies of Hargreaves' design. Hargreaves took the manufacturers to court to protect his patent, but the judge ruled that because the jenny had been used by the industry before being patented, people could make copies of it.
Arrival of Arkwright At about the same time as Hargreaves, Richard Arkwright also left Lancashire for Nottingham. Arkwright had taken Lewis Paul's technology of spinning with rollers and tried to improve the quality of the yarn produced. Aware of the demand for quality yarn in Nottingham's knitting industry, Arkwright needed financial backing to establish himself there. Support initially was secured from a Nottingham hosier, Samuel Need. Arkwright's early attempts, like Paul's, produced poor quality, irregular yarn and eventually success was achieved by fluting the rollers. Power was required to operate the rollers on the new spinning machine. The Trent did not provide sufficient power to drive a mill and the solution was to install a horse driven system in the Nottinghan1 factory. Howevet; the cost of maintaining such a system and expanding it to power further machines was prohibitive and an alternative was sought. Following in the footsteps of Cotchett and Lombe,in 1771, Arkwright moved to Derbyshire and established a string of mills with the support of Jedediah Strutt, a hosier and inventor of the Derby Rib Machine. Together they oversaw the construction of two mills at Cromford and one at Masson. The partnership between Strutt and Arkwright lasted until 1781. The development of steam-powered cotton spinning N ewcomen's engine
In 1712, Thomas Newcomen invented a steam-powered
II Knitting and its Origin
21
II
engine. He realised that steam produced by heating water could be trapped in a cylinder and that sufficient pressure could be built up to raise a piston. When the steam cooled, pressure was reduced and this caused the piston to fall. The vertical motion of this engine meant that it had limited applications, but with a beam attached to the piston, it was successfully used to pump water out of mines. James Watt's improvements
James Watt realised the potential of Newcomen's invention and began experimenting to see how the vertical motion of the piston and beam could be harnessed to drive other machinery. In 1782, he built a rotary-motion steam engine which used a series of gears to convert vertical movements into rotary motion. Watt marketed his engine in partnership with Matthew Boulton, the Birmingham entrepreneur. To highlight the capacity of the engine, Watt compared its strength with the strength of horses: a twenty horsepower Watt engine provided the same power as a team of twenty horses. , From waterwheel to steam engine
Arkwright's water frame was originally designed as a handoperated machine, but to control its use, the 1769 patent restricted its use to large mills of at least one thousand spindles. The system of water-powered mills was soon copied and by 1788 there were over 200 of them, many in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire and a few in Leicestershire. Following the introduction of rotary motion, steam power was first used with Arkwright'S frames in 1785 at Papplewick Mill, Nottinghamshire. Steam power was only widely applied at the end of the eighteenth century and was responsible for a quarter of the cotton processed in 1800. Competition from Lancashire
The East Midlands knitting industry and the Manchester textile
11
industry bought most of the cotton yarn produced by the new mills. Due to technological improvements, mills in the East Midlands were overtaken by mills in Lancashire. Adoption of Cartwright's power loom after 1785 caused a rapid rise in demand for cotton yarn which prompted further growth of mills in the north-west of England. By 1836 competition from the large numbers of mills in the north-west had affected the numbers of mills elsewhere in Britain, though the knitting industry in the East Midlands continued to support eight mills in the Mansfield area and eight in Derbyshire. With cotton yarn widely available in the East Midlands, cotton was a popular choice for knitting. It rapidly became cheaper than silk and finer than wool. Cotton, with the new technologies to process it, was used for a wide range of cotton hosiery and by 1815 production of cotton hose occupied the largest numbers of frames in the knitting industry.
Worsted innovations Spinning worsted
While Arkwright had successfully experimented with the spinning of cotton yarn, the worsted-spinning sector had watched developments with interest. Traditionally woollen fibres taken from fleeces were combed and left in oil for a year to gain strength before they were spun on a spinning wheel. In 1788, a breakthrough was made in the spinning of worsted when Brookhouse from Melton Mowbray transferred the process of spinning yarn with rollers from cotton to worsted. This avoided the yearlong resting period of the woollen fibres. Once combed, the wool could be spun immediately. Anger and destruction
The potential of this new technology was soon recognised by Leicester's industrialists and led to a partnership between
II KnittinlJ and its Origin
23 11
worsted spinners, Coltman, Whetstone and Brookhouse. As awareness of the new machine spread, workers in the worsted spinning industry reacted in the same manner as workers in Lancashire had to the spinning jenny. The workers felt their livelihoods threatened by the advance of technology and protested against the machine. For safety, the machine was moved from Leicester to Market Harborough in the hope that this would save it from the growing unrest. The determined spinners tracked down the machine and smashed it, parading the pieces back to Leicester. Anger boiled over to the extent that Coltman and Whetstone's houses were attacked. New worsted centres To avoid further unrest, Leicester Corporation banned Brookhouse's technology from the town. New centres of worsted spinning developed in areas such as Worcestershire and Yorkshire using Brookhouse's machine and gained from the lack of competition in Leicester. Improvements in the quality of yarn produced by the new worsted spinning technologies led to a move away from the industry's focus on coarse fabrics to finer, better quality products. Despite the development of new locations for yarn spinning, Leicester remained the leading centre for knitted goods using worsted yarn. Worsted knitwear was not so fine as that in cotton and silk so Leicester and Hinckley were long regarded as the cheaper end of the industry.
Distribution and warehousing Travelling salesmen In the earliest days of the knitting industI)~ knitted clothes were
expensive and worn mainly by royalty and the aristocracy. Gradually this changed as worsted and cotton yarns brought
II
more affordable knitted clothirig to the wider population. In common with other expanding industries, manufacturers developed distribution networks to supply their wares to towns and cities across the country. Hosiers gathered flnished goods together and travelled the country to fmd buyers. With a train of packhorses, the journey would often continue until the goods were all sold. Hosiers also employed salesmen to market goods for them. Regional markets opened up during the eighteenth century, but London still operated as the country's main commercial centre. To ensure that East Midlands sales continued to grow, strong links were built up between East Midland hosiers and London merchants. Frequently sons of hosiers would be apprenticed to merchants to strengthen the links. Wood street textile market
Knitted products were bought and sold in an area of the City of London centred on Wood Street. Hosiers from the East Midlands brought stock to coaching inns located there and used them as a London base. William Iliffe II, an early eighteenth century hosier from Hinckley, kept his stock at the Cross Keys Inn on Wood Street. By the 1770s, the larger, more successful hosiers had developed new relationships with the inns and constructed their own storage facilities in the inn yards. Some partnerships eventually acquired their own warehouses. John Morley of! & R Morley, Nottingham, moved to London and built a warehouse to sell the firm's goods. The success of Morley'S warehouse enabled the company to become an important wholesaler in the nineteenth century. George Brettle & Co of Belper
George Brettle & Co became the biggest firm of London wholesalers by about 1830. It opened its warehouse in London
II Knitting and its Origin
25 11
on Cateaton Street around 1801. Previously, the company had sold its goods through other hosiers, but with its own warehouse was able to sell directly to retailers. The impact of the warehouse on the company was reflected in the company's yarn purchases. Between 1800 and 1802 its yarn supply from Strutts doubled. By 1802 the company had written to other local hosiers and offered to act as a middleman and sell their hose in London. Brettle's records provide little guidance on the firm's spectacular success, but it was probably to do with easy access to capital (Southwell Bank had a Brettle partner) and early connections with the fast-growing cut-price drapers of London. Corah
In contrast with Morleys and Brettles, Nathaniel Corah focused his wholesale activities on Birmingham rather than London. After the failure of an earlier knitting business venture in Leicestershire, Corah found a job in a Birmingham gun factory. There he noticed that Birmingham's economy was expanding and that opportunities existed to sell knitted goods to its people. In 1815 Corah remrned to Leicester and bought a house on St Nicholas Street. On a Saturday morning, Corah would go to the Globe Inn in Silver Street, Leicester where stockingers met to sell their goods. While he bought stock at the illl, his wife would also buy stock taken to their house. The goods were then taken by wagon to the Rose Inn, Edgbaston Street, Birmingham where Corah rented a stock room. Corah would then remain at the Rose Inn until the goods were sold.
Changing products New technology
In the second half of the eighteenth century there were a number of advances in the development and use of knitting-
II frame technology. These followed on from Jedediah Strutt's patent for his Derby Rib machine in 1758, which created a more elastic fabric. Hose made using this type of fabric soon became more popular than hand-knitted stockings. With money to be made from successful inventions r many individuals invested time and money in experimenting with new adaptations and patterns. Simulated lace
In 1763 John Morris, a hosier from Nottingham, patented a frame that produced an eyelet hole mesh. The fabric created simulated lace and was widely used for Spanish silk mitts, gloves, aprons, handkerchiefs, hoods and caps. The frame produced eyelet holes by placing a set of needles on the presser bar and using them to transfer loops sideways between the frame's main needles. Demand for Morris's products was such that his business operated forty-nine frames with this attachment. The sales achieved by Morris encouraged others to work specifically in the development of open lace-style fabrics. Their collective endeavours provided the starting point for the famous Nottingham lace indUstry. Point net machine
Morris was determined to stay in control of the knitted lace market and he bought the patent for the point net machine invented by Thomas Taylor, a Nottingham framesmith. Mter Morris's retirement, the business and the patents were sold to John, William and Richard Hayne, three brothers from Ashbourne, Derbyshire. The Haynes continued to improve the point net frame and by 1786, they had managed to overcome the tendency of the fabric to run if a thread broke. A hexagonal net fabric was used to produce sunshades, aprons, handkerchiefs, caps, mitts, gloves, purses, waistcoats, shawls, cauls and a range of other goods.
II Knitting and its Origin
2711
In 1786, there were only around twenty point net frames in existence. By 1810 there were over 1,500 frames providing employment for 10,000 to 15,000 lace workers in Nottingham. The Haynes family still dominated the sector and owned two thirds of the point net frames. Much of their output was exported to Paris, but the silk lace trade suffered heavily at the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 and lead to the decline of the Haynes family business and other early lace merchants. The industry was revived after the introduction of John Heathcoat's bobbin net Plachine. Heathcoat's invention was based on the operations of a cushion lace wo,:"ker rather than that of a stocking frame. Warp knitting Run-resistant fabrics were also created by the technique of warp knitting, developed in 1776 by a Leicester-born framesmith, William Honon. Warp frames differed from traditional frames by feeding a separate yarn to each needle. Individual threads were formed into loops and transferred between neighbouring needles in a zigzag pattern across alternate courses. Frames were capable of producing plaited, corded, open-work and fancy fabrics for a range of goods. 'Vandyke' stockings of silk or fine cotton with zigzag patterns were produced in large quantities in Nottingham. The cost of using a warp frame led to the technology being used mainly to create high value nets, laces, trims and ornamental products. William Dawson, a Leicester mechanic, improved Horton's frame and increased its speed, making it more cost-effective to operate. Despite the improvement the warp frame was not widely used. The fabric it produced was used for the cut-up work that workers disliked and considered a threat to their fully-fashioned work. However, warp knitting emerged in the twentieth century as a major part of the knitting industry.
28 11
II
In the doldrums (1810-1850) Luddite frame breaking Wage rates
Early framework knitters were a prosperous group. An average Nottingham framework knitter in 1714 earned ten shillings and six pence for a four day week, those that produced fine embroidered work could earn as much as 20 shillings a week. Others soon entered the industry hoping to enjoy the same standard of living, but rising numbers diluted standards and earnings in the less skilled branches. Like all fashion-based industries, knitting was vulnerable to sudden shifts in demand and earnings were affected. Protests begin
Unemployment in the industry sometimes resulted in framework knitters taking direct action to. In 1778, knitters petitioned Parliament for a Bill to regulate their wages and prevent hosiers or their agents underpaying them. Framework knitters also formed friendly societies to provide support in hard times. Workers paid subscriptions to societies on the understanding that they would receive money from the society if they were sick or laid off. Knitters reacted further at the introduction of wide frames in 1776. Wide frames used more needles in a row than earlier frames and produced a wider piece of fabric. The shape of the garment was cut out of the fabric and sewn together. This type of garment was commonly referred to as a 'cut-up'. The shorter production time and less skill required meant that 'cut-ups' were cheaper to produce. As a result, knitters were paid less to produce them. Workers riot and smash
The first two decades of the nineteenth century saw a downturn
II Knitting and its Origin
29 11
in the knitting industry as fashion changes reduced demand for hosiery. Workers felt their standard of living threatened. Wages were often less than they were a hundred years earlier. Work also became scarce as the demand for men's hosiery collapsed during the turbulent Napoleonic War period. The tensions fmally erupted with the outbreak of a series of Luddite riots. In March 1811, workers tried to negotiate higher wages and force hosiers to abandon the use of cut-ups. As talks failed, groups .from across N ottinghamshire gathered in Nottingham's marketplace. Troops were brought in to control the situation in the town, but they were unable to prevent widespread destruction across the county. Sixty-three frames were smashed at Arnold (north-east of Nottingham) and a further two hundred frames were destroyed across the county over the following three weeks. The riots continued into 1812, by which time the Luddites had broken up over eight hundred frames. Rebellion spreads
During 1812, the rebellion against new technology spread to Leicestershire and Derbyshire. The plight of the workers was made worse by a rapid rise in the price of wheat. In response to the extension of Luddite actions, attempts were made to deter further disruption, 12,000 troops were ordered to take control of Luddite areas and four Nottingham rioters were sentenced to transportation. An Act was also passed making the destruction of frames punishable by death. Controlling the Luddites
By the summer of 1812, Luddite frame breaking had ceased in Nottinghamshire. Elsewhere, occasional outbreaks of destruction continued until 1817. Heathcoat's lace factory in Loughborough was attacked on 28 June 1816 and £6,000
II worth of damage was done. Transportations to Australia and a series of hangings forced the workers behind the Luddite movement to reconsider their plans. The Luddites smashed an estimated thousand stocking frames between 1811 and 1817. The emergence of trade unions Early associations The Stocking Makers' Association for Mutual Protection, fonned in 1776, was the first association in the knitting industry to fonnally represent the workers. The Association campaigned for a Bill to regulate framework knitters' wages, but when the Bill failed in 1779, the association fell apart. Workers continued to campaign against low wages with the suppurt of their trade societies. If framework knitters went on strike against a hosier that had reduced pay rates, the society would use its subscription income to provide the strikers with money. Acting against the unions
The Union Society of Framework Knitters became one of the most succes"ful societies, with members across N ottinghamshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire, London, Godalming, Tewkesbury and Northamptonshire. From its foundation in 1812, the Union had established a set of minimum rates, which if not met, resulted in strike action being taken against the hosier. However, such groups were illegal. The Combination Acts of 1799 and 1800 banned societies formed with a political purpose or that interfered with trade. Despite its success, the Union collapsed after three of its committee members were prosecuted under the Acts and sentenced to a month's hard labour. The threat of prosecution delayed the formation of further organisations. Periodically, hosiers would meet with knitters
II Knitting and its Origin
31
I
and receive their complaints about wage levels. Where agreements were reached at these meetings a new list of rates was drawn up, but without a body to police them, the agreed rates were soon ignored as people agreed less pay in order to gain work.
Lobbying Parliament Informal groups of framework knitters campaigned for a new Bill in 1819. The Bill proposed to ban production of cut-ups and bring a stop to downward pressures on wages. Mter discussion in Parliament, the Bill was thrown out. Framework knitters reacted by agreeing to a widespread strike across Derbyshire, Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire with the aim of increasing wages. 14,000 workers joined the strike and there was wide support from the public, who contributed in the region of £800 to fmance the striking workers. The strike in Nottingham forced sixty-seven out of ninety hosiers to sign an agreement that raised stocking rates from eight to twelve shillings a dozen. The strikers, with their funds spent, were forced to return to work before all the hosiers had signed up to the new rates. Within a year, gains made by the strike were lost. Leicester knitters were the only exception to this, they were able to keep the rates for two years.
Striking again A further major strike was called in 1821. Knitters again campaigned for rates to be increased in the industry. For over eight weeks the strike was widely supported and virtually nothing was produced across the three counties. An upturn in demand for knitted goods encouraged the hosiers to raise their rates temporarily and end the strike. The achievements of the strike were soon lost as knitters undercut each other to gain work. This cycle was repeated again in 1824 when knitters were on strike for four months. The lack of money and food forced the strike to end with only a few small temporary gains.
II The ending of the 1824 strike fmally broke the will of knitters to continue the fight and union activity declined until the transition of the industry to a factory system in the 1850s and 1860s. The Combination Acts that prevented the formation of unions were repealed in 1824, but in the depressed first half of the nineteenth century unionism was slow to take hold.
The 1844 Royal Commission Poor framework knitters
After the strikes of framework knitters in the 1810s and 1820s, wages in common branches of the industry remained at a low level for a further twenty years. Repons highlighted the poor conditions faced by workers. A factory commissioner noted in 1833 that 'The men sat at their work back to back, there was just enough space for the necessary motion, but not without touching each other'. He also commented that the majority of men over twenty looked 'sickly and emaciated'. However, demand developed in new sectors for workers who were adaptable. Innovations in products included cut-ups, gloves, drawers, shirts, caps, fancy goods and socks. Wages of 11 shillings a week could be earned in these new lines, while basic stocking, knitters were paid around seven shillings a week. The industry continued to grow as population in Britain expanded and new markets were developed overseas. Between 1812 and 1844, the number of stocking frames in use increased from 29,595 to 48,482. Petitions to Parliament
In 1843, framework knitters took action to campaign for improved conditions. Over 25,000 framework knitters signed a petition and submitted it to Parliament. The petition complClined about wages, unemployment, new machinery, frame rents and imports of knitted goods. The Government
II Knittino and its Origin
3311
responded by appointing Richard Muggeridge as the commissioner responsible for compiling a report on the industry. .Commission officials spent several months in the East Midlands taking evidence from a range of people connected with the knitting industry. Framework knitters, hosiers, masters, local officials, professionals (doctors, clergymen) and the mayor of Leicester were all received and presented their accounts of the industry. Frame rents The payment of frame rents was one area that particularly concerned workers. Most knitters were unable to afford to buy a knitting frame and were forced to rent their frame from the hosier. The report recorded that frame rent and other expenses (candles, oil, etc. ) could amount to a third of the knitter's wage. The impact offrame rents was made worse where hosiers rented out more frames than they needed to complete the work available. The practice became known as 'stinting'. Knitters had to pay a full week's rent even when the work supplied by the hosier only took a few days. The report recorded that between 1814 and 1844 wages fell by up to 40 percent, while frame rents continued to rise. A John Woodward complained to the Commission that he had paid £180 in rent over twentytwo years on a frame worth £9. Bagmen Middlemen or bag men collected work from the knitters' houses and took it to the hosier's warehouse. A taking in fee was charged for the service by the middleman and deducted from the knitter's wages. Framework knitters complained to the Commission that middlemen or bag men commonly underpaid them for their work, not passing on the full rate paid by the hosier. Knitters frequently demanded that lists of
II 'prices should be printed and distributed so that they knew how much they should be paid. Knitters also complained that they were forced to buy goods from specified shops or risk not being given any further work by the employer. The employer or members of his family often owned the shops and used their position to charge higher prices or just gain an unfair advantage over other local shops. The outcome of the commissions report
The commissioner's repon concluded that low wages were associated with the high number of people wanting to work in the industry. Oversupply of labour had forced wage rates down. Employers who rented out more frames than required allowed people to enter the industry easily and this did not help the situation. Some witnesses acknowledged that the merchant hosiers had been sluggish in responding to the new technical and market opponunities while others complained of competition from cheap labour in Saxony. The repon also recognised that higher wages could be gained by turning to new designs in better quality lines. The impact of the Commission was limited. The output of the domestic industry at the centre of the report was gradually transferred to factory production in the years following 1845.
The advent of factories (1820-1900) Thansition to factory production Working at home
Framework knitting was traditionally carried out in workers' homes. Hosiers supplied yarn to the workers, children commonly wound the yarn onto bobbins, men knitted it into stockings and women seamed and embroidered the stockings. The industry could keep the whole family occupied.
II Knitting lind its Origin Resisting the factory
During the eighteenth century; many industries, including other branches of the textile industry; transferred from domestic to factory production. By the middle of the nineteenth century; the knitting industry had still not made the transition to factories. A number of reasons were suggested for this. Framework knitters were resistant to any move that brought greater control over their work. Working at home, the knitter could determine his hours of work and share his workload with other members of the family. In contrast, the factory environment was associated with regulated hours and being watched over by supervisors. The system of renting frames provided employers with a reason to continue domestic production. Individuals had invested heavily in frames and benefited from the good rate of return from frame rents. The cost of frame and workplace maintenance (machine oil, candles, heating, etc.) was also the responsibility of the knitter at home under the domestic system. Transition to a factory system would require the employer to cover these costs. In addition, if the employer had insufficient work for his frames, the frames had to be shut down and earned no money. While these reasons were widely suggested at the time and have some substance, they miss the crux of the problem. Hosiers and knitters alike were hostile to the new technologies of warp knitting and circular knitting, which they regarded as inferior to the traditional fully-fashioned knitting on Lee's principles. The initiative was left to the French and Americans (circular knitting) and the Germans (warp knitting) so the British industry gradually lost the competitive edge. Redesigning the workplace
Despite these resistance factors, some factory-style developments started in the eighteenth century. Property
developers and hosiers realised tHat money could be made by 'building houses with rooms designed to accommodate knitting frames. The houses were often built in rows and focused knitting activities in one location. Houses in Bramcote, Nottipgham was built with a communal workshop on the third floor that ran through all the properties in the row. Separate workshops were built to accommodate a dozen or more frames, particularly the new wide frames. Too large for domestic living accommodation, these frames were often located in 'frameshops' at the rear of properties. A Wigston hosier built a two-storey workshop to the rear of his house to accommodate around twenty frames. The building survives today as the Wigston Framework Knitters Museum. Similarly, a Ruddington bag hosier called Parker built large workshops behind his cottage, which survive as Ruddington Framework Knitters Museum. Frameshops were common throughout the regIOn. The larger frameshops can be seen as the early factories of the knitting industry. They brought the framework knitters to a single location and enabled the hosier to control his workers. Elements of the domestic industry continued to exist with the frameshops. Hand frames were still used and they continued to be rented to the workers operating them. Employers also introduced a new charge, 'standing rent', to cover the cost of the knitter using the workshop instead of his house. Steam powered technology BruneI's breakthrough
During the early nineteenth century, framesmiths began to make discoveries that paved the way for steam power to be applied to knitting technology. William Lee's frame required a sequence of horizontal and vertical moves to be made by the framework knitter in order to produce knitted goods. The
1/ Knitting and its Origin
37 11
automation of these movements was difficult, panicu1arlywhen steam engines provided only rotary motion. However, BruneI, a French engineer and father of Isambard Kingdom BruneI, built a machine in 1816 that arranged the needles in a circular form rather than a flat bed. The machine produced a tube of fabric suitable for cut-ups, but it could not create fullyfashioned work. Against the background of resistance to cutups, the technology was slow to be introduced in Britain.
Applying power Warners of Loughborough made the first attempt to apply steam power to a frame in 1829. Success was limited and problems continued to be experienced in controlling the shape of garments. Luke Barton, a hosier from Arnold, patented a device to overcome this problem in 1838. Barton continued to work on his design as an employee ofHine & Mundella in Nottingham. In 1854, this resulted in a machine capable of producing several fashioned stockings at once. William Cotton of Loughborough secured a patent in 1864 for his rotary-driven machine. This steam-powered machine used a flat bed to produce fully-fashioned garments. The capacity of the machine continued to grow and models were built with sufficient beds to produce in excess of twelve garments·at once. Initially Cotton's machines were supplied exclusively to Hine & Mundella. After 1878, Cotton supplied his machinery to the open market and it remained a key machine in the industry for the next hundred years. Circular machines
On the continent, away from resistance to the cut-up, circular knitting technology continued to be investigated. Peter Claussen from Belgium developed Brunel's idea and patented an improved circular machine in 1845. It could produce a substantial tube of knitted fabric for cutting and be powered
by hand or steam. A Claussen machine was brought to Nottingham the same year and was not well received by hosiers wary of the potential reaction from workers. Shortly after 1845, an upturn in the economy created an increased demand for knitted goods and a shortage of knitters. This provided hosiers with an opportunity to introduce the circular machine, although a newspaper from the Great Exhibition noted that 'In addition to this large number known to be employed, many others ... are worked secretly in various parts of the town and neighbourhood of Nottingham'. Felkin estimated that 1,200 circular machines were in use by 1864. Old-established firms of merchant houses such as I. & R. Morley, however, continued to resist circulars and remained loyal to its fully-fashioned knitters.
"
Invention of the latch needle
A huge leap forward for the knitting industry was the invention of the latch needle by Matthew Townsend of Leicester, patented in 1849. Since William Lee's invention of the bearded needle in 1589 all machines had used this needle to operate. The bearded needle required a presser bar and a staged process to pass courses of loops over the beard. Townsend, from Leicester, realised that with a shorter hook on the needle and a hinged latch the process could operate without the need for a presser bar. The latch needle was particularly valuable for circular machines, so it was taken up with more enthusiasm in the USA than in Britain, particularly after Townsend migrated to New England. Workshop to factory Investing for the future
The development of steam-powered knitting machines encouraged firms to invest in new machinery and buildings to
II Knitting aM its Origin
39 11
house these large machines. Companies that had previously only operated warehouses to collect goods brought in by knitters now had large premises from which workers manufactured their goods. Pagets of Loughborough established their first steam-powered factory in 1839 followed by Hine & Mundella in Nottingham in 1851. Corah established its St Margaret works, Leicester in 1865 and L & R. Morley opened its first factory in Nottingham in 1866. Hine & Mundella
Hine & Mundella (known as the Nottingham Manufacturing Company (NMC) from 1864) benefited from its exclusive access to the Cotton machine. The company had expanded its workforce from 52 framework knitters in 1844 to 2,000 employees by 1887. The new factory, built in 1851, was extensive in scale and had long high galleries that were compared with the interior of Crystal Palace. The company built a further factory in Loughborough in 1852 __and established a European factory in Chemnitz, the centre of the German knitting industry, in 1866. Expansion was also achieved through takeovers, LL & I. Wilson were bought out in 1866 and their warehouse in Wood Street, London became a valuable resource for NMC. Richard Mitchell
Richard Mitchell, a successful merchant hosier, pioneered the factory system in Leicester. In 1851, he opened a steampowered factory with around 60 powered wide frames. He also continued to use 700-800 old-style frames for high quality work. However, his reliance on older technology led to rivals overtaking his leadership in Leicester. Corah
In 1865, Edwin Corah laid the foundation stone ofCorah's St
Margaret's works. The factory was the largest in Leicester at the time, with around a thousand people employed at the site. The site's 50 horsepower steam engine powered 50 rotary machines, 47 circulars and 77 sewing machines. The factory also used 28 hand frames for high quality products. St Margaret's works allowed the company to move from domestic to factory-based production. In 1855, the company had over 2,000 domestic workers and around 20 factory employ~es. By 1886, all of the company's employees were factory based. Improvements in technology allowed the company to maintain its output levels and cut its workforce. Morley's makes its move
By the late 1860s, Hine & Mundella were starting to lose ground to other competitors, particularly I. & R. Morley. Samuel Morley had taken control of Morleys in 1860 and started to make changes. A new warehouse was built on Wood Street with a design to impress visitors and look grander than other warehouses on the street. The company also constructed a series of factories across the East Midlands region including Nottingham, Leicester, Sutton-in-Ashfield and Loughborough. By the time of Samuel Morley's death in 1886 the company's payroll had peaked at 10,000 employees. The company's reputation for quality won many customers and enabled it to become suppliers to the royal fanlily. The product range was also extensive with around 5,000 lines by 1860. Later catalogues sent to potential customers were up to 500 pages long and contained between 40,000 and 50,000 items. Circulars in Hinckley
Hinckley's early factories were founded in the 1850s for circular-machine production. Thomas Payne opened the town's first factory in 1855 with 40 circular machines. An 1863 report recorded that five steam-powered factories had been
II Knitting and its Origin
4111
constructed in the town during the previous decade to replace hand frame production. Homework continues In many cases, the opening of a factory did not end a company's relationship with framework knitters working from home. Companies had significant capital invested in frames and continued to pass work out to them and receive frame rents back. Hine & Mundella employed 300 workers in its factory in 1857 and around 3,000 domestically based framework knitters and workers. Even at the turn of the century (1900), I. & R. Morley employed more domestic workers (3,950) than factory workers (3,173) or warehousemen (1,241). Brettles employed a number of women outworkers known as 'cheveners'. The cheveners embroidered decorative designs on stockings and socks.
Regulation of the workplace Protecting the workforce
Growth in the number offactory workers across Britain during the nineteenth century raised awareness of factory conditions. From 1833 a series of Factory Acts were passed by Parliament to control working hours and who could work in factories. The knitting industry remained largely unaffected by the early acts as before the 1850s it was still a domestically based industry. Children in the industry
The Children's Employment Commission in 1862 investigated the use of children in industry and introduced a section on the knitting industry. The Commission report noted that despite the move towards steam-powered factory production, domestic production of high quality work was likely to continue for a
nwnber of years. With many yOWlg people working at home in the industry, the Commission considered that legislation should protect these workers. Common jobs for children were winding and seaming, with reported cases of children as yOWlg as three and a half being given tasks to do. The report noted evidence from child workers that they worked long hours in factories, often outside the hours set out in the 1850 Act.
"
Workshop watch
The 1867 Workshops Act extended the protection of the Factory Acts to workers in small workshops employing less than 50 people. The Act was difficult to enforce due to the nwnber of workshops in existence. Villages associated with the knitting industry often had a workshop in almost every house and the task of checking them all was almost impossible. This was part:jcularly a problem at night when inspectors had to fmd workers who did not follow the correct working hours. The 1876 Factory Acts Commission recorded that people continued to work over the ten and a half hour working day and beyond the times set out for the working day. Education for children
The growth of factory employment enabled inspectors to more closely monitor working conditions in the knitting industry.
The transition to factories was delayed by the continued availability of cheap labour in the domestic industry, particularly that provided by children. A requirement for those fewer than thirteen to receive part time education was included in the Factory and Workshop Acts. The lack of school places prevented the clause being effective. The 1870 Education Act provided elementary education to tackle this problem. In 1876, a further act introduced compulsory education for children. With the supply of cheap child labour gone, the transition to factory production rapidly increased.
II Knitting and its Orioin Frame rents abolished
The abolition of frame rents by the Hosiery Manufacture (Wages) Act in 1874 also reduced the incentive of employers to continue to use domestic workers. Employers were no longer able to charge workers for the use of their frames. This ended a contentious but profitable source of income for the frame owners.
Women at work The role of women
Women played an important role from the earliest days of the knitting industry. While men operated the frames, women performed other tasks related to the knitting process. Generally, they wound yarn onto bobbins or seamed and finished the stockings. This division of work continued and evolved in the factories. High quality fully-fashioned work continued to be produced by men operating William Cotton machines. Women seamed, sewed and mended as before and took on new tasks. Many framework knitters considered the new circular machines and cut-up work an inferior part of the industry and this work were often undertaken by women. Growth of female employment
Demand for cut-up goods continued to rise during the nineteenth century creating more knitting and sewing jobs for women. The Rogers & Black cut-and-sew factory in Nottingham employed hardly any men in the 1880s. Statistics show the growth of female employment throughout the nineteenth century. In 1851, 30,076 of the 65,499 workers in the industry (45.9 percent) were women. By 1911, this figure had increased to 73.5 percent of the workforce, with 41,431 women employed out of the industry's 56,360 workers.
1/44
1/
Quality work
Work undertaken by women was not always linked to the production of cheaper goods. The value added to goods by women workers in some sectors of the industry, was greater than that made by the men knitting them. High quality stitching and embroidery was a skilled task and added significantly to the costs of manufacturers. The accounts of William Ball & Son from the 1850s show that to manufacture a pair of fme silk gloves 8.6 percent of the costs were related to the knitter of the fabric, whilst 19 percent of the costs were paid for stitching and embroidery. In the 1830s, an estimated 150,000 women worked in hand embroidery in the knitting industry and wider textile industry. Women in demand
New technology in the knitting industry further moved the balance of employment in the favour of women. Machines produced goods quicker and less manpower was required to operate them. The large number of goods produced still required several predominantly women-operated tasks to be undertaken. For every male employed in hand frame knitting, an average 1.77 women were employed. Where rotary machines were used the ratio was 2.3 females for every male. The ratio peaked in the favour of women for powered circular machines, where 11 women were employed for every man. The demand for women soon started to create shortages and technology was used to make the most of the women available. Rows of sewing machines were connected to belt-powered systems within factories and were use by women to assemble cut-up garments. The Singer factory in Glasgow had, by the start of the twentieth century, developed a range of eighteen different models, designed to undertake specific tasks in the knitting industry. The Singer Handbook for the Hosiery Trade
II Knitting and its Origin
II was regularly updated to provide manufacturers with guidance on how long tasks should take operators.
Raising standards Early patents
Since the fifteenth century, patents have been granted to encourage inventors to make new discoveries. The award of a patent provides the inventor with legal protection against others copying the idea within the kingdom. The Crown controlled early patents and applications were often refused ifthe monarch did not like the idea. William Lee had his application turned down by Elizabeth I because she thought Lee's frame produced an inferior product and could threaten jobs in the hand knitting industry. Patent legislation
Up to the eighteenth century, patents were generally applied to mechanical inventions or processes and not to artistic designs. The situation allowed knitters to freely copy the designs of other firms. The 1787 Design and Printing of Linen Act was the first attempt to apply legal protection to designs. The Act provided copyrights to people involved in the 'arts of designing and printing linens, cottons, calicos and muslin'. The copyright holder, under the terms of the Act, had the sole right to print the design for a period of two months. The twomonth period was extended to three months in 1794. The Copyright of Design Act, passed in 1839, updated legislation and extended the protection provided to designers. The Act covered designs in wool, silk, hair and mixes of fibres containing two materials from linen, cotton, wool, silk or hair. Legal protection provided by the Act included the shape, decoration and construction of the garment. A Registrar was appointed by the Board of Trade to manage the registration
II system. To receive protection under the Act, the design of a garment had to be registered with the Registrar before it was made publicly available. A further act in 1843 offered extended protection for designs and revised the application procedure. The new Act made provision for applicants to provide a description of the design and note which parts were not new. Registering designs East Midlands companies sent representatives to the Board of Trade office in London to register their new designs. A charge was made for the registration, which ranged from a few shillings to several pounds. An example of the garment was then glued into a register for official records and a second example attached to a certificate for the company to keep. The certificate recorded the registration number, the name of the copyright holder, the date of registration, the length of the copyright period and the copyright mark to be shown on registered designs when they were sold. Details were also entered into a logbook. Usually the copyright period was for one or two years. Between 1843 and 1883 all registered designs were marked with a diamond motif that could be used to identify registration details. The marks were either stamped onto the fabric or a paper label. The introduction of legal protection for designs led to the production of a range of unique designs by manufacturers. The registered design books held today by the Public Record Office contain many examples of knitted garments from the Victorian period.
The Trade Unions Associations and unions
Trade unions made an eady appearance in the hosiery industry. An association of framework knitters in the midland counties
II KnittingandiaOrigin
47"
existed as early as the 1770s. At this period they were closely connected with the friendly societies that developed in the towns and villages throughout the region. In those early years, the unions were a spontaneous response to threats of cuts in traditional wage rates. Fluctuations in the economy in the 1840s and 1850s led to demands from workers for increased wages in the good times and resistance against reductions during recessions. To aid them in their battle against the employers a number of new unions were formed. In 1857, the Nottingham Circular Framework Knitters' Society was formed after circular machine knitters had been out on strike for a numbers of weeks as a protest against falling rates of pay. This was followed in 1865 by the United Rotary Power Framework Knitters' Society, representing workers on the newly mechanised fully-fashioned machines.
Union membership Mid-nineteenth century union membership was often restricted to men and union activities sometimes sought to limit opportunities for women. The Circular Framework Knitters' Society campaigned against the employment of women on circular machines, with little success. The Rotary Power Society men felt less threatened by female employment and recruited female members in the 1870s including winders, seamers and linkers. The introduction of powered sewing machines led to a rapid increase in the number of women w~,rking on cutand-sew knitwear and provided an opportunity for the Society to expand its membership. However, most women were not interested in union membership and within the Rotary Power Society the women's department was abandoned as uneconomIc. The growth of union activity in factories encouraged homebased framework knitters to form unions to fight for their
II interests. In Leicester in 1858, two new unions were fOWlded, the Hose Shirt and Drawers Union and the Sock and Top Union. By 1870 the Hose Shirt and Drawers Union had aroWld 2000 members and the Sock and Top had 800. With the domestic industry in decline, framework knitters' Wlions lost members and they were closed in the 1880s. Piece rates
Victorian unions worked to raise the wages of their members. In the knitting industry they fought for printed lists of employers' rates, aiming to bring low paying firms up to the level of the best. In the 1860s, '70s and '80s, when disputes occurred between the employers and workers or Wlions, the Board ofArbitration and Conciliation of the Hosiery and Glove Trades provided a mechanism to resolve disagreements. Many disputes concerned the setting of piece rates. The continuous introduction of new machinery and products required the calculation of further piece rates. To keep the workforce happy, the rates for both the old and the new machinery had to reflect the effort put into creating a given number of pieces. New machinery generally produced more garments in a day than older machines and often needed less skill to operate them. A lower piece rate would, therefore, be set for garments produced on the new machine. Similar issues occurred with new garments, where the rate had to reflect how difficult the garment was to make and how long it took. The division of unions into separate groups, representing different sectors of the industry in different areas, diluted their power in negotiations. In 1888 the Leicester Union, the Nottingham Rotary Union and the Ilkeston Union combined to form the Midlands COWlties Hosiery Federation. The federation worked to co-ordinate activities across the region and Hinckley was brought into its membership in 1891.
II Knitting and its Origin
49 11
Boom time and heyday (1860-1960) Workshop of the world A resourceful Britain
Between 1840 and 1860 Britain experienced a period of rapid growth that saw many changes in the workplace and in society. The rail network in Britain expanded to around 10,000 miles of track, cutting travel times between many cities and towns. For the first time in history, goods could be trans po ned across the country within a matter of hours. Opportunities for business opened up and the economy boomed. The construction of the railways alone employed 200,000 people and at its peak used 40% of the country's expanding output of lron. The new steamships and the railways enabled Britain to trade with the world and outperform other industrialising nations, such as France and Germany. Between 33% and 50% of the world's shipping tonnage was British. The empire and developing countries supplied raw materials and Britain used them to manufacture goods. In the knitting industry, wool canle from Australia and cotton from India. Countries that supplied raw materials could use their export income to buy the manufactured goods produced by Britain and they provided important markets for British companies. Other industrialising nations also bought large amounts of British goods. Clothing the world
Markets opened up and provided wider opponunities for sales, especially in the USA and the Empire. I & R Morley of Nottingham extended its sales force overseas to increase exports. Sales offices were opened in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Mrica, France, Germany, Belgium, Denmark
II
and Switzerland. Similarly, Wolsey of Leicester sold extensively overseas. In many companies, export sales kept the workforce busy at times of the year when demand was lower in the British market. Mter sufficient goods had been made between July and December ready for the British winter, Australian orders and Canadian orders followed on from January to June. Between 1861 and 1910 exports of hosiery increased from £791,000 to £1,908,000. Much of this expansion was due to increased sales of high quality woollen goods. Sales of lower quality and cheaper cotton goods were being lost (from the 1890s) to producers in Germany. This had an impact on the industries in Nottingham and Hinckley where cotton was an important part of the production. Export of machinery
Britain's position as the leading industrial nation enabled it to sell its technology to the other industrialising nations. Overseas industries followed closely behind the British expansion and often purchased British machinery when they did not have their own machinery manufacturers. Knitting machine manufacmrers such as A Paget & Co and William Cotton & Co. Ltd supplied machines to France, Germany and USA. Overseas companies were able to examine the machines they bought and develop their own technology. Towards the end of the nineteenth cenmry, the British machinery industry experienced problems as these markets were supplied by their own domestic industry. The competition catches up
The end of the American civil war in 1865 created demand in the USA for knitted goods and Britain, France and Germany cdmpeted for sales. France and Germany invested in powered machinery after realising how investments made by British companies in new technology had increased output. Mundella of Hine and Mundella, Nottingham commented to a
II Knitting and its Origin
51
I
parliamentary committee in 1868 that ' ... the French and Germans are catching up in the design and manufacture of knitting machines due to the excellence of their technical and scientific education. Some years ago, although the French invented the circular knitting machine such improvements were made by the English that the French re-imported them'. He also noted that ' ... they have succeeded by the aid of our machines and their greater intelligence in developing their manufacture more rapidly than we have'. Mundella recognised the strengths of the European industry and bought a factory in Chemnitz, Germany.
Growing business Leading the industry The end of the nineteenth century saw an upturn in the British and world economy. Growth in 1. & R. Morley's sales created a turnover of £3.06 million from a workforce of 8364 employees, a considerable proportion of whom (3,950) still worked from home. In Leicester, Corahs was a leading firm in the town. The company employed 2500 factory workers in 1891 and reached a turnover of £598,000. Production concentrated on the growing outerwear market for cardigans, jumpers and jackets. The domination of the industry by 1. & R. Morley ended in 1920 when Wolsey took the lead as the industry'S biggest firm. Two Leicester hosiery manufacturers, Robert Walker and Sons and W Tyler, Sons & Co. merged together with Boswell Brown, a London-based merchant house selling to retailers. With the purchase of spinning mills in the West Riding of Yorkshire, Wolsey became a vertically integrated company with the ability to receive materials into one division of the company and process goods through to the retailer. Mergers in the British industry had been rare and the industry remained mainly composed of small firms. In contrast, the merger of firms into
single companies had been common in Germany and the US since the nineteenth century. Size enabled companies to benefit from economies of scale, thereby allowing them to compete more effectively. Financing new enterprise
New firms continued to crowd into the industry in boom periods. Some employees, with their knowledge of the industry, set up independently. A good example is John Hall, a foreman in a Hinckley knitting factory, who saved up £500 out of his £2 a week wage and borrowed £500 from a local bank in order to set up a factory in Stoke Golding, near Hinckley in 1882. The company produced fme quality socks and continues today as H J Hall & Son. By 1930, the foundation of small companies had increased the number of factories operating in the industry to 1,392. Individuals with assets to act as a security found that banks were willing to lend money to them to start up a new business. Banks in Leicester were supportive of entrepreneurs than Nottingham banks and led to many new businesses being located in Leicester. The low credit rating and greater risk associated with new firms often led to higher interest rates being charged and restrictions placed on loan amounts. John Henry Bull of Nottingham founded his business in 1879 to produce a range of goods on circular machines. The business survived until 1892 when Bull went bankrupt, attributing the bankruptcy to a lack of capital and borrowing at high interest rates. Foreign entrepreneurs move in
In the 1920s and 1930, foreign enterprise came to Britain. Howard Ford, a menswear retailer, started to import fleshcoloured stockings from the US in 1920. These sold well and a factory was set up in Liverpool four years later. With the
II Knittinp and its Origin
53 11
brand name, 'British Bear Brand Luxury Stockings', the company soon became Britain's largest producer of stockings. Kayser Bondor is another example of a company that built its business by importing affordable US stockings for the mass market. A further wave of company arrivals occurred in the 1930s when Jewish families fled Nazi persecution in Germany. The Djanogly Brothers moved to Mansfield, Noskwith (Charnos) to Ilkeston, H.Dessau & Co. to Nottingham and Louis Goldsmith to Leicester. British companies increasingly cut trade links with Nazi Germany and this further prompted the move to Britain. The home of the knitting industry
A major change occurred in the knitting industry during the twentieth century when the East Midlands ceased to be the automatic choice for the location of a factory. The pull of the London fashion market reasserted itself, particularly in women's hosiery, between the wars. The availability of workers and cheap redundant cotton mills in Lancashire saw the knitting industry expand there to employ 9,500 by 1935. Companies arriving from Germany or principally involved with imports from overseas often did not have established links with the East Midlands and were able to set up where economic circumstances were favourable. The location of the London warehouses encouraged companies to locate in the southeast. Pasold Brothers set up their factory in Langley, Buckinghamshire, Klinger was founded in Edmonton and Ballito in St Albans.
Changing cities Urban living
By 1851, more people lived in towns than in the countryside in Britain. Leicester's population expanded by 40% during
1/
the 1860s from 68,000 to 95,000. To accommodate the population growth in towns, new houses were built. The middle classes moved to new suburbs, such as South Highfields in Leicester, while the working classes were crowded into houses that were tightly packed together, creating an unhealthy environment. Civic pride The growing economic power of Britain during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries created vast wealth. Expansion of the domestic economy, export growth and returns on worldwide investments generated surplus money for individuals and organisations. In many towns and cities across Britain, money was invested in large civic buildings and facilities intended to impress and display status. Town halls, towers and toilets
The wealth acquired by Leicester from the knitting industry was used to fund a new town hall. The area once occupied by the town's cattle market was cleared to make way in 1876 for a grand Queen Anne style redbrick and cream stone building. A new square was laid out in front of the hall, complete with a bronze fountain. The square became home to Leicester's memorial to the dead of the Boer War. A few hundred metres away at the junction of the High Street and Gallowtree Gate, a grand clock tower with pink granite and marble columns was built. The tower provides a focal point for the city and incorporates statues of famous Leicester residents, Simon de Montfon, William Wigs ton, Sir Thomas White and Alderman Gabriel Newton. Expenditure on grand buildings did not just include sites at the centre of a town or city, money was also spent on unseen functional buildings. Large quantities of waste created in the towns had to be taken away from urban areas via networks of
II Knitting and its Origin
5511
sewers. In 1891, Leicester built Abbey Pumping Station some two miles out of the centre, to pump sewage from the town to Beaumont Leys. The Pumping Station (now a museum) housed four huge or nately decorated, Gimson and Co. beam engines in a room with elaborate Corinthian columns. Such buildings were built in towns to overcome the health problems caused by population growth. Marketing the city
In Nottingham, a late example of civic pride is the Council House, completed in 1929. Built on the site of the former Exchange Building, the structure was designed to dominate the landscape and match the impact of the castle on the skyline. A grand columned facade and dome of Portland Stone could be viewed across the newly laid out Great Market Place with its broad pavements, lawns and fountains. Gifts to the town
Civic developments were not always funded by public money. The first public park in Britain (Derby Arboretum) was donated by the Strutt family to the town of Derby. The Strutts made their fortune in the hosiery industry following Jedediah Strutt's patent for Derby rib stockings (1758) and partnership at Belper with Sir Richard Arkwright.
Post war recovery Planning for the future
The rationing and controls imposed during the Second World War remained in place in the immediate post war period. The fragile econo(l1Y needed careful management to ensure that the country recovered from the effects of the war. Demand for goods and services was high, blitzed towns and cities had
II to be rebuilt, wardrobes replenished and nm-down factories refurbished with new, more efficient plant. Due to shortages, the building of new factories was subject to official approval. Priority areas for investment had been set up before the war in locations with high employment. The policy resulted in companies opening factories across Britain. Corah opened a site at Aberbargoed in Wales and Y\blsey developed factories at Welshpool in Wales and Dumfries in Scotland. The post war redistribution of factories continued to reduce the concentration of the knitting industry in the East Midlands. Within the region, small firms continued to be established by ex-employees of the larger firms. Using available factory accommodation, many of them achieved profitable turnovers in this period of growth. Investing in machines
Companies also had to source new machinery and raw materials. A 1946 Working Party estimated that the British industry required further 300 to 700 Cotton's patent machines in addition to the 1205 in use at the time. Many of the fullyfashioned machines in use had been imported from Germany, but the source of the machines was now in East Germany under the control of the Soviets. In Britain, William Cotton & Co. had produced an average of 32 machines a year over the previous three decades. The solution to the problem was to import over 2,000 machines from the Textile Machine Works in the USA. It was not an easy solution though, as the availability of dollars to pay for them was limited. The rage of nylons
Clothes rationing (and the utility mark) continued until 1949, controlling production levels of garment ranges within firms. Nylon had been brought into production by Du Pont in the USA in 1938 and was largely unexploited in Britain due to the
II Knitting and its Origin
5711
war. Nylon stockings or nylons'found their way over to Britain with American forces during the war. Nylon was superior to rayon and demand for nylons seemed insatiable. Only two small plants had the ability to produce nylon prior to the war and it wasn't until 1948 that Britain had a factory capable of large-scale nylon production in Pontypool. Twin sets and panties
Despite the problems that faced the manufacturers, the British knitting industry continued to grow in the 1940s and 1950s. The move away from Victorian and Edwardian formal wear continued and demand increased for knitted outerwear and underwear. Women commonly wore woollen jumpers and started to combine them with cardigans. The development of a matching jumper and cardigan became known as a twin set. Cami-knickers were replaced by closer fitting panties. Men's underwear also became lighter with the introduction of y:. fronts. The 'Teddy Boy' look brought in brightly coloured socks of fluorescent pink, green or yellow. Cardigans and sweaters also continued to be popular in men's' wear and the Italian style cardigan jacket was knitted with no collar, lapels or top pocket.
The knitting machine building industry Improving on Lee
Since the time of William Lee, the knitting industry has been supported by the knitting machine building industry. Before the nineteenth century, knitting frames closely followed the design of Lee's frame. The mid-nineteenth century saw the development of circular knitting machines and automatic fullyfashioned machinery. Leading companies of the industry for the next century were founded around this time. Moses Mellor and G. Blackburn & Co. (initially known as Attenborough &
Mellor & Co.) were founded in the 1840s and 1850s in Nottingham. The next wave of innovations occurred in Loughborough during the 1860s, where A. Paget & Co. Ltd and William Cotton & Co. Ltd. developed fully-fashioned machines.
"
The British knitting industry traditionally favoured fullyfashioned garments and saw circular knitting machines and wide flat frames as producing an inferior product. The Paget and Cotton machines quickly became popular in British factories and many were exported. They offered reliable service and with maintenance, some of the early Cotton machines were still in use a century later. When the Cotton patent ran out in 1879, other companies copied the design and produced their own version. The machines were commonly referred to as Cotton's Patents.
Knitting in circles Overseas competition and the demand for cheap goods in the British market forced firms to use circular knitting machines. To avoid wage cuts, companies had to use a technology that would increase output, cut costs and produce a saleable garment. The introduction of new automated processes to circular machines in the last quarter of the nineteenth century further encouraged manufacturers to invest in them. In the USA and Europe, technicians worked to develop machines capable of automatically producing heels and toes on stockings and socks. Large diameter circular frames continued to be used to produce fabric for cut-and-sew knitwear and underwear.
Selling for the competition During the early twentieth century, the British knitting machine industry was heavily influenced by developments in the USA. Blackburns became agents for the American company Scott & Williams in 1890. The company was subsequently appointed
II Knitting and its Origin
59 11
the sole licensee, outside of the USA, for the Scott & Williams Interlock machine. The fully-fashioned industry that the UK had pioneered and led became dominated by German designs. The German company, Schubert & Salzer, was the largest knitting machine manufacturer in the world by 1928. The Textile Machine Works of Reading in the US also developed their version of a fully-fashioned machine, popularly known as a 'Reading'. Between 1945 and 1949, over 2,000 Readings were imported into the UK. British innovation
The outlook was not entirely bleak for machine builders as companies were still able to introduce their own new machines and capture a sector of the market. Spiers and Grieves latmched their 'XE machine in 1902. The '~, through its various models, was the main double cylinder-knitting machine tmtil the 1970s. The success of the '~was closely followed by the Bentley 'Komet', a double cylinder circular machine. The British industry was given some help in 1932 when high tariffs were introduced on imported knitting machinery. However, companies such as G. Stibbe & Co. Ltd and Wildt & Co. Ltd, both of Leicester, who had imported and sold machinery, fotmd that it was no longer profitable to do so. Forttmate1y, these companies had gained an tmderstanding of the technology by making adaptations for clients to imported machines. Stibbe manufactured such machines as the Maxim, Challenger, Model T and the PBjDR 8 feed interlock machine. Wildt introduced its Model E and Auto-Express RJ. War timeout
At the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, the knitting machine building industry employed 2,766 workers. For the duration of the war, the production of knitting machinery stopped and factories were turned over to other uses. Industries
II vital to the war effort were moved from the areas lUlder threat of air raids, such as the West Midlands, to the East Midlands. When peace returned, demand increased for knitting machines to replace those worn out during the war and British companies enjoyed full order books.
Reaching the customer The beginning of brands During the Victorian era, railways made it easier for producers to sell goods across the whole cOlUltry. To ensure that the customer knew whose product they were buying, firms began to label their goods. Ifthe customer liked the producer's goods, they could then go and buy more of them, asking for them by name. Gradually brand names were promoted by using advertisements to increase awareness of the brand. The earliest in the hosiery industry was I. & R. Morley, who inserted an M in the selvedge of their stockings from the mid-nineteenth century. Robert Walker & Sons looked to the local area to fmd a name for their brand. Close to the company's factory was Leicester Abbey where Cardinal Wolsey had been buried, this inspired the company to choose Wolsey as the brand name. The merger with W Tyler, Sons & Co. saw the brand name emerge as the new name for the combined company, Wolsey Ltd. Press advertising highlighted the quality of the Wolsey product. 'Unshrinkable' combinations and socks were two of the promoted ranges. Meanwhile John Smedley & Co of Matlock developed a strong brand name (Smedleys Knitwear) based on quality Egyptian cottons knitted on fully-fashioned machines. U clocking sales
The development of brands based on new fabrics was also
I Knitting and its Origin
61
II
used as a way of selling goods. The 'interlock' fabric, produced on a machine developed by Scott & Williams of the USA, was carefully controlled in its use. Mter Scott & Williams had patented the interlock design in 1909, G Blackburns was awarded the only licence outside the USA to manufacture the interlock machine. Subsequently, agreements were made with George Spencer of George Spencer & Co. Ltd and P.J. and B. Lewis ofJ.B. Lewis & Sons to share the rights to produce and use the interlock fabric. Spencers used its 'Vedonis' brand to promote its interlock women's and children's wear and Lewis and Sons created 'Meridian' for its menswear. The agreement with Scott & Williams protected both the Meridian and Vedonis brands from competition until the interlock patent ran out in 1929. The interlock fabric used two threads knitted alternately on two sets of needles. The stability of the fabric made it popular for cut and sew work. Leaving out the middleman
In addition to firms advertising their products to the customer in journals and newspapers, they also had to arrange for goods to reach the shops. From the eighteenth century, firms had sent their goods to warehouses based around the Wood Street area of London. The warehouse acted as a middleman between the manufacturer and the retailer, taking on stock-holding and marketing risks in return for a margin of fifteen percent or so. Warehouses faced losing their business if the manufacturers and retailers cut them out of the supply chain and traded directly with each other. Growing connections between manufacturers and retailers, together with a range of other problems, encouraged warehouses to form the Wholesale Textile Association (WTA) in 1912. The membership of the Association increased over the next two decades from an initial figure of 80 to 500 by 1935. The WTA stated in 1913 that warehouses should give
preference to manufacturers that did not sell directly to retailers. The threat of being boycotted by the WfA faced those firms dealing directly. If they were blackballed, to survive they would have to rely on their own sales team to find buyers. Corahs was struck off in the 1930s after it had emerged that it had secretly been selling goods directly to Marks & Spencer. Manufacturers became increasingly angered by the WfA and its powers, forcing them to take action. In 1926, the Leicester manufacturers made a series of complaints to the WfA about their business practices. They maintained that buyers from warehouses would often not look at samples of new products or that they would only order smail, less cost effective quantities and, therefore, companies were forced to sell directly to retailers. Retailers also took action against the WfA. Self::"idges banned purchases from 176 WfA member warehouses in 1936. Despite the growth of the manufacturer-to-retailer trade, it was estimated that 60 to 70 percent of the trade was still going through warehouses in 1950. The rise of chain stores in the following decade had a dramatic impact on this figure and the power of the warehouses collapsed. What remained of them was bought up by Courtaulds during the period of takeovers in the late 1960s.
Mergers and takeovers (1960-Present) A new way of living Choice again
The 1960s saw the post war baby-boom generation come of age, complete with new expectations and aims for life. Previous decades had seen the controls and rationing of wartime Britain gradually removed. Prosperity increased and people were able to buy an expanding range of consumer goods. Televisions,
II Knitting and its Origin
63 11
washing machines, cars and many other goods, previously unavailable or unaffordable to a large pan of the population, were being bought to improve the lifestyle of families. People's houses were also being improved. Council houses and private houses were built to house the growing population and replace war damaged propenies or poor quality slum dwellings. Former luxuries such as telephones and central heating became common in the average house and changed the way people lived. For the knitting industry, warmer, centrally heated houses meant that people did not need to wear heavy clothes to keep warm at home. Jobs for the world
The influence of overseas cultures also began to have a major impact on lifestyles. Cheaper travel made it possible for people to holiday abroad and experience the way peoples from other cultures and civilisations lived, ate and dressed. Cultural influences also entered Britain with people from across the world and the commonwealth settling in the UK. The economic boom in the '50s and '60s created labour shonages. To overcome this, employers looked to commonwealth countries where unemployment was high and opponunities were limited. Because of the campaign to recruit people, residents arrived from India, Pakistan, East Mrica and the Caribbean. Leicester offered job oppornmities in the knitting, shoe and associated industries and became a popular centre for settlers in the East Midlands. Between 1951 and 1971, Leicester's population of residents from the Commonwealth increased from 1,500 to 26,419. Swinging minis
In addition to technological changes, moral and social codes continued to relax. The young adult population took advantage of the change in attitudes and enjoyed the 'swinging sixties'.
The availability of family plarming meant that people were older when they started families. This created a larger proportion of the British population without family commitments and a higher disposable income to spend on more extravagant items. The development of a pop culture saw a number of fashions come and go, from the Beatles to punk. Some of these changes brought benefits to the hosiery and knitwear industry. Mini skirts brought ab'Jut a demand for stylish stockings to wear with them. Brightly coloured designs, elaborate patterns and fishnets were all supplied by the industry to meet the demand. The 'flower power' culture and 'hippies' sought to associate more closely with nature. Long hair, loose clothes, sleeveless coats and boots came into fashion. In the 1980s, casual sportswear became popular fashion, items with designer labels and brands were bought as soon as they could be afforded. Developments in knitting technology provided new garments and looks. The late 1960s introduced tights, which removed the need for suspenders to hold up the stocking. Early examples were produced by sewing two stocking legs to a pair of pants. A body knitted in the same fabric as the legs subsequently replaced the pants.
Joining forces Growing competition
British companies, since the nineteenth century, had faced increasing competition from overseas. Germany, Italy, the USA and other countries with growing knitting industries, started to impact on the sales made by British manufacturers. The development of the Italian machine building industry, the availability of cheap labour and EEC grants, led to the development of a significant knitting industry in Italy. Cheap Italian goods sold across Europe and the USA.
II Knitting and its Origin The era of takeovers (1960s)
The difficult trading environment weakened many companies. Staff costs were increasing, stocks were increasing, some areas of production had experienced losses and customer relations were becoming more strained. Low profitability and depressed share prices left companies open to the threat of takeover. Between 1957 and 1970, Courtaulds, a yarn manufacturer, took advantage of the state of the industry and began to build a textile super-company through a series of takeovers. The theory was that once control of a company had been secured, Courtaulds could ensure that it supplied the company's nylon yarn. Famous names taken over by Courtaulds included I. & R. Morley, Brettles, Wolsey, Meridian and Aristoc. Courtaulds had by 1968 taken control of around 20% of the knitting industry. The expansion plans of Courtaulds .also included companies in the Lancashire cotton industry and major warehousing firms. Courtaulds was not the only company to expand through takeovers during this period. Courtauld's rival yarn supplier, Coats Paton, also bougHt out several firms in the knitting industry. Byfords, the Driver Group, PasoIds and Jaeger all fell to become part of the Coats Paton group. The expansion of companies was not just restricted to yarn suppliers, companies within the knitting industry played a role in the takeover activities. The Djanoglys (Nottingham Manufacturing Company) took control of nine companies between 1960 and 1972, creating a group of companies that employed 10,650 staff. Takeover troubles
The strategy pursued by Courtaulds and Coats Paton failed to achieve the anticipated outcomes. The problems of managing diverse companies, at a difficult time in the industry, did not lead to a long-term revival of the industry. The assumed sales
11 of yarn to the acquired companies did not materialise as Courtauld's companies fought to retain their ability to choose whom they bought their yarns from. The performance of the merged companies in comparison with independent companies is highlighted by the payroll figures between 1969 and 1983. Courtauld's workforce went from 22,746 to 11,886 and Coats Paton declined from 12,954 to 5,732. Both companies cut their work force by around 50 percent. The workforce of leading independent chain store suppliers only declined by 0.5 percent from 21,728 to 21,610. Employment peaked in the knitting industry at 159,000 in 1973-4. A management consultancy report produced for Courtaulds in 1983 identified that there were key weaknesses in the business. The Meridian knitwear division was seen as uncompetitive and its profit margin on sales to Marks & Spencer was only 6-7% compared with Nottingham Manufacturing Company's 9-10%. The hosiery division secured 13% of the British market, but this was less than half that of Pretty Polly at 28%. The report highlighted that if the company was to turn itself around action was required.
The Marks and Spencer effect (1900-Present) Supplying Marks and Spencer Challenging the warehouses
The late nineteenth and early twentieth century saw attempts by London warehouses to monopolise the supply of knitted goods to retailers. The formation of the Wholesale Textile Association in 1912 was designed to co-ordinate activities of warehouses and combine their power against manufacturers who tried to sell direct to retailers. Firms found to be dealing with retailers were blacklisted and their goods banned from warehouses in the WfA.
" Knitting and its Origin
6711
Simon Marks sought to bypass warehouses in the 1920s and held secret talks with manufacturers. Many companies rejected the approaches made to them by Marks for fear of being blacklisted. Corahs of Leicester became one of the first companies to enter into an agreement with Marks & Spencer, in 1926. A slump in the company's order book led to Corahs taking the risk of dealing directly. To keep the arrangement secret, a code number was used for Marks & Spencer orders. The arrangement was, however, eventually discovered and the WfA took Corahs off their list of approved suppliers. The list of suppliers dealing directly with Marks & Spencer continued to expand as a Leicester agent, Leslie Hinmer of Turk Smith Ltd, negotiated deals with Wolsey, Pool, Lorrimer & Tabberer and Foister, Clay & Ward. A quality product The Marks & Spencer philosophy behind the direct orders was that it would result in the company being able to offer its customers a better product. Marks & Spencer had initially bought stockings through warehouses at 9 shillings and 6 pence a dozen, but were able to buy directly from Corahs for 8 shillings and 6 pence. Instead of using the saving to increase profit margins, Mark & Spencer negotiated with suppliers to improve the quality of the product with the shilling saved. The aim was to secure Marks & Spencer's reputation for supplying quality products. Selling to Marks & Spencer The success of Marks & Spencer between 1922 and 1938 led to its mrnover increasing by over thirty five times its 1922 level. Encouraged by the prospect of a lucrative sales deal with Marks & Spencer, many companies were willing to deal with the company and risk the consequences with the wrA. In 1933 Marks & Spencer claimed to have significantly increased .employee numbers in forty-two of it leading suppliers.
It A close relationship with Marks & Spencer offered manufacmrers a number of benefits. High volume orders were regularly placed by Marks & Spencer and goods were paid for promptly upon delivery. Warehouses could sometimes take between three and four months to pay for orders. Marks & Spencer also launcht>
