Pioneers of Industry

NZ Truth, Issue 1102, 13 January 1927, Page 4

Pioneers of Industry

s ' . •'- "■•*■ "' - '•"'•'! ntiiiiitiiiiittiutiiiiiiiiJiDiii utiuiMiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitititiiiiitiiiiiiiiiiitiiiiiiiiiitiiiiiiiiiiuiiiiiiniitiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiif iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiriiniiiiiiiHiiii>^ , 7 ,From*small beginnings there spring great events. And more often than not is this the case m industry. By far the greater proportion of New Zealand's big manufacturing firms have started m a small way. , v Back m 1891 John Nelson started making bricks and clay pipes at Benhar, Dunedin, working m a agnail building which he had erected. "' ■ A few years later Peter McSkimming and his son, then a young man m his 'teens, came along, and took over the contract for making these, goods. In two years' they had leased the holding and m 1900 a partnership was formeyi and the business purchased. Up till then all worlv>had been done by hand, five employees being on the pay-roll. The daily output was 1500' bricks. To-day the works have grown to ten times the size, the pay list totals 50, and the output is 12,000 bricks daily. That's not all though; for* the firm of McSkimming and Son have a brick works' at Invercargill, and a pottery works at Benhar, and turn out field and sewer pipes and mixing and pudding bowls, e&. ' "