Self-Made Men.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 180, 27 November 1886, Page 5

Self -Made Men.

Joseph Gii.lott, the eminent steel pen manufacturer, was born at Sheifigld in October 1799, died of pleurisy, January 5, 1572, aged 72, at his residonco, Westbourne Road, Edgbarton, Birmingham. Ho is said to be the firsC to use machinery for making steal pong. Originally a poor grinder at Sheffield, his first employment was that of steel toy or tool-making. His attention, however, was soon directed to stool pens, which were then made by haud, in very limited quantities, at a cost of about 35 Gd each. When he was 21 years of age, the cutlery trado in Sheffield being much depressed, young Gillott wentjto Birmingham and coinmonced the manufacture of stoel buckles and other articles of polished steel for personal ornament. Ho had no capital, but great skill. He was an excellent workman, and possessing as he did a great amount of "taate," he soon obtained abundance of orders, and became prosperous. At this time the steel pen trade— no insignificant branch of the steel manufacture at the present day— was iv a tentative condition. Josiah Mason and Perry, of tho " Morning Chronicle " news, papers were experimenting, «nd two brothers, named respectively John and William Mitchell, were actually making, by a tedious method, a fairly good article. They were assisted in their work by a sifter. By some fortunate accident Gillott and Mias Mitchell met, and the " old, old story " being in their case soon told, they entered into an engagement to marry. She told her intended husband of her occupation, and Gillott at onco conceived the idea that the press, the useful implement of the button trade, might, with some new toola to suit, produce pens in large numbers very rapidly, With his own hands, in the " upper room of his house, he secretly worked until he had mastered his difficulty, and could, unassisted, produce as many pens as twenty pairs of hands under the old system could turn out. There was an enormous demand for his goods, and as he wanted help, and secrecy was a sine quanon, the young couple married ; and in after life Mr Gillot uged to (ell how, on the wedding morning, before going to church, he made with his own hands a gro3s of pens, and sold them at one shilling each, realising thereby the sura of £7 4a. Living in a small house in Bread street, Gillot and his wife worked in the garret, no one else assisting. Tho manufacture of steel pans was then only in a crude state, for they were " blued " and varnished in a common fryingpan over a kitchen firp. Such, however, was the demand, and the goods were produced in such quantities, that the young couple made money faster than they knew what to do with it. They were afraid to invest it, as it might tell of large profits, so Mr Gillott opened several banking accounts, being afraid that if he paid all his profits into one bank it might excite cupidity and so bring about competition. In the course of a few yeara he built , large factories, and then commenced to advertise extensively, a practice which he continued during the remainder of his life. The number of pens produced by Giilott in 1836 was .36,000,000. By means of labour-saving machines which Gillott introduced, the price of the pens fell from one shilling each to less than that sum per gross, and the steel pen came into universal use. At the time of Mr Gillotfs death the number of pans produced weekly at his works was something enormous, and can scarcely be set down in figures. The average weight of the weekly make exceeded five ton 8, and would give a result in numbers of something like sixty thousand gross, or nine million separate pens, sent out from this manufactory every week. He went in , for quality in his pens rather than lownesa of price ; and in all the affairs i of life it was a joke of his that -'the best of everything was good enough for him." He earnestly carried out in life the desire to do and pos<*es3 "the best" that could be attained. The six days' sale of Mr Gillott's pictures realised 180,000 guineas,