Read Holliday

Read Holliday (1809-1889), pioneer of the Huddersfield chemical and dyestuffs industry

1830 He started his own business at the age of twenty-one, buying waste liquors from the local gas works. He distilled ammonia in Huddersfield and sold it to textile mills for wool scouring. An early sign of his ingenuity was blending unwanted coal tar with cinders to use as fuel for the ammonia stills.

1839 The growth of the business, and complaints about the fumes, caused Holliday to move the works to the canalside in Turnbridge. Lacking formal training in chemistry, he read technical publications and applied what he learned to expand the product range. He produced ammonia salts, washing powder, soda ash, Epsom salts and dye products including Prussian blue.

1845 He started distilling coal tar, becoming the biggest distiller in the north of England by 1860. He patented an improved naphtha lamp - the Holliday Peerless Lamp became widely used. Sales of naphtha for lamps and creosote and pitch for coal-brick (briquette) makers were highly successful. He had plants at six other northern sites as well as one in Bromley-By-Bow in London and a warehouse at Holburn Hill in London.

The Holliday family was also expanding: Read and his wife Emma had five sons and three daughters. When Eliza died at the age of nine, Holliday became concerned about the environmental conditions of the Turnbridge area and built a new home in the countryside of Edgerton in 1853-54. The palatial family residence, with 34 rooms, was known as Lunn Clough Hall.

Holliday was fined several times by Huddersfield authorities as neighbours complained about fumes and smoke from the coal tar distillery. The most offensive operations were moved further from residences, nearer to the River Colne on the boundary of Dalton, but still within the Turnbridge site. The stills were redesigned and fume controls implemented. These steps allowed Holliday to stay in business. But the dangers of handling flammable products continued, as was evidenced by a fire in 1859 which severely damaged the plant.

Sources of Information