Bell Brothers
of Cleveland
1836 Furnace built at Wylam
1844 Company established by Isaac Lowthian Bell and his brothers [1]to lease the furnace at Wylam from Christopher Blackett
1852 Acquired a lease, from the Ward-Jackson family, of important ore supplies at Normanby
1854 Started their Clarence works, with three blast furnaces, on the north bank of the Tees opposite Middlesbrough.
1854 Three furnaces and made 12,536 tons of pig-iron.
1858 The Skelton extension of the Cleveland Railway enabled the Bell Brothers to obtain an important tract of ironstone on the Skelton estate. Limestone quarries were also acquired in Weardale, until ultimately the firm owned all the supplies of raw material required for their Clarence works.
1863 The original Wylam furnace was finally blown out.
1866 See 1866 Cleveland Blast Furnaces for detail of furnaces.
1873 Converted to a private company.
1883 Building a plant to make soda using the ammonia process from the salt from the deposit at Port Clarence that was being developed by Newcastle Chemical Works Co[2].
1889 Open hearth furnaces were erected at Clarence; steel was first made there in January 1889.
1891 Negotiated with Dorman, Long and Co to supply steel for girders
1899 joint venture with Dorman Long; built steel works at Clarence, adjacent to the blast furnaces[3].
1899 Became a public company. According to the prospectus 'produced during the past three years an annual average of pig-iron, 320,000 tons; coal, 715,000 tons; coke, 305,000 tons; ironstone, 40,000,000 tons; and limestone, 1,165,000 tons.' The company was registered on 24 January, to take over the business of iron masters and colliery owners of a private company of the same name. [4]
1902 Dorman, Long and Co took over Bell Brothers[5], acquiring the other half of the shares[6]
1914 Ironmasters, colliery and ironstone mine owners. Specialities: pig iron manufacturing, coals, coke, ironstone, limestone etc. Employees 6,000. [7]
1927 See Aberconway for information on the company and its history.
See Also
Sources of Information
- ↑ Rise of Big Business by Hilary Adair Marquand, Edward Austin, Gossage Robinson, Mark Casson, J. Morgan Ress, Douglas Knoop, Alfred Plummer
- ↑ The North-Eastern Daily Gazette, 24 October 1883
- ↑ The Times, Jan 05, 1899
- ↑ The Stock Exchange Year Book 1908
- ↑ Biography of Arthur Dorman, ODNB
- ↑ The Times, Sep 05, 1902
- ↑ 1914 Whitakers Red Book
- Isaac Lowthian Bell [1]