Samuel Alexander Fox
Samuel Alexander Fox (1875-1948)
1949 Obituary [1]
"SAMUEL ALEXANDER Fox was the founder and chairman of Messrs. Fox and Offord, Ltd., manufacturing engineers and toolmakers, of Birmingham, and had been head of the firm for twenty-five years.
He was born in 1875 and received his technical education at Gloucester and at Finsbury Technical College. After completing a five years' apprenticeship with Messrs. W. Sisson and Company, Ltd., marine engineers, of Gloucester, in 1897, he continued in the employment of that firm for a further sixteen years, rising to be works manager and then a director. During this long period Mr. Fox gained extensive experience of conducting trials and the running of high-speed engines in various parts of this country.
In 1914 he took over the sole management of Messrs. E. Reader and Sons, Ltd., makers of high-speed engines, Nottingham, and subsequently joined the Board of Directors. Here he was responsible for the reorganization of the works and the redesigning of all types of the firm's engines, in which branch of mechanical engineering he attained to a high degree of proficiency, his designs and finished products meeting with continuous success and attracting the attention of the Admiralty. He relinquished this position in 1918 and received an appointment as manager of the Farrer boiler works at Newark-on-Trent, where he was actively engaged in schemes of reorganization and the carrying out of considerable extensions. It was in 1923 that he established the business, which bears his name. Mr. Fox remained a director up to the time of his death, which occurred on 22nd January 1948. He was elected an Associate Member of the Institution in 1907 and was transferred to Membership in 1920."