Item #123428 James Wedlock. Victoria Foundry, Hindley Street West. Every Description of Casting Executed Promptly, Efficiently, and at Reasonable Rates. Special Features in Ornamental Brackets, Frieze-Work, Balcony Panels, Palisading, &c. Trade Catalogue.
[Trade Catalogue]

James Wedlock. Victoria Foundry, Hindley Street West. Every Description of Casting Executed Promptly, Efficiently, and at Reasonable Rates. Special Features in Ornamental Brackets, Frieze-Work, Balcony Panels, Palisading, &c

Adelaide, James Wedlock, Victoria Foundry, [circa 1878].

A framed pictorial advertisement (visible image size 305 × 490 mm), with the above text printed in black along the margins of a sheet of thick brown card, at the centre of which is a group of six albumen paper photographs (each approximately 88 × 108 mm, mounted close together, three across, two deep) within a thin black border. The photographer is credited in ink below the border: 'P.J. Marchant, Photographer, Adelaide'.

The card mount has a break across the right-hand margin, resulting in a tiny tear to the margin of one photograph; the photographs are a little unevenly discoloured (more from the acidic mount than exposure to light); overall in very good condition, behind glass in an early (if not original) carved wooden frame (external dimensions approximately 385 × 565 mm, with the timber a little scuffed and rubbed).

Approximately 160 examples of cast ironwork from the foundry are depicted in the six photographs. These include the items mentioned above, as well as ornamental fences, gates, finials, door knockers and grilles, together with more utilitarian items, such as gears and spoked wheels. Five of the plates have reference numbers or dimensions written in ink against the items. This is an extraordinary example of a trade catalogue, designed surely for advertising in-house, and not for distribution or circulation: if not originally unique, there can scarcely be another surviving example.

James Wedlock died in Adelaide on 30 October 1898. His obituary appeared in the 'South Australian Register' the following day: 'Mr Wedlock was born at Helstern [Helston], Cornwall, on March 22, 1842, and arrived here in the ship "Lincoln" on December 3, 1865. Until 1878 he was an employee in the Victoria Foundry, Hindley Street, when he purchased the business from the owner, Mr F.C. Belcher, and renamed it the Cornwall Foundry, and continued in occupation to the time of his death'. Davies and Stanbury ('The Mechanical Eye in Australia') record Phillip James Marchant at Waymouth Street, Adelaide from 1864 to 1882, when he relocated to Gawler before departing for Latrobe, Tasmania in 1887.

Item #123428

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