Samuel Lister, 1st Baron Masham
Encyclopedia
Calverley Old Hall
Calverley Old Hall is a medieval manor house with Grade I listed building status situated at Calverley, West Yorkshire, England.-Architectural features:...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
– 2 February 1906 in Swinton Park
Swinton Park
Swinton Park, the seat of the Danby family and of the Cunliffe-Lister family is an English country house in Swinton near Masham, North Yorkshire, England. It is set in of parkland, lakes and gardens...
, Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
) was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
inventor and industrialist, notable for inventing the Lister nip comb
Bradford Industrial Museum
Bradford Industrial Museum, established 1974 in Moorside Mills, Eccleshill, Bradford, United Kingdom, specializes in relics of local industry, especially printing and textile machinery, kept in working condition for regular demonstrations to the public...
.
Early life
He was born in Calverley Old HallCalverley Old Hall
Calverley Old Hall is a medieval manor house with Grade I listed building status situated at Calverley, West Yorkshire, England.-Architectural features:...
, near Bradford
Bradford
Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...
, the son Ellis Cunliffe Lister
Ellis Cunliffe Lister
Ellis Cunliffe Lister-Kay was an English Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1832 to 1841....
(1774 - 1853), who was the first Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
elected for Bradford after the Reform Act of 1832 and Mary (née Kay} Lister. In 1854 he married Anne Dearden, daughter of John Dearden; they had five daughters. He started his working life working for a Liverpool firm of merchants.
Industry and enterprise
Samuel Lister went on to play a key role in the development of BradfordBradford
Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...
's wool
Wool
Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and certain other animals, including cashmere from goats, mohair from goats, qiviut from muskoxen, vicuña, alpaca, camel from animals in the camel family, and angora from rabbits....
industry during the nineteenth century Industrial Revolution
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
. The textile industry
Textile industry
The textile industry is primarily concerned with the production of yarn, and cloth and the subsequent design or manufacture of clothing and their distribution. The raw material may be natural, or synthetic using products of the chemical industry....
transformed Bradford from a small rural town into a rich and famous city. As well as being a successful mill
Factory
A factory or manufacturing plant is an industrial building where laborers manufacture goods or supervise machines processing one product into another. Most modern factories have large warehouses or warehouse-like facilities that contain heavy equipment used for assembly line production...
owner he occasionally diverged to other subjects, such as an air brake for railways. He was fond of outdoor sports, especially coursing
Coursing
Coursing is the pursuit of game or other animals by dogs—chiefly greyhounds and other sighthounds—catching their prey by speed, running by sight and not by scent. Coursing was a common hunting technique, practised by the nobility, the landed and wealthy, and commoners with sighthounds and lurchers...
and shooting, and was a keen patron of the fine art
Fine art
Fine art or the fine arts encompass art forms developed primarily for aesthetics and/or concept rather than practical application. Art is often a synonym for fine art, as employed in the term "art gallery"....
s.
In 1838 he and his elder brother John started as worsted
Worsted
Worsted , is the name of a yarn, the cloth made from this yarn, and a yarn weight category. The name derives from the village of Worstead in the English county of Norfolk...
spinners
Spinning (textiles)
Spinning is a major industry. It is part of the textile manufacturing process where three types of fibre are converted into yarn, then fabric, then textiles. The textiles are then fabricated into clothes or other artifacts. There are three industrial processes available to spin yarn, and a...
and manufacturers in a new mill
Factory
A factory or manufacturing plant is an industrial building where laborers manufacture goods or supervise machines processing one product into another. Most modern factories have large warehouses or warehouse-like facilities that contain heavy equipment used for assembly line production...
which their father built for them at Manningham
Manningham, Bradford
Manningham is an area of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, approximately a mile north of the city centre and is seen as the centre of the city's south Asian population.- Geography :...
. Lister's Mill (otherwise known as Manningham Mills), and its owner, were particularly well known in the district. The business eventually made Lister one of Bradford
Bradford
Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...
's most famous fathers, a multi-millionaire and the provider of thousands of jobs in the city. Lister's Mill changed the identity of the region, and its economy. Lister himself came to epitomise Victorian
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
enterprise. However it has been suggested that his capitalist
Capitalism
Capitalism is an economic system that became dominant in the Western world following the demise of feudalism. There is no consensus on the precise definition nor on how the term should be used as a historical category...
attitude made trade union
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
s necessary.
Textiles
Bradford Industrial Museum
Bradford Industrial Museum, established 1974 in Moorside Mills, Eccleshill, Bradford, United Kingdom, specializes in relics of local industry, especially printing and textile machinery, kept in working condition for regular demonstrations to the public...
which separated and straightened raw wool
Wool
Wool is the textile fiber obtained from sheep and certain other animals, including cashmere from goats, mohair from goats, qiviut from muskoxen, vicuña, alpaca, camel from animals in the camel family, and angora from rabbits....
, which has to be done before it can be spun into worsted
Worsted
Worsted , is the name of a yarn, the cloth made from this yarn, and a yarn weight category. The name derives from the village of Worstead in the English county of Norfolk...
yarn
Yarn
Yarn is a long continuous length of interlocked fibres, suitable for use in the production of textiles, sewing, crocheting, knitting, weaving, embroidery and ropemaking. Thread is a type of yarn intended for sewing by hand or machine. Modern manufactured sewing threads may be finished with wax or...
, and in the nineteenth century it was a hot, dirty and tiring job. By inventing the nip comb, Lister revolutionised the industry
Textile industry
The textile industry is primarily concerned with the production of yarn, and cloth and the subsequent design or manufacture of clothing and their distribution. The raw material may be natural, or synthetic using products of the chemical industry....
.
Around 1855 he began work to find a way of utilising the fibre contained in silk waste
Silk waste
Silk waste includes all kinds of raw silk which may be unwindable, and therefore unsuited to the throwing process. Before the introduction of machinery applicable to the spinning of silk waste, the refuse from cocoon reeling, and also from silk winding, which is now used in producing spun silk...
. The task occupied his time for many years and brought him to the verge of bankruptcy
Bankruptcy
Bankruptcy is a legal status of an insolvent person or an organisation, that is, one that cannot repay the debts owed to creditors. In most jurisdictions bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor....
, but at last he succeeded in perfecting silk-combing
Combing
Combing is a method for preparing carded fibre for spinning. It separates out the short fibres by means of a rotating ring of steel pins. The fibres in the 'top' it produces, have been straightened and lie parallel to each other...
appliances which enabled him to make good quality yarn at a low cost. Another important invention in connection with silk manufacture was his velvet
Velvet
Velvet is a type of woven tufted fabric in which the cut threads are evenly distributed,with a short dense pile, giving it a distinctive feel.The word 'velvety' is used as an adjective to mean -"smooth like velvet".-Composition:...
loom
Loom
A loom is a device used to weave cloth. The basic purpose of any loom is to hold the warp threads under tension to facilitate the interweaving of the weft threads...
for piled fabrics which made him very rich. He had his portrait painted with a model of one of his inventions. However, the business was seriously affected by the prohibitory duties imposed by the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, making him an early critic of the British policy of free trade
Free trade
Under a free trade policy, prices emerge from supply and demand, and are the sole determinant of resource allocation. 'Free' trade differs from other forms of trade policy where the allocation of goods and services among trading countries are determined by price strategies that may differ from...
.
Honours
In 1887 he was appointed High Sheriff of YorkshireHigh Sheriff of Yorkshire
The High Sheriff of Yorkshire was an ancient High Sheriff title originating in the time of the Angles, not long after the invasion of the Kingdom of England, which was in existence for around a thousand years. A list of the sheriffs from the Norman conquest onwards can be found below...
In 1891 he was made a peer; he took his title from the little Yorkshire town of Masham
Masham
Masham is a small market town and civil parish in the Harrogate district of North Yorkshire, England. It has a population of 1,235. Situated in Wensleydale on the western bank of the River Ure, the name derives from the Anglo-Saxon "Mæssa's Ham", the homestead belonging to Mæssa. The Romans had...
, close to which is Swinton Park, purchased by him in 1888. He died at Swinton Park on 2 February 1906, and was succeeded by his son, Samuel Cunliffe Lister, 2nd Baron Masham
Samuel Cunliffe Lister, 2nd Baron Masham
Samuel Cunliffe Lister, 2nd Baron Masham was an English baron and industrialist.He was born in 1857, the son of Samuel Lister, 1st Baron Masham, and was educated at Harrow and St. John's College, Oxford...
.
Lister Park
A statue of him now stands in Lister Park, in HeatonHeaton, West Yorkshire
Heaton is a Ward of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, England. It includes the villages of Frizinghall, Heaton and Daisy Hill, extending to Chellow Heights reservoir on the western edge and the Bradford-Shipley railway line on the eastern edge...
, Bradford
Bradford
Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...
, sculpted by Matthew Noble
Matthew Noble
Matthew Noble was a British sculptor.-Life:Noble was born in Hackness, near Scarborough, as the son of a stonemason, and served his apprenticeship under his father. He left Yorkshire for London when quite young, there he studied under John Francis...
from a block of white Sicilian
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
marble
Marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock composed of recrystallized carbonate minerals, most commonly calcite or dolomite.Geologists use the term "marble" to refer to metamorphosed limestone; however stonemasons use the term more broadly to encompass unmetamorphosed limestone.Marble is commonly used for...
and unveiled on Saturday 15 May 1875 by W. E. Forster, then Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Bradford. Lister Park was donated to the people of Bradford by Lister.
