The Rex Wailes Collection A Man of Letters
by Mildred Cookson, The Mills Archive Trust, UK In my article on the Collection in February’s Milling and Grain, I included the 1900 photograph of the millwrights Wakes & Lamb replacing a sail on Coleby Heath windmill in Lincolnshire. Much to my delight, we have discovered amongst Rex’s papers, a letter from the firm dated March 1930 - a few months after Rex joined the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings as Technical Adviser. They were asking to be included on his list of specialised craftsmen, citing their 60 years of experience together with the number and geographical spread of their workforce. Based in Newark on Trent in Nottinghamshire, their letterhead shows that they had won prizes overseas and had also manufactured wind pumps, another of my passions. Known as wind engines in the UK, and American Windmills in the USA, these simple structures were exported all around the world for irrigation purposes. We have many old catalogues of these machines dating back to the early 1900s; a number complete with what an American correspondent apologetically described as “mouse chew”. Apart from the historical interest of the letter and its stationery, the letterheads often are works of art in themselves and we are keen to add more to our large collection. Frequently with designs unchanged for many years, they were used by engineering firms, mills and suppliers from over 100 years ago, in a way that always attracts attention when we hold an exhibition. Sadly many are now only available on eBay through dealers, a market we cannot afford to enter. A second example from Rex’s collection shows how popular windmills were as an icon of a well-established firm. Dated December 1949, Smithdale and Sons were established over 100 years previously. Not only were they iron and Brass founders, they were engineers, millwrights and electrical contractors specialising in water supply and the drainage of marshes and fens. I can only assume that their telephone number (Acle 71) no longer works!
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26 | January 2021 - Milling and Grain
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