Frome Times Past- Singing the praises of an industrial giant

For anyone interested in Frome’s industrial past, it will not have escaped their notice that this year sees a highly significant bicentenary commemoration.

John Webb (J.W.) Singer was born on the 23rd of February 1819 in Frome and spent his formative years at the Butts.

It was while growing up in this area that the youthful J.W. Singer watched with enthusiasm the goings on at a nearby foundry.

Although he tried his own hand at casting toy cannons, this avenue of workmanship was put to the back of his mind for the time being.  

After leaving school he undertook an apprenticeship with a local watch-maker firm and on its completion went to work in London.

Sometime later, however, he returned to manage the Frome business with which he had undertaken his training.

At the same time, he began making brass ornaments for local churches, initially encouraged by the town’s recently appointed vicar, William Bennett.

Legend has it that J.W. Singer cast his first brass altar candlesticks using turnips as moulds!

The rise of the Oxford movement, with Bennett at its forefront, sought to reinstate older Christian traditions and thus created a huge demand for his work.

This eventually led to J.W. Singer establishing an art metal work foundry and giving up watch-making, as this new business grew and expanded.

During the final year of the nineteenth century the firm became a limited company and by now had also become internationally known for its bronze statues.

These included such iconic ones as Boudica, which stands on the Thames Embankment, Lady Justice at the Old Bailey, and Winchester’s Alfred The Great.

When a new bronze statue was ready to leave the factory, it is said that the town’s entire population would turn out for its journey to the railway station.  

And from here, the firm’s work was also exported to countries around the world including Australia, India, South Africa and New Zealand.

By the start of the twentieth century, however, J.W. Singer had retired and his sons, Herbert and Edgar, had taken over running the business.

John Webb Singer died in 1904, but as the plethora of events – exhibitions, walks & talks etc. – taking place this year testify, his legacy remains intact.

The start of these celebrations, entitled ‘Casting the World’, begins at 2.00pm on 23rd February – J.W. Singer’s birth date – at Frome Heritage Museum. 

Mick David & David Lassman