Crookes, Jonathan

Jonathan Crookes, a maker of ‘common’ pocket and penknives in Scotland Street, appeared (with his heart and pistol mark) in directories in 1774, 1787, and 1797. However, it was another Jonathan Crookes, who made that mark famous after the 1820s. This Jonathan was apparently baptised in 1788, the son of Marmaduke Crookes and his wife, Martha. Marmaduke was the son of Jonathan Crookes, who was a cutler (possibly the individual in Scotland Street). If this is correct – and the identification is not entirely certain – then the second Jonathan Crookes was the grandson of the first. Certainly, a Freedom was granted to Jonathan Crookes in 1810. Jonathan Crookes is known to have worked for Joseph Rodgers & Sons. In 1821, he was apparently involved with the production of Rodgers’ famous Year Knife. A directory advertisement (1884) described him as, ‘Inventor and Sole Maker of that Unique and Superb Specimen of Cutlery, containing Eighteen Hundred and Twenty-one Blades, with Different Instruments, value 200 guineas’. In 1827, Crookes’ partnership with James Bingham for the manufacture of pen knives and razors was dissolved. In the following year, he began business in Rockingham Lane as a manufacturer of pen knives. His works address was later Bailey Lane (1833) and Broad Lane (1837). He had a residence in Rockingham Street. Henry Crookes (1811-1892) – his son by his first wife, Ann (d. 1817) – had joined the business by this time. By 1839, Jonathan Crookes & Son had moved to Eldon Street, where it remained until the end of the nineteenth century. The firm claimed to manufacture ‘superlatively finished Pen, Pocket, and Sporting Knives, Razors, etc.’, including in the 1830s and 1840s ‘fly open knives’ (switchblades) and Bowies. One of Crookes’ switchblades can be seen in Punchard and Fuller (2012). Eldon Street bounded part of Wostenholm’s Washington Works and both companies looked across the Atlantic for orders. The Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 15 August 1892, reported: ‘Though the goods of Jonathan Crookes & Son were approved wherever known, the name became peculiarly identified with the United States’. The trade made Jonathan Crookes wealthy. His partnership with his son was dissolved in 1841, when he probably retired. By 1851, he lived amongst the well-to-do in Broomhall Park. Little is known about much of his career, though the business was relatively small (employing about 30 workers in 1851). He was a member of the Methodist New Connexion and was remembered as a ‘Methodist of the old type .. [who] … had a Bible not only at home, but at his warehouse’ (Methodist New Connexion Magazine & Evangelical Repository, 1867). He died on the 28 November 1866, aged 79, at his Broomhall Park home and was buried in the General Cemetery in unconsecrated ground. His second wife, Mary, had predeceased him in 1856. Crookes left nearly £5,000. His son, Henry, continued the business. In 1861, he employed 25 men and nine boys. The heyday of the American trade had passed, but Henry maintained his father’s emphasis on quality and limited output. The Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 15 August 1892, noted that: He had been through the mill himself and had a poor opinion of modern apprenticeship, or the untrained labour which partially supersedes it. His pleasure was in his business. He liked money making by the antique rules of inflexible integrity, martinet attention to details, fair profits and thrift. Nothing could induce him to extend his business to a scale beyond his practical and personal supervision. By 1871, his workforce was fifty (36 men, 8 boys, and six girls), though this fell to fifteen hands by 1881. Henry was still attending to business only days before his death. He died on 6 August 1892, aged 80, at his home, Northumberland Villa, Northumberland Road. He was remembered as a ‘typical old-fashioned Yorkshire nonconformist and Sheffielder of the better class’ (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 15 August 1892). He, too, was buried in the unconsecrated section of the General Cemetery. He left a fortune of £83,164 (worth over £7m today) to his widow, Ann, but they had no children. She died on 15 May 1896, leaving even more money (£90,217). After her death, Crookes’ workshops at 95 Eldon Street were vacated (Sheffield Independent, 12 October 1896). The mark was soon acquired by razor maker Joseph Allen, at Ecclesall Works, 245 Rockingham Street. Crookes continued to be advertised as a stand-alone name at that address. In the 1950s, Slater acquired the heart and pistol mark, which it continued to stamp on Bowies and other knives until about 1990. These knives were usually made by outworkers, such as Graham Clayton and Stan Shaw.