Chance Brothers
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Chance Brothers and Company was a glassworks in Spon Lane, Smethwick, West Midlands (formerly in Staffordshire), England.
The Chance family originated in Bromsgrove as farmers and craftsmen before setting up business in Smethwick in 1824. Situated between the industrial heartlands of Birmingham and the Black Country, they took advantage of the skilled workers, canals and many advances that were taking place in the Industrial West Midlands at the time.
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[edit] Early history
Robert Lucas Chance bought the glassworks of the British Crown Glass Company in Spon Lane in 1824. They made blown window glass.[1] The company soon ran into difficulty and its survival was guaranteed in 1832 by investment from William and George Chance who owned a successful iron merchants in Great Charles Street, Birmingham. They became partners in the business, now called Chance Brothers and Company. In 1832, they made the first British cylinder blown sheet glass with the expertise of Georges Bontemps, a French inventor from a glassworks in Choisy-le-Roi.
Chance Brothers were amongst the earliest glass works to carry out the cylinder process in Europe. Just three other companies in Britain made glass in the same way, Pilkington of St. Helens, Hartleys of Sunderland and Cooksons of Newcastle. During 1832, Chance Brothers became the first to adopt the cylinder method to produce sheet glass, and overtook all rivals becoming the largest British manufacturer of window and plate glass, and optical glasses.
[edit] Lighthouse engineering
Chance Brothers also became a major lighthouse engineering company, producing optical components, machinery, and other equipment for lighthouses around the world. James Timmins Chance pioneered placing lighthouse lamps inside a cage surrounded by fresnel lenses so as to increase the available light output; these cages, known as optics, revolutionised lighthouse design. Another important innovation from Chance Brothers was the introduction of rotating optics, allowing adjacent lighthouses to be distinguished from each other by the number of times per revolution that the light flashes. John Hopkinson, the noted English physicist and engineer, invented this system.
[edit] Later history
Chance Brothers' other projects included the glazing of the original Crystal Palace and the Houses of Parliament, and it was the only firm at the time able to make the opal glass for the four faces of the Westminster Clock Tower which house the famous bell, Big Ben. The ornamental windows for the White House in America were also made there. Other products included stained glass windows, ornamental lamp shades, microscope glass slides, painted glassware, glass tubing and specialist types of glass.
Elihu Burritt once said about Chances: “In no other establishment in the world can one get such a full idea of the infinite uses which glass is made to serve as in these immense works”.
In the early 20th century, many new ways of making glass evolved at Chance Brothers such as the innovative welding of a cathode ray tube used for radar detection.
Pilkington acquired a 50% shareholding in Chance in 1945, then assumed full control of Chance Brothers by the end of 1952. The production of flat glass ceased at Smethwick in 1976. The remainder of the works closed in 1981, thus ending over 150 years of glass production at Smethwick.
Chance also popularised slumped glass tableware, called Fiestaware, see ChanceGlass.net that included many innovative designs, including the famous Swirl design.
Remaining glass tube processing was moved to Malvern where the operation was incorporated as an arms-length subsidiary of Pilkington, under the old name Chance Brothers Ltd. Since then the company has continued to develop its range of products and capabilities.
In 1992, during a period of rationalisation at Pilkington, Chance once again became an independent company, changing its registered name to Chance Glass Limited, but retaining the historical Chance logo. Further processes have since been added.
Industries now served include Pharmaceutical, Chemical, Metrology, Electronics and Lighting.
[edit] Heritage site
The glass works lies between the Birmingham Canal Navigations (BCN) Old Main Line and New Main Line canals near the Spon Lane locks and has several Grade II listed warehouses and adjacent canal bridges on the BCN New Main Line. The works lies within the Smethwick Summit - Galton Valley Conservation area. There is also a listed memorial to James Chance, one of the partners, in West Smethwick Park.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- The Infinite Uses of Glass: Chance Brothers, Glassmakers of Smethwick, Revolutionary Players West Midlands industrial history project
- Lighthouse history
- Chance Expressions: The History of Domestic Glassware from Chance Brothers
[edit] External links
- Revolutionary Players - The Smethwick Glass Works of Chance Brothers, West Midlands
- The Domestic Glassware of Chance
- Chance Encounters - history
- What remains of the company today
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219348) 9/135 Double range of warehouses on canal side, 1840-52- Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219345) 9/132 Seven storey warehouse, 1847 - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219346) 9/133 Two warehouses - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219347) 9/134 Warehouse - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219210) 9/11 Canal bridge - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219209) 9/10 Hartley Canal bridge - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219211) 9/12 Canal railway bridge - Grade II
- Images of England — details from listed building database (219389) Memorial to James Chance in West Smethwick Park - Grade II
