Keeping with our luxury theme, here is an elegant lady looking at "Countess" boots. However this was a British manufacturer, Freeman, Hardy and Willis founded in 1875, and still operating, though under new management and only in online store form.
The company actually started in Leicester, in 1870, as Edward Wood and Company, and he was purely a boot and shoe manufacturer, not a retailer. Within six years he had made enough money and prestige to become a limited company. To do this, he needed directors, and chose three men. These were Mr. William Freeman (his factory manager), Mr. Arthur Hardy (an architect) and Mr. Frederick Wills (one of his commercial travellers). For some reason Mr. Wood chose not to have his own name in the company, but he was the overall chairman thereof.
Mr. Freeman and Mr. Wills seem to have left fairly quickly, and quite permanently, there are records that both partnerships were dissolved - even before it was decided that the company was to become a shoe retailer rather than a manufacturer. That was in 1897. Their first branch was in Wandsworth, London, and they would eventually be able to claim in their advertising that they had a branch in almost every town.
There is some confusion over Mr. Hardy. Most records satet that he stayed for a long time after this, right into the 1940s. However this is incorrect. Our Mr. Hardy was born in 1846 and died even before Mr. Freeman and Mr. Willis left - in 1891. But his directorship was then assumed by his son, confusingly also called Arthur Hardy, born in 1878, and died in 1949. After that, his son, who was called Hugh, born in 1910, took over, but the last record I can track down has him still alive in 1939, then he disappears, though elsewhere it says that he was still involved with the business until the mid 1950s, even getting to see a large new headquarters open in Leicester - though this was not through expansion, it was to replace the former headquarters, and a huge proportion of the stock in hand, which had been destroyed by a bomb in 1940.
Whilst all this was going on, the firm had actually been bought out by the American company Sears, in 1929 - who are responsible for the name change that ousted the ampersand, and sometimes even abbreviated it to simply "FHW". From the mid 1950s, they ran the shops under the aegis of The British Shoe Corporation, until the early 1990s, when almost half of the shops were renamed as "Hush Puppies" stores and the other half sold. This did not work out so well, in either case, and the British Shoe Corporation also failed, closing in 1998.
The online version is actually operated by a company called Gardiner Bros & Co (Leathers) Ltd - but I have not been able to determine their connection with the original company.
Freeman, Hardy & Willis Ltd cards first make their appearance in our original British Trade Index part three, with quite a multitude of cards. Our set appears right at the top, entered as :
- Advertisement Cards (A). 4 groupings .... FPMB-1
- 142 x 87. "Customer No.7 - The Mayoress - is not so young". No address.
- 138 x 95. "The Evolution of the Leviathon No.4 - The Great Eastern" - back with Lincoln address
- 157 x 65. River picnic scene, inscribed "Freeman, Hardy & Willis Ltd - For Boating Shoes"
- 126 x 98. "Heeling Out!" (football scene). Back with Hounslow address.
Now after a little bit of investigation we can confirm that both 1 and 2 above are actually part of longer sets.
Tomorrow I will add the record from our updated British Trade Index, where their code is FRE-040, it is not that different, our set not at all, but there are a few more cards added below number 4.
I can add a couple of new cards to our set though, namely
- The Mayoress - is not so young
- Miss Hygrade - wants something that will not wear out (Academy)
- Mrs. Smart - considers carefully before she buys (Countess and Miranda)
And if you know any more, or the boots and shoes featured on the back of the Mayoress, please do tell us.