Latest Acquisitions (June 2022)

Rowe Bros. Co. Ltd. Catalogue No.41

Rowe Brothers was a builder’s merchant with premises in Exeter, Bristol, Liverpool and Birmingham. This catalogue was published by the Birmingham branch. Unfortunately, and like most catalogues, it is undated and therefore difficult to put a date on. Usually the only way to date the catalogue is if there is a price list included, as this would often have a published or “valid to” date on it. Inside there are few clues that help: page 205 shows a cast iron rainwater head dated AD 1908 which might imply the catalogue is later than this date. Page 204 shows a similar item dated 1901 and page 250 shows rain heads dated 1900 and 1902.

A further clue is on page 4 which shows a photograph of the building. If you look closely at the side of the building you will see a plaque on the wall celebrating 30 years of Rowe Brothers 1895-1925. This puts the catalogue at later than 1925.

Another way of dating these catalogues is from their issue numbers but this supposes you have earlier and later copies that are dated. Unfortunately for us we do not have other issues and a trawl of the internet produced no further information.

The fact that the company promotes the sale of lead pipe for plumbing must put it before 1970 (lead pipe in plumbing became illegal in the UK in 1969 for new-build housing).

I always thought that coloured baths were a 1960s/1970s creation but as can be seen from the attached pictures you could get coloured enamel baths in this catalogue.

All in all it is an excellent addition to the archive and it will join the other Rowe Bros. catalogue we have from the Bristol Branch.

One fascinating discovery on the internet is that although the showrooms have long gone the façade of the building still remains and it is now the administrative and rehearsal rooms for the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra.

Auto-Universum 1965

This motoring annual was published from the late 1950s to the early 1970s with this copy being issue number 8, published in Switzerland in 1965.

The book itself is primarily a potted history of the car industry together with a brief listing of all production cars from around the world. Although the annual is partly paid for by advertisements, these are a welcome addition to the technical content and add to rather than take away from the publication.

A Selection of Gardening Magazines

My good friend John Atkins who is a librarian at the Vintage Sports Car Club brought along a selection of gardening magazines donated by his wife. As the couple have links with South Africa it was no surprise to find, alongside a long run of the Royal Horticultural Society magazine “The Garden”, a small number of magazines from South Africa. It is always a particular delight to receive foreign magazines as it is particularly difficult to source them in the UK (and postage from overseas too expensive).

Look and Learn Magazine

A collection of several hundred issues of this children’s educational paper have just come our way. First published on 20th January 1962 this magazine had a regular subscription of 300,000 in its early years. The magazine ran for 1,049 issues, finally closing on 17th April 1982.

The success of the magazine was put down to the high quality of its content (both the editorial and the artwork).

Over its life it managed to absorb a number of other titles and pull in some of their best features. “The Children’s Newspaper” was merged in 1965, “Ranger” in 1966, “Finding Out” in 1967, “World of Wonder” and “Speed and Power” in 1975 and finally “World of Knowledge” in 1981.

Don’t forget that all these titles and many more which have arrived after the publication of this blog post are available to view at our next open evening which is on the second Monday of June which is Monday 13th June 2022 from 7 pm to 9 pm.

Please do let us know if you would like to view anything else from past editions of our “Latest Acquisitions” blog posts before Saturday 11th June.

Hope to see you there,

Richard Roberts