RICHARD AUSTIN, circ. 1815.
Richard Austin began business as a punch cutter in the employ of Messrs. S. and C. Stephenson of the British Type Foundry, about the year 1795. On the Title-page of the specimen issued by that foundry in 1796, his name is {360} mentioned as the cutter of the punches, and the excellent specimen itself is no mean testimony to his abilities.
The activity prevailing throughout the trade generally at that period, consequent on the transition of the Roman character from the old style to the modern, brought the punch cutter’s services into much request, and Hansard informs us that Mr. Austin executed most of the modern founts both for Messrs. Wilson of Glasgow and Mr. Miller of Edinburgh.
Prior to the year 1819 he began a foundry of his own at Worship Street, Finsbury, in which subsequently his son, George Austin, joined him; and, in the year 1824, succeeded to the business. This foundry was styled the Imperial Letter Foundry, and carried on under the style of Austin & Sons. The earliest known specimen was issued in 1827. This 8vo volume is prefaced by a somewhat lengthy address to the Trade, in which, after criticising the letter founding of the day, the proprietors boldly claim to be the only letter founders in London who cut their own punches, which they do in a peculiar manner so as to insure perfect sharpness in outline. They also announce that they cast their type in an extra hard metal.
Mr. Austin appears to have been a man of considerable force and independence of character. It is related of him that once, on receiving—what to any founder at that day must have been a momentous mandate—an intimation that The Times wanted to see him, he replied, with an audacity which sends a shudder even through a later generation, “that if The Times wanted to see him, he supposed it knew where to find him!”
On the death of Mr. Austin, his foundry was acquired by Mr. R. M. Wood, who subsequently, in partnership with Messrs. Samuel and Thomas Sharwood, transferred it to 120 Aldersgate Street, under the title of the Austin Letter Foundry. Messrs. Wood and Sharwoods’ first specimen was issued in 1839. In their preface, reference is again made to the late Mr. Austin’s hard metal, the superiority of which, it is stated, “was owing to one peculiar article being used in the mixture which is unknown to our brethren in the Art.”
Mr. Wood died in 1845, and the firm subsequently became S. and T. Sharwood, who, in 1854, published two specimens, one of Types, the other of Polytyped Metal Ornaments.
This latter collection had been begun more than twenty years previously by Vizitelly, Branston & Co.,[747] who, in 1832, had issued a specimen of Cast Metal {361} Ornaments, “produced by a new improved method.” This method appears to have consisted of the soldering of the casts on metal mounts—at that time a novelty. The Sharwoods subsequently acquired this collection of blocks and considerably increased it.
On the death of the two Sharwoods, which occurred about the same time in 1856, the Austin Foundry was thrown into Chancery and put up for auction, and its contents dispersed among the trade.