Mason

Mason, SIR JOSIAH, manufacturer and philanthropist, born at Kidderminster, 23d February 1795, began life by selling cakes on the street, and after turning his hand to various employments took over the split-ring business of Mr Harrison (1822) at Birmingham. He began to make pens in 1829 for Perry & Co., and his business increased till he became the largest pen-maker in the world. Partner with Elkington in the electro-plating trade (1842-65), he gave Dr (afterwards Sir) C. W. Siemens his first start in life by paying him £1600 for a patent; and he paid Krupp, founder of the works at Essen, £10,000 for the patent for machinery to roll the metal 'blanks' from which spoons and forks are made. Mason erected and endowed almshouses, and an orphanage at Erdington, at a cost of £260,000, and was the founder of the Josiah Mason College at Birmingham. He died at Erdington, June 16, 1881. See the Memoir by J. T. Bunce (1890).