History: Mudgee A E Thomas and Company Australian Tannery
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1896
24 October 1986
24 October 1896
Messrs. A. E. Thomas and Company's Australian Tannery was established by the present proprietor some forty years ago. In 1880 a boot factory, in which twenty-five hands are regularly employed, was added to the business, and later on the now well-known Boot Palace stepped into the current of Mudgee commerce. All told, this firm employs about thirty-eight hands, and is a very large purchaser of all kinds of skins. An average of ninety-five hides pass through the tannery every week, and large quantities of kip, tweed, yearling, calf, and kangaroo leathers are manufactured. The machinery, which is complete throughout, is driven by an 8 h.p. engine, and includes a large steamroller for hardening and finishing heavy leathers. This was recently erected by Pullin and Company, of Melbourne, at very heavy expense, and has exercised a very beneficial influence on the trade. Indeed, so highly are the products of this tannery estimated, the proprietors invariably command the topmost figures in the metropolitan market, some of the heavy buyers even asking to be informed of the dispatch of consignments. In the boot factory nothing but local leathers are used, and a ready sale is found for all the goods turned out. In this department many orders to measure are fulfilled, Mr. Thomas even receiving letters from former patrons, now resident in other colonies, requesting to be supplied1
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1905
6 September 1905