Page 209 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

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In the Five Towns.
from Manchester, Newcastle, and London, was an obvious and
necessary centralisation. Small premises were rented, therefore, at
Longton, the southernmost of the Five Towns. A little later the
C.VV.S. sought to buy land for building upon, but the negotiations
fell through, and it was not until the end of 1888 that a purchase
was made at King Street, Fenton. Here, upon part of the plot,
the depot buildings were erected, and eventually again and again
extended. Ten years later a decorating department was added, and
a kiln built for the work of finishing. Two more kilns were brought
into use later. The Potteries was for a long time perhaps the most
provincial of England's innermost parts. Although then as now it
produced delicate and beautiful wares, and exported them over the
globe, the district itself outwardly was squalid, mean, broken up
into separate communities, and peopled with poorly-paid workers,
the despair alike of the trade unionist and the co-operator. Even
yet, with moorlands on the east, a purely agricultural country to
the west, and a local railway system of its own. it is still a rather
isolated region, comparative! j'^ difficult of access from Manchester
and Birmingham. But the amalgamation of its towns in one
important county borough is significant of a new spirit, and the
union of its co-operative forces under the title of the Burslem and
District Co-operative Society, with the subsequent progress of that
society, show that the workers of the Potteries mean in the future
to strive for their full inheritance.^ Meanwhile, the C.W.S. at
Longton has developed a big purchasing centre that not only has
become to some extent a pottery itself, but has consistently striven
to minimise the evil of lead glazing. It has used its purchasing
power to support the better employers only, has stocked leadless
glaze ware, and preferred, where possible, pots made by processes
in which lead is used least.
This last claim was challenged, but unsuccessfully, in 1892.
About that time Mr. A. Brownfield, a partner in an old-established
firm at Cobridge that at one time had occupied a leading position,
succeeded in converting the business into a copartnership society
or, as he named it attractively, a Guild Pottery. Pressure afterwards
was exercised upon the C.W.S. to obtain a support for the Brownfield
Guild Pottery, which Mr. Rhodes, then as now the C.VV.S. buyer at
Longton, on business grounds, did not by any means feel justified
• The flrot society established under the joint propaganda scheme of the
Co-operative Union and the C.VV..S. (see page 168) was at Longton. Helped from
the depot, through its branches eventually it became strong, amalgamating with
the Burslem Society only because of success leading to overlapping.
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