Expect the unexpected...

Following on from my post earlier this week on patents, I came across a collection dating between 1825-1890s in the records of Old Castle Tinplate Company.

They don�t contain much informational value, other than the name of the patentee, occupation, brief description of invention, money involved, time period and date. They are, however, visually very striking, written on large parchment, with decorative borders and attached royal seals. 

Surprisingly one of the letters patent was for a Gustav Scheurmann, music publisher of Newgatestreet, London for the invention of �improvements in printing music when type is employed� in 1856. It was unexpected to find that the company would possess, and retain, this patent as it appears to have nothing to do with the business of tinplate. Our first thoughts were that Scheurmann could be one of the company directors, but there was no evidence of this. 

 After doing a little digging, we found reference to Guatav Scheurmann, in 1856, inventing a system of double printing of music, printing the staves and notes separately from moveable type.[1] So, we can presume that this system might have included tin in either the type or the equipment used for the printing.

Unfortunately, it seems the process never took off, and a few years later Gustav Scheurmann was facing bankruptcy: http://www.londongazette.co.uk/issues/22195/pages/4636/page.pdf

 

With some more research, I�m sure we could find out more about Scheurmann and his failed invention, but it does show how business collections have unexpected stories to tell.

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[1] Pg 68 Music engraving and printing: historical and technical treatise William Gamble. Ayer Publishing, 1972