Long Lost and Forgotten Occupations

From time to time my company are invited to attend at School Careers Evenings and we are more than happy to do so. This usually involves our preparation of a short powerpoint presentation about the Surveying Profession, a collection of enlarged photographs of some of the more interesting properties we have looked at in recent years, some frightening photographs of bad workmanship, rampant fungus or hazardous arrangements that defy all the laws of construction, physics and gravity and a few leaflets hurriedly obtained from our Professional Institution  outlining the broad range of actual work under the term of Surveying.

The typical event takes about 2 to 3 hours in the main school assembly hall or in a series of classrooms. We have a reasonable level of interest in what we have to offer although it is mainly the prompting and kettling action of parents that produces a vaguely interested child in front of us.

If I get a chance to trawl around the exhibitors I can clearly see what jobs are the current favourites amongst the 14 to 18 year old pupils attending. Top spot is always the legal profession followed by journalism, travel agency, sports therapy, accountancy , police force and armed services.

This will certainly be in sharp contrast to the league table of jobs, say at the equivalent school careers event of some 50 years ago where I would expect the top three positions to be taken up by Civil Servants, Teachers and Medical, with the armed forces and law still in the frame as a choice for a lifetime of employment. Go back some 80 years ago and I would expect the hierarchy to consist of Civil Servant either domestic or Commonwealth, Transport such as the Railways or Merchant Navy, Military, Engineering, Agriculture, Architecture and Law.

By way of actual research I have sourced the following list of forms of employment for Kingston Upon Hull from 1892. These come from a trade directory covering the main central city area which was at that time very densely populated with back to back terraces, numerous short off road terraces with a central footpath approach, larger town houses and the semi detached and detached villas of the better off. Some of the jobs are self explanatory but I have had to look up some of the terms which have been lost from public understanding over the ensuing century but were commonplace in the late Victorian period. The majority of the jobs are listed against male names although some will have been open to both men and women.

Sausage and skin dresser                            Bristle merchant                                 Letter carrier

Brick burner                                                 Rag merchant                                     Currier

Bird dealer                                                   Inventor & Patentee                           Seed crusher

Water Bailiff                                                Mast Maker                                       Wharfinger

Sail maker                                                    Lead grinder                                       Dry salter

Waterman                                                    Cooper                                                Cow keeper

Stamper G.P.O                                              Canvasser N.E.R                                Rullyman

Waggonette Proprietor                                 Stevedore                                          Tinner

Brass finisher                                                 Smack owner                                    Soot merchant

Lighterman                                                    Wardrobe dealer                              Oil Press Wrapper
                                                                                                                                            Maker

Tar distiller                                                     Corn Factor                                       Rate collector

Many of the jobs are specific to the maritime status of Hull as a trade and fishing port but are a very interesting insight into the life and times of our relatively near ancestors. The majority of the jobs have just died out although some do survive today in some guise or under a more technical description. 
A Rullyman was someone who worked the horse drawn carts onto which ships were unloaded. A job done for by containerisation of cargo. 
The job of a Soot Merchant has been described as collecting the waste from residences and then selling it to agriculture for spreading on the land being particularly good for forcing root vegetables. This job title also applied to the collection of night waste to be mixed into a very sticky mess.
A brick burner, usually a female occupation, had responsibility for maintaining the brick-firing kilns in the days when the excavation of clay and then manufacture of bricks was a very local operation. My late father in law remembers, when he was a child, the almost apocalyptic sight of the glow of brick kilns amongst the clay pits off Marfleet Lane in East Hull.

Some of the occupations were of the wealthier in the society of the time, the high flyers could be amongst the Master Mariners, Smack Owners, Wharfingers, Waggonette Proprietors and there was, of course,  no stopping those in the heady position of keeping their own cow.

(Smallprint.- yeah, yeah, another recycled effort from last year but one that needs another airing if ony to give an opportunity to speak loudly the lovely words in the job descriptions - very therapeutic)