Collecting Co-op Societies ..... no. 7....... The Failsworth Industrial Society

Now I have just added another co-op society to my Co-op Hall of Fame.

Failsworth Industrial Society Limited, 2022

It is The Failsworth Industrial Society which was formed in 1859, with a co-operative grocery shop opening in Dob Lane on 28th March 1859. 

“Its first members were William Fletcher, James Taylor, Jock Whitehead, William Barlow, Charles Cordow, James Robinson, Robert Barlow, Thomas Hayes, Tom Taylor, Jonathan Taylor, Josiah Etchells, Ben Aldred, James Winterbotton and James Smith. Thomas Hayes played a prominent part in the establishment of the Failsworth Industrial Society and became the first Secretary of the Society. 

He drew up the rules for the Society based on those of the Rochdale Equitable Pioneers Society”*

The Graver Lane store, 2022

And in the fullness of time I think I will go looking for these fourteen co-op pioneers.  

For now I shall just reflect that “it set up a laundry business in 1908, which would join with 10 other local societies in 1913 and this federal enterprise would grow to be the United Co-operative Laundries. 

The Society was also a partner in the formation of the Manchester and District Funeral Association and in 1932 joined forces with four other retail societies and the CWS in establishing the United Co-operative Dairies”.*

Our shop was opened in the Society's Golden Jubilee in 1909 when it had nearly 10,000 members and operated 43 shops. 

And it easy to forget that co-op societies were not just trading organizations, but had a wide range of cultural activities, including its own political party. 

The Failsworth Society had opened a library in 1873 and in 1909 it's valuable collection of 20,000 books was passed to the local Council as a nucleus to the first public library.

All of which has come from a most interesting history of the society produced by Jisc Archives Hub, which offers up the full history of the society, along with links to where its archives can be found and a select bibliography.

The Graver Lane store, 1960

Leaving me just to thank Andy Robertson who took these two pictures of the Graver Lane branch as was in Newton Heath.

Location; Failsworth

Pictures; former Graver Lane Co-op store, Newton Heath, 2022, from the collection of Andy Robertson, and in 1960, T Brooks, m35568, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

* The Failsworth Industrial Society,  Jisc Archives Hub https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/search/archives/e6180c09-f6ab-3211-9c51-d688f328f48f