Victoria Foundry - Paragon Foundry

Victoria Foundry

later the Paragon Foundry, Victoria Road



This page began when I was sent a photograph of a manhole cover (see Gallery) that sits in the car park of the Quicksilver Mail.

There is very little information concerning Fisher & Swain, or the Victoria Foundry. Indeed, the only reference I found was an advertisement placed in the 24 April 1925 edition of the Western Gazette in which Fisher & Swain, Engineers of Victoria Road, were advertising motor parts.

It would seem that the name changed from the Victoria Foundry to the Paragon Foundry during the mid-1920s. It was sold off in the late 1950s and by 1960 was the premises of Victoria Engineering Co (Yeovil) Ltd. of the Paragon Foundry.

There is no information beyond 1960.

 

Yeovilians remember...

Many thanks to Val Le Poidevin, who wrote "I've had a reply from my old school friend Margaret Dean, we started at Pen Mill School together in 1940. Her father was the manager of the Victoria Foundry, or Paragon Foundry as it was known when her father took over. The Paragon was one of three foundries owned by a Mr Baker. One was in Bridport and one at Portland Bill. Originally Mr Dean, a blacksmith fitter worked at Bridport, where his wife's uncle worked and who presumably got him the job there. He lived in Honiton and cycled to Bridport on a Sunday, staying with his wife's Uncle George and cycled back home on Saturday. This would have been the mid 1920's. The person who owned the two Dorset Foundries acquired the Yeovil one around that time and Mr Dean was offered the Managership. That's how the family came to move to Yeovil around 1927. Margaret visited all three foundries, especially Portland, as her dad helped with the casting. He retired through ill health in 1957. Soon after, the Foundry was sold off to a Mr Sparrow [this was Eric Sparrow] of the Vita Ray Laundry for his retirement."

 

 


gallery

 


Courtesy of John Penny

The manhole cover that sits in the car park of the Quicksilver Mail.

 

An advertisement in the 20 August 1960 edition of the Taunton Courier, placed by Victoria Engineering Co (Yeovil) Ltd. of the Paragon Foundry.