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"Old Bricks - history at your feet"
Foreign bricks
The naming of bricks was not only a British custom, below are a few I have been sent from foreign parts.
India
Frank Lawson sent this photo of a brick which came from Delhi. Frank writes: ' I am told that the initials RBF stand for Ram Building Fund and that the bricks were subscribed for by the public to fund the building of a temple. The swastika is a Hindu religious symbol which is thought to be auspicious and is often found on Indian bricks as it is supposed to bring good fortune'.
China
David Kitching writes: Having never previously seen a Chinese brick with a name in the frog, I was surprised to find this example amidst demolished housing in the centre of Beipiao, Liaoning Province, North-east China. The spelling is an alternative pinyin version of the town name.
Chile
The most southerly produced brick on the website by far! Robert Runyard writes:
This brick was found in the vicinity of the freezer works in Puerto Bories here in southern Chile. The city of Punta Arenas indicated on this brick is located on the straits of Magellan about 150 miles south of the brick discovery location. The shallow impression of the letters makes it difficult to read the first name in the upper left but the word MARCOU is related to an early French resident and investor in this region around the beginning of the 20th century. Among Marcou's other industries (besides brick manufacturing) he was involved in lumber mills and the earliest petroleum exploration in this region.
Chile was not known for extensive use of brick, but the extreme south was influenced perhaps more by European practices than by the distant central region of the country. During an uprising in 1877 nearly all the (wooden) buildings in the regional centre of Punta Arenas were destroyed by fire, and thus the authorities sought to reconstruct the city at least in part with brick. Unfortunately, the first attempt at brickworks fell victim to one of Chile's frequent earthquakes, in 1879. In 1892, Mauricio Braun, the most important business owner in the region at the time, imported brick from Uruguay for the construction of his "palace" on that city's main square. The success and need to emulate such "modern" and more civilised (and functional, for the region) brick construction surely incited Alejo Marcou's development of the brickworks ("Alejo Marcou i Co") and this represented the first successful production for this region.
Lota Green
Another one found by Robert Runyard near a now closed animal processing and freezer complex in Puerto Bories in Chilean Patagonia. Lota is known as one of Chile's few coal-producing areas (the mines have been closed for years) and it is located near Concepción in southern Chile. The "Lota Green" brickworks (officially "Refractarios Lota-Green Limitada") were founded in 1854. By 1863 this brickworks was providing 2 million bricks a year. The factory went on to produce ceramic dishware, tile, clay pipe, electrical insulators and similar objects. Many of the ceramic items became well known throughout Chile particularly for their "Art Nouveau" style, though the ceramics portion of the factory closed in 1951 while the brick-making continued until about 1997. In recent years the brickworks were purchased by Global Industrial Technologies, for their refractory products division.
France
It seems the hobby is thriving in France as well, here are two examples submitted by Fabien:
Simon Patterson photographed these three French examples in Coulommiers in north central France.
Pourchot, Passavant
Found in France and made at Passavant-la-Rochere, Haute-Saone. Image PRBCO.
French penal colony bricks
Thanks to Christian Clavel for these three photos of bricks used in the infamous French penal colonies in French Guyana. These colonies were made famous by Henri Charriere and the film based on his experiences: 'Papillon'.
Administration Penitentiaire ( St Jean du Maroni)
Administration Penitentiaire (St Laurent du Maroni)
H.R for hopital de la reclusion
Russia
An M.T.Strelin brick found in St Petersburg by Vladimir N Smirnov. This is a very famous brickyard est. 1875 and the whole Strelin's family (the father and later 2 sons) owned 3 different brick plants around St.Petersburg. Vladimir has a collection of over 800 Russian bricks found in the St Petersburg area. The bricks all pre date the 1917 Revolution after which the name stamping of bricks ended. His website may be viewed here, it is in the Russian language.
U. S. A
David Kitching writes: A visit to the former Hathern Station Brickworks in Leicestershire yielded a surprise in this brick which is a product of the Harry Brigham & Bros yard on the Hudson River at East Kingston, New York state. Brickmaking commenced here in 1904. How did it come to be in the UK? The answer is that there is still design undertaken here for terracotta restoration work and the brick was attached to the back of a piece that had been shipped over from a building in New York so that a replacement could be made by Shaws of Darwen who maintain a design section here after the demise of the Hathern operation when Ibstock closed the site.
I found the above in a Welsh slate quarry. I understand it is an American brick made by the Robinson Sewer Pipe Company of New York, thanks to Fred Rieck for the information. How it ended up in North Wales is another matter.
Washburn
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An American brick found by Robert Runyard in southern Argentina. A long way from where it was made on the Hudson River.
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