page_title: B. Hick and Sons
section_title: Diversification
hierarchical_section_title: B. Hick and Sons / Diversification
caption_attribution_description: English: Ink photograph of William Hargreaves of Hick Hargreaves and Company
context_page_description: B. Hick and Sons, subsequently Hick, Hargreaves & Co, was a British engineering company based at the Soho Ironworks in Bolton, England. Benjamin Hick, a partner in Rothwell, Hick and Rothwell, later Rothwell, Hick & Co., set up the company in partnership with two of his sons, John and Benjamin in 1833.
  Benjamin Jr left the company after a year for a partnership in a Liverpool company, possibly George Forrester & Co. In 1840 he filed a patent governor for B. Hick and Son using an Egyptian winged motif, that featured on the front page of Mechanics' Magazine.
  Hick's youngest son William served as an apprentice millwright, engineer in the company from 1834 and a 'fitter' from 1837, he was listed as an iron founder in 1843 with his eldest brother John.
context_section_description: About 1885 Hick Hargreaves & Co became associated with Sebastian Ziani de Ferranti during the reconstruction of the Grosvenor Gallery and began to manufacture steam engines for power generation including those of Ferranti's Deptford Power Station, the largest power station in the world at the time.
  In 1908 the company was licensed to build uniflow engines. From 1911 the company began the manufacture of large diesel engines, however these did not prove successful and were eventually discontinued.  Boiler production finished in 1912. During World War I the company was involved in war work, producing mines, 6 and 9.2 inch shells and oil engines for submarines.
  In the early hours 26 September 1916, the works were targeted  by Zeppelin L 21; a bomb missed passing through the roof of nearby Holy Trinity Church.
  The company's recoil gear for the Vickers 18 pounder quick firing gun was so successful that by war's end a significant part of the factory was devoted to its production. Civil manufacture was not suspended entirely and in 1916 the firm began making two-stage steam jet air ejectors and high vacuum condensing plant for power generation. Its production was greatly expanded as centralised power generation was adopted in Great Britain, by the formation of the Central Electricity Board (CEB) in 1926.
  After the war the firm entered a contract with the Vulcan Motor & Engineering Co of Southport for 1000 20 hp petrol engines, but work was discontinued in 1922 when Vulcan became bankrupt, with only 150 completed.
  As the steam turbine replaced reciprocating steam engines Hick Hargreaves' development continued, by 1927 its engine work was principally steam turbines for electricity generating stations and the company became a major supplier to the CEB.
  During the 1930s Hick, Hargreaves acquired the records, drawings and patterns of four defunct steam engine manufacturers: J & E Wood, John Musgrave & Sons Limited, Galloways Limited and Scott & Hodgson Limited. As a consequence it made a lucrative business out of repairs and the supply of spare parts during the Great Depression. Large stationary steam engines were still in use the many cotton mills in the Bolton area until the collapse of the industry after World War II.
  3 and 4-cylinder triple expansion marine steam engines were built during the 1940s, post-war the company expanded its work in electricity generation, again becoming a major supplier to the CEB and branched out into food processing, oil refining and offshore oil equipment production, continuing to supply vacuum equipment to the chemical and petrochemical industries. By 2000 its products included compressors, industrial blowers, refrigeration equipment and liquid ring motors.
caption: Entrepreneur, William Hargreaves JP c.1880, from a Photograph by Alex Bassano 25 Old Bond St. W. "Ink-Photo." Sprague & Co. London. Inscribed Mr Hargreaves Moss Bank Halliwell Bolton[71][66]
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