page_title: L. P. Lawrence
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: L. P. Lawrence / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Drawing of two storey building in Grenfell Street, Adelaide designated William Cameron's Virginia Tobacco Factory
context_page_description: Laurie Phillip Lawrence was a businessman and philanthropist in South Australia.
context_section_description: Lawrence was born in Dover, England, and was educated at Wanstall's academy, Chatham, Kent.
  At the age of 15 he left for Australia and the Victorian gold diggings, but had little success. He worked as clerk and storeman on a sheep station near Bathurst and at a softgoods warehouse in Melbourne, where in 1862 he married, before moving to New Zealand, where the Otago Gold Rush was under way. If he went prospecting success once again eluded him, but he stayed in Dunedin for three years. Somehow that did not work out, and he returned to Australia.
  Back in Melbourne, he found employment as a travelling salesman for I. Jacobs & Co., wholesale tobacconists.
  In 1875 he was appointed manager of their Brisbane office, which was at the time an offshoot of their Sydney branch. He either found that arrangement unsatisfactory, or the climate, and was given management of their Adelaide office, which traded as Feldheim, Jacobs & Co.
  The company became Jacobs, Hart, & Co. (Adelaide) in 1883, and Lawrence became a partner in the Adelaide firm. In 1888 the Melbourne partnership of Isaac Jacobs (c. 1835–1914) and Alfred David Hart (c. 1849–1928) was dissolved, and Jacobs withdrew from the Adelaide firm, which became Hart, Lawrence & Co., whose establishment included  Wm. Cameron & Company's Virginia Tobacco Factory, Grenfell Street, near Hindmarsh Square; Wm. Cameron & Co. being an American company, the factory having been established by Feldheim, Jacobs, & Co. in 1876.
  His son Philip M. Lawrence was manager of the factory.
  In 1890 Lawrence and son Philip settled a strike by tobacco workers and in 1896 Hart and Lawrence restructured the business as Hart, Lawrence, & Co. Pty, Ltd, with Lawrence as Managing Director. and later still as the States Tobacco Company.
  In 1900, with the certain prospect of Federation and the abolition of inter-state duties, there was no longer any advantage to companies having separate factories in each State, and the three Adelaide tobacco factories (Wm. Cameron & Co., H. R. Dixson, and Dungey, Ralph & Co.) sought to cut costs by reducing the men's wages. The unions called a strike, whereupon the owners closed the South Australian factories, and Hart & Lawrence became solely a wholesale outlet for the Victorian manufacturers.
  Lawrence retired as a director of States Tobacco in 1904, having been for 20 years closely associated with the mercantile life of South Australia. He was
  a committee member, Adelaide Chamber of Commerce, 1882–1907, and served as its president in 1882 and 1889–90.
  a longtime member of the South Australian Chamber of Manufactures, [1901 1906] for 23 years a member of its committee, and president in 1902–03, and helped organise four of its Exhibitions [1905].
  a member of the General Manufactures Committee organising the Adelaide Jubilee International Exhibition
  a member, Employers' Union of South Australia [1890]
  a director, SA Brewing Company in 1912.
  a director of the Permanent Equitable Building and Investment Society, [1887]
  for 45 years a member of the South Australian Commercial Travellers and Warehousemen's Association, a trustee and vice-patron,"Needles". Chronicle. South Australia. 25 June 1898. p. 4. Retrieved 5 May 2020 – via Trove. was granted life membership, and served as president 1881–84.
  a foundation member and trustee of the Justices' Association, and had served as JP from March 1887.
  He was active in a range of philanthropic movements: he was
  a member, Boys Brigade committee 1886–
  a member, Adelaide Children's Hospital [1891] board of management, and served as its Vice-President.
  in 1892 a founding member of Lady Kintore Cottages committee
  a member of the Adelaide Benevolent and Strangers' Friend Society and for many years honorary treasurer.
  on the committee of Minda and the Home for Incurables
  a member of the St John Ambulance Association.
  On the social and sporting side he was
  for many years hon. treasurer of the Adelaide Jewish Congregation.
  a member of the Adelaide Literary Society and the Zoological Society
  a life member of the Adelaide Bowling Club
  president of the Nort
caption: Cameron's Virginia Tobacco Factory
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