Alf Harrison & Sons and Sawtells of Sherborne


I am indebted to Joy Osborne for supplying me with information on the two printing firms used by Johnsons of Hendon for their 'Home Photography' booklets during the 1950s and 1960s. Joy made contact with me while conducting family genealogy research relating to her grandfather, Alf Harrison, a printer in Leeds. If any member of the Harrison or Sawtell family similarly find their way to this web page, please contact me and I will try to put you in touch with Joy.

As far as Joy has been able to establish, there is no family connection between the two printing firms. It is unknown why Johnsons chose to work with these two firms, rather than staying with just the one, though it may simply have been a sensible desire to keep prices competitive.

Alfred Harrison, Joy's grandfather, was born in Leeds in 1852. He became a Master Printer (no doubt serving an apprenticeship) and began his own printing firm by 1880 in conjunction with Thomas Waide, who was a family friend or maybe closer, as Thomas was a witness at the wedding of Alf to his wife Alice Teale, in 1883.

One of Alf's sons was named Waide, presumably after Thomas. The association between Harrison and Waide persisted both in Leeds and Harrogate into the first decade of the 20th century. Unfortunately, by 1915 Alf had succomb to a heart condition and died in Harrogate, in 1916.

Alf's eldest son, Alfred Edward, born Harrogate 1885, was already working with Alf before 1915 and when Alf senior died, Alf jnr. kept the business going with the help of a brother (we know their were 10 siblings, including Joy's father). Alfred Edward died in 1961 and currently that is the end of the family information. However, we know that the printing firm of Alf Harrison & Sons Ltd (the Ltd title appears in the Leeds directory for 1947) survived into the late 1970s as they are recorded at 224 Burley Road, Leeds, in Yellow Pages for 1978, the same address as in the 1947 directory.

Joseph Cullen Sawtell was born about 1861 in Sherborne, Dorset, son of Walter Sawtell, a butcher. His mother was named Anne. Joseph started a printing business in the early 1880s. Firstly the firm was situated in The Parade and later in Yeovil Road, Dorset, with a partner named A.T. Sawtell, possibly Alfred Sawtell, Joseph's younger brother. The firm stayed in Yeovil Road until at least 1939, by which time it had become a Ltd company, but there is no longer mention of either Joseph or A.T. Sawtell (by then they would have been aged 78 and 74 respectively). However, clearly the family firm survived post-WW2 as the earlier editions of 'Home Photography', from the late 1940s to the late 1950s, were printed by Sawtells of Sherborne and the penultimate edition was also printed by them, around 1968. Then, as late as 1987, they published the Paterson 'Book of Photography' and 'Book of the Darkroom'.