As part of our 150
th anniversary, we have been searching through our archive to discover as much as we can about Redmayne Bentley’s history and John Redmayne’s story. This includes the investments he was making when he first set up as a Stockbroker on his own at the Leeds Stock Exchange back in 1875, with an aim to provide an excellent service to his clients.
He commuted in his horse and carriage from Grosvenor Road to Albion Street, with all his important documents and ledger in his ‘John Redmayne Box’. By the time John had joined the Stock Exchange, Leeds was booming and Park Row was already the hub of Leeds’s finance sector.
From his ledger, it was clear that John studied the local newspaper forensically, cutting and pasting any industry that was doing well to invest in and, after a few years of overseas investing, John’s day-to-day trading balanced out. Investment choices were now in transport, engineering, printing and ready-to-wear clothing had come to the forefront. Our founder made investments in John Barran and Sons, a Leeds company which was a pioneer of ready-to-wear clothing, creating mass produced garments. John Barran, a Londoner who moved to Leeds, originally opened a tailors near Briggate, but his business grew rapidly and he soon employed over 3,000 workers and had 20 factories. He was the first person to use the bandsaw to cut multiple layers of cloth, speeding up his production time. With his growing success he built a new factory and warehouse near Park Square (St. Paul’s House), which is still there today.
Another company found in John Redmayne’s clippings was Petty and Sons Ltd, a Leeds-based printer which opened in the 1860s and grew to be the first UK printer to install colour web offset presses.
The appearance for ‘public transport’, initially private horse buses offered John a new avenue for investment and he saw the financial potential of the ‘Tramway Revolution” and traded shares in Leeds, Lincoln, Leicester, Colne, Morecambe, Sheffield and Liverpool.
While transport was a large portion of his portfolio, the list of UK investments included gas companies, a brewery and a football club! Clifford Stead, a local Historian who has been helping us with our research said
“John Redmayne I regarded as a 21st century man living in the 19th century in the 1890s, investing in new tech of the time like electricity, transport and ready-to-wear clothing. He did all the right research at the time for potential investors in the city to basically buy shares in transport links, energy suppliers, and all the latest works, so he was very much a trailblazer for Leeds at that time.”
From two of John’s quotes below, we can see the ever-lasting volatility of investing, but our priorities remain much as they did when John Redmayne first set foot inside the Stock Exchange. While we may have grown, we are still resolutely focused on what we do best, providing a personal service for our clients.
“With regards to business I am delighted to inform you that the last six weeks, it has been as good as it gets. A great revival has taken place in the American railway market brought about by the splendid harvest prospects in that country” – A letter written by John, October 1891
“Most anxious time on the stock markets” – A letter written by John, October 1890
Further details on the Redmayne Bentley’s 150th Anniversary can be found here:
https://www.redmayne.co.uk/about/150th-anniversary.