I remember something somebody once said to me. “We have ELO (Electric Light Orchestra), ELP (Emerson Lake and Palmer), and ELR (Eadon Lockwood and Riddle).”
The last one was meant as a joke, but it showed the strength of a local business that was founded almost two centuries ago.
The firm of Eadon and Lockwood was founded in 1840 by William Henry and John Alfred Eadon, the second and third sons of George Eadon, a well known cabinet maker.
The business was carried on as W.H. and J.A. Eadon, auctioneers, valuers and share brokers for some years at Fargate in part of the premises that we refer to today as Coles Corner.
In 1855, they moved to new premises at No. 2 St James Street, which were built on the site of the old Sheffield Parish Church vicarage by George William Travis, known in his day as a builder and contractor, who subsequently sold it to tenants.
William Henry Eadon died in 1876, after being in failing health for five years, and his son, William Mitchell Eadon, who had joined the business in 1867, became a partner, and eventual head of the firm. Vincent Percy Eadon, the son of J.A. Eadon subsequently joined the business.
J.A. Eadon retired about 1880 and died shortly afterwards.
The business carried on under the same name until 1887, when, although the partnership continued, the stock-broking part of the business was separated, and attended to by Vincent Percy Eadon until his death in 1900, after which date William Mitchell Eadon carried on their auction and valuation business as sole partner until joined in 1917 by Joseph Cyril Lockwood, who married his daughter.
He was the grandson of Joseph Lockwood, and second son of William Lockwood of Lockwood Brothers (another auctioneer and well-known amateur cricketer). William Mitchell Eadon had already been in business with Lockwood (and Ernest Dutchmann) as a stock and share broker but this had been dissolved in 1912.
Eadon and Lockwood covered a wide range, including many extensive sales of machinery, while, after the First World War, a succession of sales for the Disposals Board was entrusted to them, the amount of money raised reaching nearly half-a-million pounds.
Art sales also formed a part of the firm’s activities including collections by Richard Bayley, Henry Elliott Hoole, William Turner, W.H. Crowley, and the Craven collection. Among important sales of property were the estate of Robert Younge in the 1870s and the Duke of Norfolk estate.
Sales of antique furniture, silver plate, and other objects occupied a prominent place in the firm’s operations.
The Eadon and Lockwood partnership was dissolved in 1933, and a new company formed when John Tharratt Riddle, the younger son of J.C. Riddle of Grindleford, joined the firm. He had previously been articled to a firm of Sleaford auctioneers and the Sheffield connection probably came through his father who was head of silversmiths Walker and Hall Ltd.
Over the following years, ELR became one of the region’s biggest and most trusted estate agents, as well as operating the auction house business.
The St James Street building was sold in 2001 and obtained by the Blue Moon Cafe looking for somewhere larger after their initial Norfolk Row premises were proving too small. Refurbishment was by Burnell Briercliffe Architects. Blue Moon Cafe closed in January 2023.
ELR auctions continued at the Nichols Building at Shalesmoor and in 2010, now independent to the estate agent business, underwent a substantial programme of expansion, constructing a modern, purpose-built saleroom, re-branding, and becoming the Sheffield Auction Gallery at Windsor Road, Meersbrook.
The estate agency business was sold to Abaco for £4m in 1987 and would form the regional office of Lambert Smith Hampton in 1988, and was one of the few acquisitions that was allowed to trade under its own name.
It was forced to downsize either side of the millennium, and in 2006, a new independent company was created called Eadon Lockwood and Riddle Ltd, and still maintains its Sheffield connection as the city’s longest established estate agent.
© 2024 David Poole. All Rights Reserved
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