Finding your ancestor worked for – or better yet owned – a business can be a gold mine of information. Even knowing an ancestor’s occupation, if not the business they worked for, opens up information that fleshes out their lives, much more that basic dates and places.
The business itself may have left records behind – things such as reports, employee records, and more. It may not have been big – if your ancestor had a trade or skill, they may have run a small business with just a few others, or even by themselves.
Old newspapers could be a gold mine. Did the business advertise their services or products? Did they advertise for employees? Was the business ever reviewed or reported about? In the article below my great great grandfather William Pummeroy, who ran his own small business as a plasterer, advertised for a labourer to work for him in the Argus on Wednesday 23 September 1864.
Similarly, my ancestor John Thompson Argent, of Newbridge Mill near Colchester in Essex, England, advertised for a new employee in the Suffolk and Essex Free Press on Thursday 22 June 1865. Interestingly, the advertisement specifies that the applicant must be able to drive a steam engine, highlighting the direction in which the business must be moving.
Two men, years apart, taking care of business by seeking new employees.
