James Hartley was born in 1811 in Dumbarton
and went on to own the largest glassworks in Sunderland of the
nineteenth century. His father had worked in glassworks in
several parts of Britain, at Smethwick near Birmingham he went
into partnership with Chance & Co. They went on to produce
crown glass and German sheet glass. In 1833 Hartley senior
died and in 1836 James and his brother John, left Smethwick
and moved to Sunderland.
In 1837 James and John started their own business, Hartley's
Wear Glassworks, off Trimdon Street, near the eastern end of
Hylton Road. In the coming years Hartley Wear Glassworks
improved the manufacture of crown glass and in 1847 they
patented a new process for making rolled plate glass. It was
Hartley's plate glass which was ideal for roofing that was
largely responsible for the company's success.
Hartley Wear Glassworks were also one of the earliest
companies in the world to produce coloured glass which was
used mainly in churches. James Hartley would occasionally make
a gift of entire windows to local churches. One example was
the large geometrical window in Park Road Methodist Church,
Sunderland in 1887. Its value was £125.00.
By the 1860's Hartley Wear Glassworks were employing 700 men.
They were supplying one third of all the plate glass being
used in the country, along with a large export trade. It was
in 1868 when James Hartley retired from the management of the
glassworks, he was replaced by his son, John. In 1877 while on
a two day stay in Sunderland former president of America,
Ulysses Simpson Grant was shown around Hartley's Glassworks on
the afternoon of 25th September.
After his father retired things started to slow down at the
glassworks as John did not have his fathers abilities. While
Hartley's two main competitors Chances near Birmingham and
Pilkingtons in St. Helen's had begun using better methods of
production, by converting from coal to gas-fired furnaces,
Hartley's did not make the change until 1891. Since the 1870's
Hartley's had begun to suffer, from several strikes, bad
industrial relations and also from their competition.
When the firm faced even more competition from abroad
especially from Belgium, Hartley Wear Glassworks had to close
down in 1894. In 1896 the buildings were dismantled so that
the land could be redeveloped for housing. A year before the
closure of the glassworks the grandson of the founder also
named James Hartley, had gone into partnership with Alfred
Wood making stained glass at the Portobello Lane Works.
The founder of the glassworks did not live to see the closure
of his factory but James had led a full and active life. After
arriving in Sunderland in 1836 he not only opened the largest
glassworks he went on to become a town councillor from 1842,
and Mayor of Sunderland in 1851, 1853 and 1862. While he was
the Mayor in 1851 he helped promote the town improvement act.
James was also the River Wear Commissioner and he encouraged
the railway development in Sunderland and became a director of
the North East Railway Company. James was a conservative M.P.
for Sunderland from 1865 to 1868. In 1871 he was a founder
member of the Sunderland School Board and its first chairman.
James also paid for the building of Ashbrooke Hall on
Ashbrooke Road, though it was later renamed Corby Hall in
1864. James Hartley died on the 24th May 1886 in London and
left an estate worth £147,623
