Thomas Ferens
Encyclopedia
Thomas Robinson Ferens was a British politician, a philanthropist, and an industrialist. He was the Member of Parliament
for Hull East
for 13 years, and served the city as a Justice of the Peace
and as High Steward. He helped establish Reckitt & Sons, a manufacturer of household goods, as one of Kingston upon Hull’s
foremost businesses. His career with the company spanned 61 years—from his initial employment as a confidential and shorthand clerk until his death, as chairman, in 1930.
In the House of Commons, Ferens spoke to further the cause of Women's Rights
. He supported women's suffrage
at home, and repeatedly drew attention to the trafficking of women and girls in the colonies. But never a great orator, and by nature a retiring man, much of his work at Westminster was completed in the committee rooms, away from the limelight. He did not seek re-election after being unseated in acrimonious campaign in 1918.
A devout Wesleyan Methodist
, Ferens made numerous charitable donations throughout his life. His gifts to Hull include the Ferens Art Gallery
and a donation of £250,000 for the establishment of University College (now the University of Hull
). He is memorialized in the University's motto: Lampada Ferens. In other parts of the country he made substantial donations to schools, hospitals and charitable organisations.
, County Durham. He was the third of the seven children of George Waller Ferens (1817–1893), a flour miller, and his wife, Anne, née Jackson.
After attending Bishop Auckland private school until the age of thirteen, he found employment as a clerk in the Shildon office of the mineral department of the Stockton and Darlington Railway
. Six years later, he left home for Stockton where he worked as a clerk to Head, Wrightson & Co.
A committed autodidact, he taught himself grammar, arithmetic, mechanics, and shorthand. At weekends he taught at Sunday School
and enjoyed playing cricket. In 1868, after working in Stockton for two years, he left to take up a post as a confidential shorthand clerk to James Reckitt of Reckitt & Sons in Kingston upon Hull.
Till Ferens, like Thomas, was a Liberal and stood for the Liberal Party at Gainsborough in the 1935 General Election.
, in 1840 and was now run by his sons, also Quakers, George (1825–1900), Francis (1827–1917) and James (1833–1924).
Ferens was industrious and forward-thinking; he moved swiftly through the company's managerial ranks. In 1874 he became Works Manager with a share in profits; in 1879, Secretary; in 1880, General Manager. He joined the board of directors in 1888 when Reckitt & Sons became a private joint-stock company. When James Reckitt died, 36 years later, Ferens was named joint chairman.
Under the guidance of Ferens and James Reckitt, the company flourished, becoming one of the most successful in the city. It opened offices in London and New York and expanded into pharmaceuticals—a natural progression from its disinfectants business.
Dettol
was launched in 1932.
In 1894 Ferens was appointed a Justice of the Peace
. In 1911 he was made a Freeman
of the City of Hull. He entered parliament as Liberal member for Hull East in 1906 after an unsuccessful bid for the same seat six years earlier. In 1912 King George V
appointed him to the Privy Council, and in the same year he became High Steward of Hull.
He was not a frequent speaker in parliament but he chaired several committees and was a member of the Inter-Parliamentary Union prior to the First World War. Hansard, the printed record of parliamentary debates, records that his first parliamentary contribution related to schools in orphan homes, and his last to the health of troops in Palestine.
A recurrent theme in Ferens' parliamentary contributions is Women's Rights. In 1910 he presented a petition in favour of the enfranchisement of women. In 1912, when the House discussed an allegedly inflammatory speech by Emmeline Pankhurst
, Ferens wondered whether her speech might have been influenced by the "example of some Privy counsellors." The following year, he asked several questions regarding slave-trading in women; including the trade in West African women, and the trade of European and Japanese women to India. In 1917 he questioned the Home Secretary on the role of women in the police force.
Ferens' personal and religious convictions are evident in other of his parliamentary contributions. He tabled a number of questions concerning temperance, both at home and in the colonies. His first question in the Commons was about orphan schools. He later asked about railway accidents to children, and about trafficking of young girls in India.
In 1915 Ferens opened a parliamentary debate on the increase in the cost of living caused by the war, which was "causing much hardship, especially to the poor." He noted that "Many labourers' families have now to be content, owing to the high price of the necessaries of life, with one meal of meat in the week." In replying, the Prime Minister, Herbert Asquith, agreed that prices were high but he felt they were not as high as might have been expected considering the scale of the global conflict. He remarked that the current high prices were not without precedent, even in peacetime; the price of coal was no higher than it had been in 1875.
Ferens also intervened on behalf of his constituency and its inhabitants. In April 1913 he drew the attention of the Postmaster-General to the case of a post office sorting-clerk who was having difficulties claiming his pension. On 10 August 1916, after a fatal raid by a Zeppelin in the early of the previous morning, against which the city had been able to muster only a single searchlight and one gun, he asked that adequate defences be provided and brought to action where necessary.
The 1918 election campaign was acrimonious and Ferens was subjected to personal attacks accusing him of being a Little Englander
. In reporting on the four contested Hull seats, The Times
spoke of “Slashing attacks, covert insults, challenges, defiances and the incessant chatter of other weapons...” It noted that Ferens’ opponent, Charles Murchinson, was “busy digging out 'Little Navy’ speeches of Mr Ferens in 1909 [cf.Little Englander
] ...”
Murchinson was elected and Ferens resolved never to stand again. After the war he became an active supporter of the League of Nations
.
Away from politics, Ferens was an important figure in the Nonconformist community although, typically, he stayed out of the limelight. In a survey of the personalities of Free Church leaders, the Times noted that “among the most respected counsellors of Nonconformity are men who seldom figure on platforms”, and went on to list Ferens among their number. “The leadership of Nonconformity is largely in the hands of laymen”, it commented.
In 1924 Ferens attempted to intervene on behalf William George Smith, a Ship’s Painter who had been sentenced to death for murder at York Assizes
. A telegram addressed to the King was sent in the early hours of December 9 appealing for the exercise of the Royal Prerogative. But the appeal was unsuccessful and Smith was executed at Hull Gaol later that morning.
. In his youth he attended Band of Hope
meetings. In 1913 he was elected treasurer of the United Kingdom Alliance.
In 1923 he shared a platform with the Archbishop of Canterbury
at the Mansion House
. The occasion was the inaugural meeting of the National United Campaign of the Churches, which was organised by The Temperance Council of the Christian Churches of England and Wales.
The campaign's objectives were to present “the modern scientific indictment of alcoholic beverages and its moral implications”, and to “rally local support for the Council’s immediate legislative program”, which included the prohibition of the sale of alcohol to persons under the age of 18, and the banning of the sale of alcohol on Sundays. But the Campaign was firmly opposed to Prohibition
, as is plain in the Times' report of the Archbishop's address:
From the time he started earning a salary, Ferens allocated 10% of his income to charity. His personal wealth increased quickly, inline with the growth of Reckitt & Sons, affording him the opportunity to make ever more generous donations. This he deemed "one of the greatest blessings of my life." By 1920 he was distributing £47,000 out of his annual income of £50,000.
In 1917 Ferens purchased a plot of land in Queen Victoria Square in Hull city centre. The land was the site of a former Church, Saint John's. Later in the year he wrote to the council, informing them that he intended to donate the land to the city, and that he would also donate shares in Reckitt & Sons worth £35,000. In his letter, which was read out at a council meeting, Ferens explained that the shares and the land were to be used to build an art gallery.
Nine years later the Prince of Wales
laid the foundation stone for The Ferens Art Gallery
. Afterwards, the prince visited the premises of Reckitt & Sons where he was greeted by the company’s workforce which now numbered 6000.
The Ferens Art Gallery finally opened in 1927.
Educational establishments and hospitals were often the beneficiaries of Ferens’ munificence. In 1924 he donated £30,000 to extend Kingswood School for Boys
, Bath.
A year later, the Queen
opened an extension to Farrington Girls School, Chiselhurst, which Ferens had made possible with a donation of a similar amount.
In the same year a new post-graduate Theological College, to which he had donated £17,000, was opened in Cambridge for the training of Wesleyan ministers.
In February 1927 Ferens formally handed over the Ferens Institute of Otolaryngology
to Prince Arthur
, which he had made possible by a donation of £20,000. In handing over the institute, Ferens said that he hoped that it would attract workers from all parts of the Empire, and from countries outside it.
In 1925 Ferens made his largest single donation. He wrote to the Lord Mayor of Kingston upon Hull to inform him that he intended to donate £250,000 towards the foundation of a university college in the city.
The college would be built in the east of city on an eighteen and a half acre site, which Ferens had previously donated. The Duke of York laid the foundation stone in 1928, and Prince George
opened the new college in 1929. Ferens became the college's first president, and is memorialized its motto: "Lampada Ferens"—"carrying the light (of learning)." The dove in the university's logo, which signifies peace, is taken from Ferens' coat of arms.
Ferens remained a modest man; he saw giving as a moral duty and repeatedly declined offers of ennoblement. In replying to the headmaster’s speech when he visited Kingswood school in 1926, the King said:
Ferens died in his home, Holderness House, in East Hull on 9 May 1930. Hettie had predeceased him eight years earlier. In his will he bequeathed the house and its grounds, together with an endowment of £50,000, to be used as a rest home for poor gentlewomen and to be preserved as an open space for East Hull. , the house continues to be run as a residential home for ladies.
The year after his death, a pageant was held to mark the opening of Ferensway, a major new thoroughfare in the centre of the city. The Times reported that it would “rank as one of the finest in the North of England”, and continued, “The street is 100 ft wide, 10 ft wider than Regent Street in London." To make way for the new street, a large slum area was cleared of houses. Low-rent housing was provided to those displaced by the new road.
Reckitt & Son merged with J&J Colman in 1938 becoming Reckitt & Colman Ltd. In 1999 that company merged with Benckiser N.V. to become Reckitt Benckiser
. In 2006 Reckitt Benckiser acquired Boots Healthrcare International for £1.9 billion. Though the company is now headquartered in Slough, the Hull site remains one of the city’s most significant employers.
In the 21st century, Thomas Ferens' legacy remains woven into fabric of the city of Hull. University college continued to expand, gaining its Royal Charter in 1954. In 1979 it became the first university to be awarded the Queen’s award for Technological Achievement.
Alumni
include John Prescott
, Frank Field, Roy Hattersley
and Roger McGough
. Ferens Art Gallery now houses an internationally renowned permanent collection which includes works by Antonio Canaletto, David Hockney, Stanley Spencer and Henry Moore. Generations of Hull's children have enjoyed summers on the boating lake and drenching, perilous trips aboard its Wicksteed Splashboat. Almshouses which Ferens donated to the city in 1910 still provide shelter to the City's needy almost a century after his death.
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
for Hull East
Kingston upon Hull East (UK Parliament constituency)
Kingston upon Hull East is a borough constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elects one Member of Parliament by the first past the post system of election.- Boundaries :...
for 13 years, and served the city as a Justice of the Peace
Justice of the Peace
A justice of the peace is a puisne judicial officer elected or appointed by means of a commission to keep the peace. Depending on the jurisdiction, they might dispense summary justice or merely deal with local administrative applications in common law jurisdictions...
and as High Steward. He helped establish Reckitt & Sons, a manufacturer of household goods, as one of Kingston upon Hull’s
Kingston upon Hull
Kingston upon Hull , usually referred to as Hull, is a city and unitary authority area in the ceremonial county of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It stands on the River Hull at its junction with the Humber estuary, 25 miles inland from the North Sea. Hull has a resident population of...
foremost businesses. His career with the company spanned 61 years—from his initial employment as a confidential and shorthand clerk until his death, as chairman, in 1930.
In the House of Commons, Ferens spoke to further the cause of Women's Rights
Women's rights
Women's rights are entitlements and freedoms claimed for women and girls of all ages in many societies.In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behaviour, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed...
. He supported women's suffrage
Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage or woman suffrage is the right of women to vote and to run for office. The expression is also used for the economic and political reform movement aimed at extending these rights to women and without any restrictions or qualifications such as property ownership, payment of tax, or...
at home, and repeatedly drew attention to the trafficking of women and girls in the colonies. But never a great orator, and by nature a retiring man, much of his work at Westminster was completed in the committee rooms, away from the limelight. He did not seek re-election after being unseated in acrimonious campaign in 1918.
A devout Wesleyan Methodist
Methodism
Methodism is a movement of Protestant Christianity represented by a number of denominations and organizations, claiming a total of approximately seventy million adherents worldwide. The movement traces its roots to John Wesley's evangelistic revival movement within Anglicanism. His younger brother...
, Ferens made numerous charitable donations throughout his life. His gifts to Hull include the Ferens Art Gallery
Ferens Art Gallery
The Ferens Art Gallery is an art gallery in the English city of Kingston upon Hull. The site and money for the gallery were donated to the city by Thomas Ferens, after whom it is named. Opened in 1927,...
and a donation of £250,000 for the establishment of University College (now the University of Hull
University of Hull
The University of Hull, known informally as Hull University, is an English university, founded in 1927, located in Hull, a city in the East Riding of Yorkshire...
). He is memorialized in the University's motto: Lampada Ferens. In other parts of the country he made substantial donations to schools, hospitals and charitable organisations.
Childhood and early career
Ferens was born on 4 May 1847 in East Thickley, a village close to the market town of Bishop AucklandBishop Auckland
Bishop Auckland is a market town and civil parish in County Durham in north east England. It is located about northwest of Darlington and southwest of Durham at the confluence of the River Wear with its tributary the River Gaunless...
, County Durham. He was the third of the seven children of George Waller Ferens (1817–1893), a flour miller, and his wife, Anne, née Jackson.
After attending Bishop Auckland private school until the age of thirteen, he found employment as a clerk in the Shildon office of the mineral department of the Stockton and Darlington Railway
Stockton and Darlington Railway
The Stockton and Darlington Railway , which opened in 1825, was the world's first publicly subscribed passenger railway. It was 26 miles long, and was built in north-eastern England between Witton Park and Stockton-on-Tees via Darlington, and connected to several collieries near Shildon...
. Six years later, he left home for Stockton where he worked as a clerk to Head, Wrightson & Co.
A committed autodidact, he taught himself grammar, arithmetic, mechanics, and shorthand. At weekends he taught at Sunday School
Sunday school
Sunday school is the generic name for many different types of religious education pursued on Sundays by various denominations.-England:The first Sunday school may have been opened in 1751 in St. Mary's Church, Nottingham. Another early start was made by Hannah Ball, a native of High Wycombe in...
and enjoyed playing cricket. In 1868, after working in Stockton for two years, he left to take up a post as a confidential shorthand clerk to James Reckitt of Reckitt & Sons in Kingston upon Hull.
Family life
In Hull, Ferens continued to teach in Sunday School, a practice he began during his time in Stockton. While teaching at the Brunswick Sunday School he met Ester Ellen (Ettie) Field, a fellow teacher and a wealthy merchant’s daughter of "rather masculine appearance." They married in 1873 at Sculcoates Registry Office; and they continued to teach at the Sunday School for the rest of their lives. Though Ettie remained childless, the couple adopted her nephew, John Johnson Till (known as Till), in 1880. Till Ferens separated from his wife and became estranged from his adoptive parents during the 1914–18 war.Till Ferens, like Thomas, was a Liberal and stood for the Liberal Party at Gainsborough in the 1935 General Election.
A career in industry
Reckitt & Sons was already a successful firm when Ferens joined it in 1868. It produced household wares such as starch, washing blue and black lead. It had been acquired by Isaac Reckitt, a QuakerReligious Society of Friends
The Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...
, in 1840 and was now run by his sons, also Quakers, George (1825–1900), Francis (1827–1917) and James (1833–1924).
Ferens was industrious and forward-thinking; he moved swiftly through the company's managerial ranks. In 1874 he became Works Manager with a share in profits; in 1879, Secretary; in 1880, General Manager. He joined the board of directors in 1888 when Reckitt & Sons became a private joint-stock company. When James Reckitt died, 36 years later, Ferens was named joint chairman.
Under the guidance of Ferens and James Reckitt, the company flourished, becoming one of the most successful in the city. It opened offices in London and New York and expanded into pharmaceuticals—a natural progression from its disinfectants business.
Dettol
Dettol
Dettol is the trade name for a line of liquid and solid antiseptic cleansing products manufactured by Reckitt Benckiser.It is ranked as the 48th most trust brand in India by The Brand Trust Report 2011...
was launched in 1932.
Politics and public life
Justice of the Peace
A justice of the peace is a puisne judicial officer elected or appointed by means of a commission to keep the peace. Depending on the jurisdiction, they might dispense summary justice or merely deal with local administrative applications in common law jurisdictions...
. In 1911 he was made a Freeman
Freedom of the City
Freedom of the City is an honour bestowed by some municipalities in Australia, Canada, Ireland, France, Italy, New Zealand, South Africa, Spain, the United Kingdom, Gibraltar and Rhodesia to esteemed members of its community and to organisations to be honoured, often for service to the community;...
of the City of Hull. He entered parliament as Liberal member for Hull East in 1906 after an unsuccessful bid for the same seat six years earlier. In 1912 King George V
George V of the United Kingdom
George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 through the First World War until his death in 1936....
appointed him to the Privy Council, and in the same year he became High Steward of Hull.
He was not a frequent speaker in parliament but he chaired several committees and was a member of the Inter-Parliamentary Union prior to the First World War. Hansard, the printed record of parliamentary debates, records that his first parliamentary contribution related to schools in orphan homes, and his last to the health of troops in Palestine.
A recurrent theme in Ferens' parliamentary contributions is Women's Rights. In 1910 he presented a petition in favour of the enfranchisement of women. In 1912, when the House discussed an allegedly inflammatory speech by Emmeline Pankhurst
Emmeline Pankhurst
Emmeline Pankhurst was a British political activist and leader of the British suffragette movement which helped women win the right to vote...
, Ferens wondered whether her speech might have been influenced by the "example of some Privy counsellors." The following year, he asked several questions regarding slave-trading in women; including the trade in West African women, and the trade of European and Japanese women to India. In 1917 he questioned the Home Secretary on the role of women in the police force.
Ferens' personal and religious convictions are evident in other of his parliamentary contributions. He tabled a number of questions concerning temperance, both at home and in the colonies. His first question in the Commons was about orphan schools. He later asked about railway accidents to children, and about trafficking of young girls in India.
In 1915 Ferens opened a parliamentary debate on the increase in the cost of living caused by the war, which was "causing much hardship, especially to the poor." He noted that "Many labourers' families have now to be content, owing to the high price of the necessaries of life, with one meal of meat in the week." In replying, the Prime Minister, Herbert Asquith, agreed that prices were high but he felt they were not as high as might have been expected considering the scale of the global conflict. He remarked that the current high prices were not without precedent, even in peacetime; the price of coal was no higher than it had been in 1875.
Ferens also intervened on behalf of his constituency and its inhabitants. In April 1913 he drew the attention of the Postmaster-General to the case of a post office sorting-clerk who was having difficulties claiming his pension. On 10 August 1916, after a fatal raid by a Zeppelin in the early of the previous morning, against which the city had been able to muster only a single searchlight and one gun, he asked that adequate defences be provided and brought to action where necessary.
The 1918 election campaign was acrimonious and Ferens was subjected to personal attacks accusing him of being a Little Englander
Little Englander
Little Englander is an epithet applied in criticisms of English people who are regarded as "xenophobic" and/or overly nationalistic and are often accused of being "ignorant" and "boorish". It is applied to opponents of globalism; for instance those who are against membership of the European Union...
. In reporting on the four contested Hull seats, The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
spoke of “Slashing attacks, covert insults, challenges, defiances and the incessant chatter of other weapons...” It noted that Ferens’ opponent, Charles Murchinson, was “busy digging out 'Little Navy’ speeches of Mr Ferens in 1909 [cf.Little Englander
Little Englander
Little Englander is an epithet applied in criticisms of English people who are regarded as "xenophobic" and/or overly nationalistic and are often accused of being "ignorant" and "boorish". It is applied to opponents of globalism; for instance those who are against membership of the European Union...
] ...”
Murchinson was elected and Ferens resolved never to stand again. After the war he became an active supporter of the League of Nations
League of Nations
The League of Nations was an intergovernmental organization founded as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. It was the first permanent international organization whose principal mission was to maintain world peace...
.
Away from politics, Ferens was an important figure in the Nonconformist community although, typically, he stayed out of the limelight. In a survey of the personalities of Free Church leaders, the Times noted that “among the most respected counsellors of Nonconformity are men who seldom figure on platforms”, and went on to list Ferens among their number. “The leadership of Nonconformity is largely in the hands of laymen”, it commented.
In 1924 Ferens attempted to intervene on behalf William George Smith, a Ship’s Painter who had been sentenced to death for murder at York Assizes
Assizes (England and Wales)
The Courts of Assize, or Assizes, were periodic criminal courts held around England and Wales until 1972, when together with the Quarter Sessions they were abolished by the Courts Act 1971 and replaced by a single permanent Crown Court...
. A telegram addressed to the King was sent in the early hours of December 9 appealing for the exercise of the Royal Prerogative. But the appeal was unsuccessful and Smith was executed at Hull Gaol later that morning.
Temperance
Ferens was a lifelong teetotaller and a strong advocate of temperanceTemperance movement
A temperance movement is a social movement urging reduced use of alcoholic beverages. Temperance movements may criticize excessive alcohol use, promote complete abstinence , or pressure the government to enact anti-alcohol legislation or complete prohibition of alcohol.-Temperance movement by...
. In his youth he attended Band of Hope
Hope UK
Hope UK is a national Christian charity located at 25 Copperfield Street, London, England which educates children and young people about drug and alcohol abuse.-Band of Hope:...
meetings. In 1913 he was elected treasurer of the United Kingdom Alliance.
In 1923 he shared a platform with the Archbishop of Canterbury
Archbishop of Canterbury
The Archbishop of Canterbury is the senior bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, and the diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury. In his role as head of the Anglican Communion, the archbishop leads the third largest group...
at the Mansion House
Mansion House, London
Mansion House is the official residence of the Lord Mayor of the City of London in London, England. It is used for some of the City of London's official functions, including an annual dinner, hosted by the Lord Mayor, at which the Chancellor of the Exchequer customarily gives a speech – his...
. The occasion was the inaugural meeting of the National United Campaign of the Churches, which was organised by The Temperance Council of the Christian Churches of England and Wales.
The campaign's objectives were to present “the modern scientific indictment of alcoholic beverages and its moral implications”, and to “rally local support for the Council’s immediate legislative program”, which included the prohibition of the sale of alcohol to persons under the age of 18, and the banning of the sale of alcohol on Sundays. But the Campaign was firmly opposed to Prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
, as is plain in the Times' report of the Archbishop's address:
"To his mind prohibition was the very antithesis of temperance (Cheers.) It was an open confession of failure."Ferens donated £1,000 to a fund established to accomplish the aims of the campaign.
A benevolent man
In 1917 Ferens purchased a plot of land in Queen Victoria Square in Hull city centre. The land was the site of a former Church, Saint John's. Later in the year he wrote to the council, informing them that he intended to donate the land to the city, and that he would also donate shares in Reckitt & Sons worth £35,000. In his letter, which was read out at a council meeting, Ferens explained that the shares and the land were to be used to build an art gallery.
Nine years later the Prince of Wales
Edward VIII of the United Kingdom
Edward VIII was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth, and Emperor of India, from 20 January to 11 December 1936.Before his accession to the throne, Edward was Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall and Rothesay...
laid the foundation stone for The Ferens Art Gallery
Ferens Art Gallery
The Ferens Art Gallery is an art gallery in the English city of Kingston upon Hull. The site and money for the gallery were donated to the city by Thomas Ferens, after whom it is named. Opened in 1927,...
. Afterwards, the prince visited the premises of Reckitt & Sons where he was greeted by the company’s workforce which now numbered 6000.
The Ferens Art Gallery finally opened in 1927.
Educational establishments and hospitals were often the beneficiaries of Ferens’ munificence. In 1924 he donated £30,000 to extend Kingswood School for Boys
Kingswood School
Kingswood School, referred to as 'Kingswood', is an independent day and boarding school located in Bath, Somerset, England. The school is coeducational and educates some 950 children aged 3 to 18. It is notable for being founded by John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, in 1748...
, Bath.
A year later, the Queen
Mary of Teck
Mary of Teck was the queen consort of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Empress of India, as the wife of King-Emperor George V....
opened an extension to Farrington Girls School, Chiselhurst, which Ferens had made possible with a donation of a similar amount.
In the same year a new post-graduate Theological College, to which he had donated £17,000, was opened in Cambridge for the training of Wesleyan ministers.
In February 1927 Ferens formally handed over the Ferens Institute of Otolaryngology
Otolaryngology
Otolaryngology or ENT is the branch of medicine and surgery that specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of ear, nose, throat, and head and neck disorders....
to Prince Arthur
Prince Arthur of Connaught
Prince Arthur of Connaught and Strathearn was a member of the British Royal Family, a grandson of Queen Victoria. Prince Arthur held the title of a British prince with the style His Royal Highness...
, which he had made possible by a donation of £20,000. In handing over the institute, Ferens said that he hoped that it would attract workers from all parts of the Empire, and from countries outside it.
In 1925 Ferens made his largest single donation. He wrote to the Lord Mayor of Kingston upon Hull to inform him that he intended to donate £250,000 towards the foundation of a university college in the city.
The college would be built in the east of city on an eighteen and a half acre site, which Ferens had previously donated. The Duke of York laid the foundation stone in 1928, and Prince George
Prince George, Duke of Kent
Prince George, Duke of Kent was a member of the British Royal Family, the fourth son of George V and Mary of Teck, and younger brother of Edward VIII and George VI...
opened the new college in 1929. Ferens became the college's first president, and is memorialized its motto: "Lampada Ferens"—"carrying the light (of learning)." The dove in the university's logo, which signifies peace, is taken from Ferens' coat of arms.
Ferens remained a modest man; he saw giving as a moral duty and repeatedly declined offers of ennoblement. In replying to the headmaster’s speech when he visited Kingswood school in 1926, the King said:
“The headmaster is right in assuming that I am already well acquainted with Mr Ferens’s benefactions in other parts of the country; this is not the first time I have been associated with him in this manner, and though I know the last thing that he would want would be a public expression of thanks on my part, I would like to be allowed to share in the debt of gratitude which the Kingswood School owes him today.”
Legacy
In March 1930, ill health prevented Ferens from attending the company’s Annual Meeting. It was the first he had missed in 50 years. He had not fulfilled any public engagements for some weeks; nevertheless, he wrote out his speech and it was presented by Sir Harold Reckitt. In the speech Ferens was again able to present the board with pleasing figures. The net profit was £1,277,683, an increase of £33,108 over 1928, which was itself a record year. It was a source of great gratification for him “to be able to say that the most cordial relations exist between the workers, the management and the board”.The year after his death, a pageant was held to mark the opening of Ferensway, a major new thoroughfare in the centre of the city. The Times reported that it would “rank as one of the finest in the North of England”, and continued, “The street is 100 ft wide, 10 ft wider than Regent Street in London." To make way for the new street, a large slum area was cleared of houses. Low-rent housing was provided to those displaced by the new road.
Reckitt & Son merged with J&J Colman in 1938 becoming Reckitt & Colman Ltd. In 1999 that company merged with Benckiser N.V. to become Reckitt Benckiser
Reckitt Benckiser
Reckitt Benckiser plc is a global consumer goods company headquartered in Slough, United Kingdom. It is the world's largest producer of household products and a major producer of consumer healthcare and personal products...
. In 2006 Reckitt Benckiser acquired Boots Healthrcare International for £1.9 billion. Though the company is now headquartered in Slough, the Hull site remains one of the city’s most significant employers.
In the 21st century, Thomas Ferens' legacy remains woven into fabric of the city of Hull. University college continued to expand, gaining its Royal Charter in 1954. In 1979 it became the first university to be awarded the Queen’s award for Technological Achievement.
Alumni
Alumni of the University of Hull
- Notable alumni :*Michael Aldrich, online shopping pioneer, innovator, and entrepreneur * Daniel Francis Annan, former Appeal Court Judge, member of the Provisional National Defence Council and Speaker of the Parliament of Ghana...
include John Prescott
John Prescott
John Leslie Prescott, Baron Prescott is a British politician who was Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2007. Born in Prestatyn, Wales, he represented Hull East as the Labour Member of Parliament from 1970 to 2010...
, Frank Field, Roy Hattersley
Roy Hattersley
Roy Sydney George Hattersley, Baron Hattersley is a British Labour politician, author and journalist from Sheffield. He served as Deputy Leader of the Labour Party from 1983 to 1992.-Early life:...
and Roger McGough
Roger McGough
Roger Joseph McGough CBE is a well-known English performance poet. He presents the BBC Radio 4 programme Poetry Please and records voice-overs for commercials, as well as performing his own poetry regularly...
. Ferens Art Gallery now houses an internationally renowned permanent collection which includes works by Antonio Canaletto, David Hockney, Stanley Spencer and Henry Moore. Generations of Hull's children have enjoyed summers on the boating lake and drenching, perilous trips aboard its Wicksteed Splashboat. Almshouses which Ferens donated to the city in 1910 still provide shelter to the City's needy almost a century after his death.