Staff members of William Brooks & Co. at dinner

SPG/242

fonds

approximately 1915

Graphic Materials, Photographs, Textual Records

9663829

1 photographic print, with copy of poem - silver gelatin, mounted on card - 15 x 20 cm

William Brooks (1858-1937) founded William Brooks & Co. in 1887 as a printer of invitations and similar items. Brooks was also the co-founder of the Soldiers' Club in 1915, and a vice-president of the Citizens' Referendum Six O'clock Association. Brooks expected Australians to go to the help of the 'Old Country', to the last man, and he believed that the contribution of those who went should be fully and formally recognized. At the Soldiers' Club in 1915 he helped organize the Returned Soldiers' Association, acting temporarily as its first president.

William Brooks & Co. Ltd was incorporated in 1901. By 1917, the company had been awarded a significant contract with the Postmaster General's Office to print some of the company's earliest telephone directories. William Brooks maintained that relationship over the course of the century, even as the Postmaster General's telecommunications wing evolved as Telstra. William Brooks & Co. was acquired by McPherson's Printing Pty. Ltd in 1982, and continued to retain its position as Telstra's largest supplier of directories into the 2000s.

References:
Library correspondence file
Heather Radi,'Brooks, William (1858–1937)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/brooks-william-5379/text9103, published first in hardcopy 1979 (Aaccessed 27 October 2022)

Donor's grandfather (George Fredrick Davis, second from right in photograph) worked for William Brooks and Co. at the time the business was starting as a linotype operator, and was an employed at the time of the start of the First World War.

Photographic print of 20 staff members (possibly board members) of William Brooks & Co., probably at a Christmas dinner. Accompanied by copy of a poem titled 'XMAS, 1915. Wm. Brooks & Co. Ltd. Roll of Honor', which contains the names of staff who have left to fight in World War I.

Out of copyright:
Please acknowledge:: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales

On verso in black ink: William Brooks Prints, about 1930 [added at a later date]

Date based on accompanying poem, and dress of subjects in the photograph, including a man dressed in an army uniform.