George Price doors

[safeman]

the cyrus price stuff I saw was garbage compared to the G price stuff

Yes, but he did more for the pleasures of mankind than the others.

[chubbbramah]

Well! Who would of thought it — I didn't know that.

[chubbbramah]

I remember the scrapyards; there was one near my school, and one near an early workplace. My wife refused to let me take a large double-door castiron safe with box of wards for a tenner, as a room divider! and we had a solid floor.

Soon after the war, the PO (probabably just northern England) commisioned a survey and report on PO safes by a locksmith named Key (that really was his name!). I've not seen a copy of the 'Key Report', only heard about it, but it condemned c90% of PO safes, even crown offices, as inadequate for post-war risks. But there didn't seem too much enthusiasm for upgrading even PO safes, seemingly. In my young days, the local paper had reports almost weekly of safbreakings/blowing. I remember the strongroom door in ?Rochester cathedral was blown, early 1960s. Nothing sacred.

[Huw Eastwood]

Yes, but he did more for the pleasures of mankind than the others.

I've seen Cotterill's corkscrews some of which are even more sought after than his climax detector padlocks!! But had no idea about Cyrus P!

[safeman]

[QUOTE=chubbbramah;33625]I remember the scrapyards; there was one near my school, and one near an early workplace. My wife refused to let me take a large double-door castiron safe with box of wards for a tenner, as a room divider! and we had a solid floor.

[Huw Eastwood]

I remember the scrapyards; there was one near my school, and one near an early workplace. My wife refused to let me take a large double-door castiron safe with box of wards for a tenner, as a room divider! and we had a solid floor.

She probably did you a favour!
I turned down 4 or 5 of those huge cast double door ones about 25 years ago, abandoned in an old industrial unit and going for free.
They were in superb condition and all with keys but the work involved in shifting them was ridiculous and I'd already got a small size cast Carron with original key to keep, from years before.

30 years on and you can't give them away cos everyone had the same idea and the marketplace is flooded. Glad I didn't spend the time moving and storing all those big ones cos I'd still be stuck with them now, and they'd be rusting away like all the others we'd kept!

[Redoubt]

We had piles of these old safes that made their way down to NZ over the years.

Some of the better safes that had a descent door on them, had the back cut out of the body, the fill removed, and replaced with Concrete.

Instantly made them a bit more serious, and didn't really take that much time to do.

Just seemed a waste to scrap them.

Sprayed them with some hammered silver. As good as new!

[Huw Eastwood]

Some of the Tann's I saw were quite good from memory, far more advanced than the basic iron stuff and the James Gray (Edinburgh)that John (safeman)had in the safe museum was a real gem. Wouldn't trust the generic cast iron stuff with anything more valuable than teabags tho!
I'm sure John or Brian won't mind an old museum pic of the James Grey from John's safeman.org website.

[safeman]

Some of the Tann's I saw were quite good from memory, far more advanced than the basic iron stuff and the James Gray (Edinburgh)that John (safeman)had in the safe museum was a real gem. Wouldn't trust the generic cast iron stuff with anything more valuable than teabags tho!
I'm sure John or Brian won't mind an old museum pic of the James Grey from John's safeman.org website.

This picture makes me very sad and angry Huw because the very special old key was stolen from the exhibit when Tann moved offices to Letchworth.

By good fortune Tommy Watson was visiting me in Aberdeen and agreed to make a replacement for me in exchange for my copy pf Price's Treatise. A stem had already been made for me by Tim Taylor who also visited me but then felt that he was maybe not up to that task. I'm quite overwhelmed by Tommy's skills. Miss him even though his NE accent almost made him incoherent. Not to me of course.

Back to my Jas.Gray safe. Despite what looks just like a rough wrought iron finish is was at the time of the Great Exhibition a Bank Quality as illustrated in the famous Prize Winning Essay.




I've had to sell my cottage in Portsoy as shown here because of my mobility problems so the dear old safe is now here in Aberdeen in my garage.

Thanks Huw for the mention and my Best Regards to you and yours.

Aye ..... John.

[Gary Stephenson]

the whisky and rommels gold books I am not too bothered about, but I want to read the rest
8-)