No 13. Brick Making

Date: 20th century

Why is it important: Before mass production of bricks, Emsworth and the surrounding area had a small batch production industry.

The expense of firing and transporting finished bricks meant that brickmaking was a much more localised industry than it is today. Three seams of brick clay ran in and close to Emsworth:

• Rowlands Castle – exploited by Rowlands Castle brickworks.
• Emsworth – exploited by a number of small, part time brickworks.
• North Hayling – exploited by Pycroft’s Brickworks. The picture above shows the team at Pycroft’s stacking dried bricks ready for firing.

Cheaper transport and more efficient kilns for firing bricks has concentrated brickmaking to fewer, larger factories.

The right-hand most frames on the swing panels in the North Wall show further information about brick making