Ledgers Teare and Sons
Norwegian College Fishery Science Tromsø
statue to fishermen Tromsø
The Teare and Sons story was presented at the 14th North Atlantic Fisheries History conference held in the Norwegian College of Fisheries Science, Tromsø, Norway September 24-27th 2014. The papers from the conference will be published in a supplement to the International Journal of Marine History in 2015. A summary of the paper:
Using archives from the Teare family and Manx National Heritage in Douglas Michael Teare has been researching Teare and Sons, the family run company, founded in 1866 on The Quay, Peel.
Teare and Sons were sailmakers and ships chandlers supplying the rapidly growing fishing fleet during the 2nd half of the 19th century. They were also shareholders in fishing boats and trading schooners. By examining the company ledgers we can see how the daily operations in the chandlers worked and the growth of the company in customer numbers and turnover as the Manx fishing fleet expanded. Fishing boats needed to be prepared and equipped before the start of the Irish mackerel fishery in March, but they didn’t pay their bills until the end of the Manx herring fishing season in September. Teare and Sons had to take bank loans, using property as security, to finance their business.
At the end of the 19th century the company survived a series of difficulties. In 1898 the fishing smack Bee Hive, owned jointly by brothers William Edward and Henry Teare, was wrecked off Cambelltown, the schooner Lily Miles, in which the company had 8 shares, was wrecked on Longstone Rocks in 1899 and the schooner Phoebe (the company was a ⅜ shareholder) was run down by the steamship Duke of Lancaster in Belfast Loch in 1900 – it was not insured. But worse was to come when on 3 February 1900 the company’s bank, Dumbell’s, went bust. Suddenly Manx companies were unable to get credit from their suppliers who would only take new orders with cash up front. Dumbell’s had been an important bank in Peel and many other fishing boat shareholders and fishermen were faced with the same or an even worse financial disaster. As a result many fishermen lost everything, many boats were sold to Ireland or simply left to rot.
Teare and Sons survived and after WW1 ownership transferred to sailmakers John and Freddy Teare. Now they were making more sails for yachts and selling fuel to fishing boats. The business continued on The Quay in Peel until 1964 when Freddy Teare, the last sailmaker in Peel, died and the business closed.