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canada goose clearance sale The Strand Magazine ran from 1891 to 1950, and in the early years in particular canada goose outlet houston the December issue was a particular treat, packed full of Christmassy goodness. The first of these, Issue 12 from December 1891, included an article about Christmas crackers, written by a journalist who had visited a cracker factory. I am quoting the full article here as it is a fascinating insight into the 19th Century manufacturing process, but also canada goose outlet 80 off very entertaining reading. canada goose clearance sale
canadian goose jacket I there is one thing inseparable from Christmas in general and the little ones seasonable gatherings in particular, it is a cracker. With what a delightful look of expectation they have waited for it to go and how they have screamed as they scrambled after the surprise which came in response to the explosion, and revelled in a complete outfit in the way of paper garments, hats and caps, jewels, toys, puzzles, and what not. But there are others who love the cracker. Have you not seen them? She is merry eighteen, canada goose outlet in montreal and he with just enough moustache to twirl. They each seize canada goose vest outlet an end of that convenient little cracker it goes. Why doesn he pick up the gaily decorated paper cap, or she the piquant little apron with the blue bows? Simply because there is a tiny slip of paper inside, and they are eager to read it. It was Cupid himself who hopped out of that cracker. Christmas crackers have much to answer for. canadian goose jacket
cheap Canada Goose Considering the many moments of merriment which these small rolls of paper will surely bring, and the countless chats on courting topics they are sure to give rise to, we are inclined to hasten from romance to reality, and take a peep in upon the workers whose busy fingers provide the crackers in short, to find out exactly how they are made, from the moment the paper arrives at the factory to the time the completed article is ready to be packed up in dozens and sent away. Messrs. Tom Smith Co., of Wilson street, Finsbury, are really the creators of the Christmas cracker as we now know it. About forty years ago a sweetmeat and love motto was wrapped in a piece of fancy paper, and in those days answered the same purpose as Christmas crackers do now. They were called Mottoes. Then it got converted into Luggage, and finally the elaborately got up Christmas Cracker of to day. Oscar Wilde did much, however, for its welfare. Even the crackers caught the aesthetic movement and became wrapped up in aesthetic colours. Messrs. Tom Smith Co. manufacture eleven millions in a single season. Our own country will claim some eight or nine millions of these, and the remainder will get scattered over the world, India claiming a big parcel. cheap Canada Goose
The first room visited at their immense factory was on the ground floor. Here is a miniature quarry. Hundreds of stones imported from Germany are stacked everywhere. Men are busy in the far corner grinding and grinding them until a perfectly pure and level surface is obtained. If you feel inclined you might endeavour to raise from the floor the largest litho stone used. It measures sixty inches by forty, and would turn the scale at a ton. canada goose outlet in toronto The stones are then passed on to the litho artists, for lithography plays a most important part in the manufacture of a Christmas Cracker. Upstairs canada goose https://www.goosefrshop.com premium outlet is the artists room. Clever artists are constantly engaged in making fresh designs year in and year out, and it is nothing extraordinary for some of them to spend weeks in completing a single set of designs. The literary work, too, is canada goose outlet winnipeg no small item, and a man who can write good verse can earn good money. Ladies seem to be the most adept at this sort of thing, which is paid for at so much a set of verses. Mr. Walter Smith, who accompanied us on our tour, goes to a desk and takes out canada goose outlet uk a handful of canada goose outlet in uk sheets on which all sorts and conditions of bards have written. Some of them are very funny. Here is one, which is immediately waste paper basketed :
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In love its fragrance softly shed. In one stack alone there are no fewer than 50,000 boxes in a line one hundred feet long and ten feet wide. This represents a month work, and every one is sold. We can quite realise this when we are told that one retail firm alone in London will send in such an order for crackers that it would take sixteen of the largest delivery vans built to convey them, with 1,200 boxes packed away in each van. It is no unusual thing for an order of 500, 1,000, or 1,500 worth of Christmas crackers to be received, the biggest of all totalling up to 3,000, the highest in the trade. This reminds us of the number of cardboard boxes which must be needed. The box making is a distinct industry. A plant of machinery for their manufacture costs anything between 2,000 and 5,000, and during a busy week 30,000 would be made and used in that time. The card is all cut to shape and stacked away, and the patterns are many, for there are over 150 varieties of boxes. Just look at this pile of sacks in the corner. It is all waste cuttings, and often ten and fifteen bags will come down canada goose outlet niagara falls the lift in the course of a day.
Canada Goose Jackets canada goose outlet london uk On the floors above, the printing is going on. A number of litho machines are running, for the most part presided over by men assisted by girls, who certainly take off the sheets with marvellous rapidity. One machine is printing funny faces to go outside the crackers, another is turning out sheets with hundreds of flowers on it, and yet another is giving us countless little Cupids. Every rose and Cupid is cut out, and it is the same with any other picture with which it is intended to decorate a cracker. We shall be safe in saying that the contents of crackers come from every part of the world, and a peep into the store room where they are kept in huge bins and great boxes, will substantiate this. On one corner of the counter are thousands of tiny pill boxes. These are filled with rouge and powder, with a little puff thrown in. Such are the contents of one of the canada goose outlet nyc for Spinsters, those estimable single ladies also being allotted faded flowers, a night cap, a wedding ring, and a bottle of hair dye. This pile of bracelets came from Bohemia, fans from Japan, toys from Christiania, with little wooden cups and saucers from the same place, scarf pins from Saxony; the little miniature pipes, as played on by the accompanist to a Punch and Judy show, are made by Parisians; Jews harps come from Germany, and tiny wooden barrels from America. The familiar flexible faces which can be squeezed and pulled into every conceivable shape are made in London. Hundreds of little glass bottles are here, supposed canada goose outlet black friday to be filled with a certain intoxicant known as gin. A young girl is filling them with the very reverse of anything intoxicating, although the label on the bottle says 1,000,000 overproof. Italy, Turkey, India, China, and South Africa all contribute to the store. The sight would set a child pining with pardonable envy to play about this part of the factory. Canada Goose Jackets
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canada goose coats We are now on our way to the top of the building where the Christmas cracker is really made. First, there is the giving out counter. Here come the girls canada goose outlet online uk and receive into their hands a certain quantity of what is wanted to make the particular part on which they are engaged. Every strip of paper is counted. Close by the giving out counter a number of young women are fringing the edges of the paper to be rolled. This is done on a canada goose factory outlet vancouver small machine capable of taking four thicknesses of ordinary paper and six of the brighter looking gelatine. The material to be fringed is put against the teeth of the apparatus, the girl stamps it, and it is ready to give a neat and gay appearance to either end of the body of the cracker. canada goose coats
canada goose coats on sale The main workroom presents a busy sight. It is nearing one o when the dinner bell will ring, and the hands are working at high speed so as to finish their self allotted task ere the bell tolls. Four hundred feet of benches are ranged from end to end canada goose outlet canada of the room, and here are scores of girls sitting in front of partitioned off spaces ranged along the lengthy counters. Every girl canada goose stockists uk has her glue pot by her side. Turn round and look at the immense stove where twenty pots are being constantly warmed up, so that as soon as a worker glue cools down she has only to cross to the stove and there is another pot ready at hand for her. It canada goose outlet mississauga is noticeable how cheerful the young women are and to what a superior class they apparently belong. A good cracker hand can easily earn 14s., 16s., and at a busy time 18s. a week, and the cracker trade of this firm alone means the constant employment, directly and indirectly, of close upon 1,000 people. canada goose coats on sale
canada goose clearance One young woman is rolling the paper paper of all the colours of the rainbow are before her, and dozens of completed crackers are arranged in front waiting to be carried away, and the manufacture of them booked to her credit. The paper is rolled on a brass tube, so that a trim appearance is obtained. Coloured string ties it up, and the gelatine is quickly placed round it. The girl we were watching said she could roll two dozen work in a quarter of an hour, though she could do commoner work much quicker. Her next door companion was blessed with busy fingers. First she took a slip of paper this was the inner lining; round this she wrapped the official canada goose outlet gelatine, added two decorating ends or fringes, and then put in canada goose outlet location the detonator, the explosive paper tape, and it was ready to receive its contents. She could do a gross an hour. Her fingers travelled faster than the pencil in our note book. Passing girl after girl, we find them all surrounded by the brightest of colours in gelatine and paper. One is making paper dresses for a doll, a neat little white tissue frock trimmed with red braid. This formed part of rather a novel box of crackers. A good looking doll is placed in the box, and each cracker has some article of attire inside, so that when every one was the doll could be provided with a complete outfit. Others were making hats and caps. The paper is rolled round a tin to shape, pasted together, and there is your chapeau. All is very simple, but nothingcould be more effective when the article is completed. canada goose clearance
canada goose The cardboard alone used in the manufacture of the empty boxes in which the crackers are packed exceeds a hundred tons in weight during a single season, and the tiny strips of card constituting the detonators over five tons. Twenty tons of glue and paste, between 6,000 and 7,000 reams of coloured and fancy papers are used, whilst the total weight of the thin transparent sheets of coloured gelatine, which add so much to the brilliancy of a Christmas cracker, amounts to nearly six tons. canada goose
The process by which gelatine is manufactured is a most interesting one. The raw gelatine comes over in five hundred weight casks from Switzerland. It arrives on these shores in thick, rough sheets, measuring six feet by three feet, weighing about three to four ounces each. It is then reduced to a liquid by steam power; water being added, it is clarified, and while in its liquid state dyes of the richest hues are poured in to render it of the shade of colour desired. While the gelatine is thus in a liquid form, it is poured upon frames of glass, measuring twenty four inches by eighteen inches, much resembling window panes. Workmen, by the movement of the glass, allow the melted gelatine to spread over it, and so form a sheet of uniform thickness. These sheets of glass are then arranged in stacks, and the film of gelatine allowed to set. When the gelatine sheets are hard upon the glass, they are then transferred to a room in which a strong current of air is allowed to pass in and out, to complete the drying process. This takes from twelve to eighteen hours, after which a knife is run round the edges of the gelatine, which then being cut with a knife peels easily off the glass, and is now ready for use.
buy canada goose jacket cheap We were curious to know what was the biggest cracker ever made. Crackers are made three feet long, containing a full sized coat, hat, collar, frill, whiskers, umbrella, and eye glass, A story is told of a well known member of the aristocracy who entered a West end shop one day and saw one of these gigantic crackers. He inquired the size, and when he heard it, exclaimed: buy canada goose jacket cheap
Canada Goose Outlet feet! Not big enough for me. Whether the nobleman congratulated himself on the fact that he had obtained the largest cracker canada goose black friday up to date we do not know, but the biggest of all was that made every night for Harry Payne as clown to pull with the pantaloon in the pantomime at Drury Lane. It was seven feet long, and contained costumes large enough for the merry couple to put on, and a multitude of crackers, which were thrown amongst the children in the audience. Canada Goose Outlet
canada goose store From 1st to 24th December there will be a History article on Windows into History every day, exploring how people spent Christmas in the past through first hand accounts in forgotten books. Please come back tomorrow for the next article canada goose store.