Tom Lemon (Weston super Mare)

"WESUMA WARE" 12in vase 1926-1930s.
Incised mark "Lemon ?? Weston-s-Mare"

Tom Lemon was part of the Lemon & Crute partnership in Torquay from 1914 until July 1926 and before that he had been a thrower at C. H. Brannam. You couldn't really make up names like Tom Lemon and Harry Crute could you?

It was after the partnership was dissolved that he moved to Weston super Mare and started the Westsuma Pottery with his son. I think that it continued until the outbreak of war in 1939.

It is what I would class as Art Pottery so................. permission to move it to British Pottery?

Yes of course.
I had the info you gave, but there's not much info on this particular pottery
ie. how big it was, how many employees.

I do tend to add information, if I have it, to threads with just a pot and a mark so that anyone coming to it in the future has some information to hand.

Like you I know little about the size of the pottery but don't recall seeing a great amount of work over the years. This matt green glaze is probably the most common, as it is what I associate with the name but I do remember seeing a similar matt blue glaze in the past.

I've seen a few in that uranium orange also, always with the same distinctive incised
scroll decoration in a band round the top.

There is a nice little book 'Wesuma ware. The pottery of T.W.Lemon & Son, Weston-super-Mare ' which was published in 1997 and which among other things describes the lead up to the opening of the pottery in Weston Super Mare and Tom Lemon's skills as a thrower ('he could throw a gross (144) an hour of small items....').

According to the book there were between 16 and 18 employees at the pottery.

Tom died in 1941, a year after his wife, and the pottery was destroyed by a bomb in 1942.

Welcome to the Forum, retropots, and thank you for the information.

retropots wrote:There is a nice little book 'Wesuma ware. The pottery of T.W.Lemon & Son, Weston-super-Mare ' which was published in 1997 and which among other things describes the lead up to the opening of the pottery in Weston Super Mare and Tom Lemon's skills as a thrower ('he could throw a gross (144) an hour of small items....').

According to the book there were between 16 and 18 employees at the pottery.

Tom died in 1941, a year after his wife, and the pottery was destroyed by a bomb in 1942.

Again, thanks for the invaluable information Retropots.

Wide mouthed jug by T.W. Lemon & Son, Weston-super-Mare