Alfred Hugh Harman (1841 – 23 May 1913) was a pioneer of photography and founder of Ilford Limited. He established a photography business in

Peckham Peckham () is a district in southeast London, within the London Borough of Southwark. It is south-east of Charing Cross. At the United Kingdom Census 2001, 2001 Census the Peckham ward had a population of 14,720. History "Peckham" is a Saxon p ...

in 1862 using

William Fox Talbot William Henry Fox Talbot Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS FRSE Royal Astronomical Society, FRAS (; 11 February 180017 September 1877) was an English scientist, inventor, and photography pioneer who invented the Salt print, salted paper and calo ...

’s

Calotype Calotype or talbotype is an early photographic process introduced in 1841 by William Henry Fox Talbot, using paper coated with silver iodide. Paper texture effects in calotype photography limit the ability of this early process to record low co ...

negative/positive printing process. In 1864 he was advertising enlargements using solar cameras and artificial light. In 1879 Harman abandoned his photographic studio and moved to Ilford village where he began manufacturing dry gelatine plates in the basement of his new home in Cranbrook Road on the corner with

Park Avenue Park Avenue is a wide New York City boulevard which carries north and southbound traffic in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx. For most of the road's length in Manhattan, it runs parallel to Madison Avenue to the west and Lexington Avenu ...

. As business grew, he expanded his workplace into the ground floor and employed two men and three boys. His early processes were rudimentary—he applied his emulsion formula with a teapot—but the huge growth in the photography market gave him the revenue he needed to build purpose-built premises in 1883. These 'Britannia Works' went public in 1891, were relaunched as The Britannia Works (1898) Limited in 1898. In 1900 they were renamed Ilford Limited, despite objections from the Ilford Urban District Council, who argued that being the area's largest employer did not give the company the right to assume the town's name. Harman retired from the company in 1897 due to ill health, but returned around the time of the renaming. By then he held a substantial share in the company. He favoured a proposal by

George Eastman George Eastman (July 12, 1854March 14, 1932) was an American entrepreneur who founded the Kodak, Eastman Kodak Company and helped to bring the photographic use of roll film into the mainstream. He was a major philanthropist, establishing the ...

that

Kodak The Eastman Kodak Company (referred to simply as Kodak ) is an American public company that produces various products related to its historic basis in analogue photography. The company is headquartered in Rochester, New York, and is incorpor ...

and Ilford should merge in 1902. However, the directors of the much smaller Ilford perceived it as a takeover attempt, and Harman was persuaded to reject the proposal. Harman married a Dublin-born widow, Nina Knobble, who had a son George from her first marriage. In 1894 Harman moved to Grayswood,

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

. In 1900 he offered to finance a church in Grayswood, on land given by Lord Derby, on the condition that a parish be created there. In 1901, the new parish of Grayswood was formed from parts of the old parishes of

Witley Witley is a village and civil parish in the Borough of Waverley in Surrey, England centred south west of the town of Godalming and southwest of Guildford. The land is a mixture of rural (ranging from woodland protected by the Surrey Hills AO ...

Chiddingfold Chiddingfold is a village and civil parish in the Weald in the Waverley district of Surrey, England. It lies on the A283 road between Milford and Petworth. The parish includes the hamlets of Ansteadbrook, High Street Green and Combe Common. C ...

Haslemere The town of Haslemere () and the villages of Shottermill and Grayswood are in south west Surrey, England, around south west of London. Together with the settlements of Hindhead and Beacon Hill, they comprise the civil parish of Haslemere i ...

and

Thursley Thursley is a village and civil parish in southwest Surrey, west of the A3 between Milford and Hindhead. An associated hamlet is Bowlhead Green. To the east is Brook. In the south of the parish rises the Greensand Ridge, in this section reachi ...

and

All Saints' Church All Saints Church, or All Saints' Church or variations on the name may refer to: Albania *All Saints' Church, Himarë Australia *All Saints Church, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory * All Saints Anglican Church, Henley Brook, Western Austr ...

was consecrated in 1902.

References

Bibliography

*R Hercock and G Jones, ''Silver by the Ton: A History of Ilford Limited 1879-1979''. (London: McGraw-Hill, 1979) {{DEFAULTSORT:Harman, Alfred Hugh 1841 births 1913 deaths Pioneers of photography Photographers from London 19th-century English photographers