Case PHSL : 315
We believed it to be A CWS (Co-operative Wholesale Society) Dustette hand-held vacuum cleaner with fishtail attachment, made of phenol formaldehyde by Streetly in the 1930s.
Chosen as an object made by Streetly Manufacturing Company: we have 21 other objects by the same manufacturer and information about one may help to unearth information about the others.
Contributing agents
David Harman Powell & Ian Holdsworth
What we wanted to know & what we found out
- Designer: still wanted
- Date: circa 1935
Importantly, we found that the information we had was incorrect. It is not a 'Dustette' but a 'Dudley' and it was not manufactured by Streetly Manufacturing Company but by the Co-operative Wholesale Society.
The case remains open: we still want to find out who designed this distinctive product and a more precise date for when production began.
Evidence trail
- Personal testimony
- Trade magazine
- Expert website
- Company website
- History website
The hunt
Personal testimony
Agent Harman Powell provided considerable usuefull infomation about Streetly Manufacturing Company and how designing within the industry worked during its early years.
Trade magazine
Agent Holdsworth knew that Streetly Manufacturing Company usually, on producing a new product, would put a photograph and short description into the Moulded Plastics Trader magazine for publicity purposes but he could not find this product. This made him doubt whether it was a manufactured by Streetly.
Expert website
Agent Holdsworth then posted a message about the product on www.vacuumland.org to which a collector calling himself Al replied. He said that the vacuum cleaner was not a Dustette but a Dudley, that it had a blue bag with this written on it, that he owned one and and would post a picture of it but he never did.
This is Al's post.
Company Website
Agent Holdsworth then found on The Co-operative Group's website that the CWS purchased a prouducer co-operative, at Dudley, in 1908 and that by the 1930s many manufacturers were refusing to supply co-operative societies with electrical goods if they paid dividends on the items. Therefore, CWS began to produce more 'own-brand' electrical goods, moving into larger premises in 1934.
History Website
This was corroborated by a history website focused on the Black Country, the Black Country Bugle. An article on Dudley Bean that states that an offer was made for its bodyshop works in 1934 by the CWS and that co-operative products such as electric fires, irons, and vacuum cleaners were made in the factory. Could our Dudley have been made around this time?