Best of British: Finishing firsts
There’s been an engineering works on Taunton’s Albemarle Road since Victorian times. It was built in 1879 as a foundry, then as a company called Easton & Bessemer it built steam engines which powered the first paper-making machine as well as the electricity generator as Taunton became the first town in the UK to have electric street lighting. There’s a stone plaque proudly displaying a later name, ‘Easton & Johnson Engineers’, over the original front door, though there’s now a more modern extension to the side. It’s been involved in engineering ever since, though the ownership ...