logologo-optometry

Illustrated catalogue of modern goods interesting to the Optician and Jeweller

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Catalogue Number: 2777
Illustrated catalogue of modern goods interesting to the Optician and Jeweller
Category: Papers
Sub-Category: Ophthalmic product catalogue
Corporation: Arthur Cocks and Co
Year Of Publication/Manufacture: c 1905
Time Period: 1900 to 1939
Place Of Publication/Manufacture: Sydney
Publisher/Manufacturer: Marchant and Co Ltd Print
Description Of Item: Photocopy of selected pages (pp 13-71) from the illustrated catalogue of Arthur Cocks, wholesale supplier to opticians and jewellers
Historical Significance: This is a photocopy of the original catalogue held by Michael Aitken. Arthur Cocks and Co Ltd was a large and successful wholesaler of goods for opticians and jewellers with branches in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Wellington NZ and Birmingham UK, It was founded in 1899 by Arthur Cocks (1862-1943). Arthur Cocks was its managing director until 1939. He had been employed in 1880 by Melbourne optical wholesaler W. Wood and Co as a commercial traveller. He was sent to Sydney in 1886 to establish a new branch of that company but in due course took financial control of the whole company before establishing his own eponymously named company. He became a councillor of the City of Sydney and served a term as Mayor of Sydney in 1913. He was elected to the State Legislative Assembly from 1910 to 1925. He was appointed Agent-General in London in 1925 and was knighted (KBE) in that year. This catalogue gives an excellent insight to spectacles and ophthalmic instruments of the time. Cocks was a member of the British Optical Association and the foundation Secretary of the Australasian Optical Association, founded in 1904. This was the first optometry association to be formed in Australia.
How Acquired: Donated by Michael Aitken, honorary archivist
Date Acquired: Jan 2016
Condition: Copy of original
Location: Archive office. Pamphlet and ephemera filing cabinet. Drawer 7

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