Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
of the craft in the eyes of the public. The Tylers and Bricklayers Company still
promoted the craft of bricklaying within its historical London area.
The hierarchy of apprentice, journeyman, craftsman, and master craftsman,
nevertheless, remained a fixed and powerful force within building companies. In
the larger towns and cities, apprentices increasingly attended local tech-nical col-
leges to gain additional theoretical and technical education and refine practical
skills. This was seen as essential to achieve highly productive, accurate tradesmen
capable of executing a wide range of skills within the broad canvas of the craft.
Only the finest apprentices were selected by the older experienced craftsmen
to share in the knowledge and finer craft skills of the cutting-shed and learn
gauged work. This judgement was based on the technical and practical compe-
tency and of the individual and all-important characteristics of enthusiasm and
patience to learn and ultimately master the wide breadth of skills demanded.
Although no statistics exist, it is likely that only the top 5% of bricklayers in each
historic period were ever truly masters of gauged work, capable of advanced work
such as setting out, cutting, and building an ornate cut and rubbed chimney
stack or a gauged niche. Yet probably around 50% of all qualified bricklayers
would have possessed varying degrees of competence in the skill for work on
basic arches and cut-moulded enrichments, in the areas where such work was
traditionally employed.
Study of the apprenticeship syllabus of college tuition to gain the Inter-mediate
and Final City and Guilds examinations in the 1920s and 1930s reproduced in
The Modern Bricklayer
(Frost, 1931, 130-32), is most revealing. There is a specified
emphasis and depth for sound education in theory, science, related technology,
mathematics, geometry and workshop practice, which allowed the most capable
apprentice to experience and develop their potential to excel at gauged work.
Frost (1931, 83), making the distinction between axed and gauged work
says that axed work may be '…considered as the first step or introduction to
the highest grade of bricklaying: gauged work…for this class of construction
exceptional skill is necessary in the craftsman…'
In discussing the opportunity to learn gauged work, Frost continues
(1931, 87):
…The young craftsman of the present-day has no doubt great opportunities for
extending his knowledge in this particular section of his craft. In the old days
cutters were looked upon in the trade as very superior beings compared with the
general bricklayers…great strides have been made in technical education, and
today there are unlimited opportunities for the young craftsman to obtain all the
knowledge he requires….
Throughout this period, up to the Second World War, practical and theoret-
ical examinations for the City and Guilds of London Institute intermediate
certificate were held for both part-time day and evening class students. Below
