Victorian St Albans

Kershaw Hat Factory

St Albans Museum

Hat Factories

By Lin Keen

Junction of Victoria Street and Marlborough Road
This was the boundary until 1835.  Location of straw hat factories - one on each of three corners and one behind houses on the other.  Straw plaiting had been carried out by women and children in the town since C17th but hatmaking became very important in the second half of C19th.  At its height it employed 11,000 people in 40 factories.  Slades was the first here in 1776 - they made straw hats for sailors, in family for 5 generations.  Began to decline towards end of century with competition from Japan and the continent and changes in fashion.  Slades diversified - they made hat boxes then making boxes for other industries became their core business.  Last one Dunham and Martin Fishpool St in 1937.  Kershaw and company here from 1882-1905.