Hiram Wild (1843-1924) was born in Sheffield, the son of Joseph – a table knife grinder – and his wife, Harriet.  Hiram followed his father’s trade and apparently started his enterprise in 1864.  In the following year, he was awarded £3 10s (£3.50) for loss of earnings at Globe Works due to the Sheffield Flood.  (According to an undocumented company account, Wild rescued a local landowner’s son from the Sheffield Flood and the £200 reward enabled him to start his business.) By 1876, Williamson & Wild was launched in Milton Street, with Samuel Williamson and Hiram Wild (cutlery manufacturer and shoe and boot dealer) as the partners.  Their partnership was dissolved in 1876, and in the following year Hiram Wild, Chester’s Horn Works, Holly Street, was declared bankrupt with £300 debts. 

In 1879, Wild, who lived in Walkley, was listed alone as a table cutlery manufacturer at Cutts Works in Division Street.  By the turn of the century, his enterprise operated in Rockingham Lane and Carver Street.  By 1911, the works address was Central Cutlery Works, 62 Carver Street, with Hiram’s son, John Arthur Wild (1874-1936), running the business.  Hiram Wild, South View Street, Cleethorpes, died on 2 March 1924, aged 81.  He left £5,314.  During the 1920s, Wild’s manufactured electro-plate and steel cutlery in Carver Street and Matilda Street.  Its trade marks included the words ‘EQUAL’ and ‘MUTUAL’.

John Arthur Wild died on 14 June 1936, leaving £6,200.  His son (and grandson of the founder) was John ‘Jack’ Leslie Wild (1906-1982), who in 1937 incorporated the firm with £5,000 capital  at Radford Works, Radford Street.  In 1951, Hiram Wild (Holdings) Ltd was registered, with £185,000 capital, at newly-built Central Cutlery Works, Herries Road.  Wild’s continued to specialise in table and kitchen cutlery and thrived with the growth of export markets and mail order catalogues.  According to its prospectus, 90 per cent of the firm’s turnover was from exports (especially to the Commonwealth).  Wild held fifteen trademarks, including  those of Francis Newton & Sons (‘TRY’, ‘PREMIER’, and ‘DODGE’), which were bought from George Butler.  Other marks were acquired from Atkinson Bros, John McClory, and Latham & Owen.  Jack Wild provided work for smaller cutlery companies but had a reputation as a tough negotiator on price.  He died on 29 September 1982, leaving £318,308.  After his death, the company – which employed about 180 workers in 1986 – became a subsidiary of Walter Lawrence plc.  In the 1990s, when it was still based in Herries Road, J.L. Wild’s son, John, was still involved as a director.  The firm became an importer rather than manufacturer.  It closed its operations in 2006, after a takeover by J. & C. Products, which had a registered Sheffield address.  In 2013, ‘Hiram Wild’ (incorporating ‘United Cutlers’) sold branded tableware via a web-site, which had a contact address in Cupola – off Gibraltar Street.