Jonathan Badger (c.1771-1834), a scissors grinder, was the son of Thomas Badger, a nailer of Huthwaite, Yorkshire.  Jonathan was apprenticed to James Whiteley, a scissors smith, and granted his Freedom in 1796 (though there is no record of a mark).  In 1794, he married Lydia Dearden (c.1774-1838), who was apparently the sister of John Dearden, whose family operated a scissor business at Copper Street.  Jonathan Badger briefly partnered William and Mark Dearden, but this was dissolved in 1817.  In the 1820s and 1830s, Badger was listed as a scissors and tailors’ shears maker in Copper Street.  He died on 18 March 1834, aged 63.  His will had been witnessed by Luke and Mark Dearden.  The  estate was valued at under £450.  Lydia died on 3 June 1838, aged 64, and both were interred at St Peter & St Paul churchyard.  Their gravestone was lost when the churchyard was later cleared, though a record survived of the inscription.  They had two sons – Thomas (1806-1852) and William (1814-1868) – who inherited the business at 47 Copper Street.  Thomas lived in Hoyle Street (where he was also briefly a shopkeeper and beer retailer); William resided in Bellefield Terrace.  By 1849, Thomas had a works address at 253 Shalesmoor; William at 47 Copper Street.  

Thomas Badger died in Upperthorpe of ‘apoplexy’ on 29 February 1852, aged 46.  He was buried in the General Cemetery.  His widow, Elizabeth, apparently took over his workshops.   In 1859, the address was Bridgehouses Works, 255 Shalesmoor.  She died in Shrewsbury Hospital, Sheffield, on 13 July 1881, aged 75, and her burial in the General Cemetery was unconsecrated.  William – after apprenticeship to his father – had been granted his Freedom in 1847, alongside the ‘ELITE’ mark.  (Woodhead, 1991, listed that mark in the nineteenth century under William Badger & Co, Philadelphia.¹) In the 1850s, William became a ‘searcher’ at the Company of Cutlers.  In 1851, he was living at West Don House, Grove Row (St Philip’s district) with his wife, Mary née Champion Jackson, whom he had married in 1838.   Their eldest son was John Jackson Badger (1839-1912).   

In 1862, the firm was styled William Badger & Co, Copper Street, and manufactured scissors, shears, and table and spring knives.  William Badger, Grange Cottage, Ecclesall, died on 27 March 1868, aged 55.  He was buried in Pitsmoor cemetery.   John J. Badger continued in partnership with Joseph Denton (dissolved in 1868) and then with W. R. Humphreys.  They traded as William Badger & Co until 1876, when Badger sued Humphreys for a £41 debt.  The Copper Street premises had been vacated by 1874 and were offered for sale (Sheffield Daily Telegraph, 22 September 1874).  Between 1879 and 1887, William Badger & Co was in Matilda Street; then in the early 1890s Phoenix Works, St Mary’s Road.   The firm sold table cutlery, pen and pocket knives, razors, and scissors.  It was last listed in 1895.  In 1901, John J. Badger, aged 62, was living in Norton with his wife, Eliza, and still describing himself as a cutlery manufacturer.   Their son, J. W. W. Badger, launched his own cutlery business.   (Mary Rhodes, Sheffield Local Studies Library, kindly provided important information on the Badgers.)

^1. Woodhead, Eileen, Trademarks on Base-Metal Tableware (Ottawa, Canada Parks Service, 1991)