MADE IN HAMILTON
19TH CENTURY
INDUSTRIAL TRAIL

SITE 5
ARTHUR E. SNELGROVE CASKET
MANUFACTORY, c. 1850s

This building is one of the few to survive from the era when most manufacturing in the city was per-formed by skilled artisans inside small shops. It was built sometime before the mid-1850s to house the carpentry shop for Arthur Snelgrove's casket manufacturing business.

Snelgrove used the caskets produced in this shop to supply his undertaking business, the Hamilton Funeral Establishment, located nearby on the east side of John Street between King and Jackson Streets.

After Snelgrove's death, the business was continued by Elizabeth Snelgrove. She was one of the city's very few businesswomen at that time. The casket manufactory was still a modest operation in 1871, employing two men, a boy and a girl. This well-pre-served rubblestone building has served as a bar and restaurant in recent years.

It was common for undertakers to manufacture the caskets they sold. They often trained as cabinet-makers or upholsterers before moving into the undertaking business. Arthur Snelgrove offered furniture upholstering services in addition casket  manufacture and undertaking. The city's other undertaker, John Blachford, moved into the business after first working as a cabinet-maker and upholsterer in the 1840s.

Bowen Street is a short street running between Jackson and Main Streets, one block east of John Street.