This firm was established in 1859 by Richard Mather (c.1827-1892), who was born at Whiston, near Prescot, Lancashire.   The family was Huguenot in origin (Quality, April 1959).  Richard was a tool maker, who in 1851 employed a couple of men in Whiston.  He moved to Sheffield and by the late 1860s was a nippers and pliers manufacturer in Pond Street.  He later specialised in engineers’ tools (in the Census he described himself as a ‘telegraph combination tool maker’).  He died at Lancing Road on 12 April 1892, aged 65, leaving about £300.  The funeral was at City Road.

His son, Richard (1858-1946), took over the firm, which by 1900 was at Shoreham Street Works.  It became ‘& Son’, when Richard’s son, Harold (1885-1965), became partner.  Richard Mather, of Wye House, Buxton, died on 4 February 1946, leaving £3,262.  His remains were cremated at City Road.  In that year, the firm became a private limited company, with £12,000 capital.  The directors were Harold Mather and Gilbert Brightmore (1892-1988).  The firm switched from tools to butchers’, bread, shoe, and palette knives.  It also sold scissors, which became a speciality.  The works management seems to have been in the hands of Brightmore.  Surprisingly, Harold Mather described his occupation in official records and directories as a registered osteopath.  For example, the Sheffield directory of 1951 listed Brightmore as the company director; Mather was an osteopath.  

By the end of the 1950s, Harold’s son, Alan Mather (1919-1975) – though he had trained as an architect – became the fourth generation head of the company.  Harold Mather, of Northumberland Road, died on 1 April 1965 at Hallamshire Golf Course.   He left £30,630.   In the same year, the company was sold.  The assets and goodwill in scissors manufacturer was acquired by Ernest Wright.  Gilbert Brightmore died on 21 November 1988, leaving about £70,000.  Mather’s trade mark was ‘PIVOT’.  A brief account of the company was published in Quality, April 1959