Daniel & Arter was a prominent Birmingham silversmith and electro-plater.  The founders were Thomas Henry Daniel (c.1835-1916) and Thomas Richard Arter (1833-1897). The former had been born at Newark, New Jersey, USA, and naturalised in 1841; but his father, George, was a brass founder from Birmingham.  George must have worked in New Jersey in the 1820s and 1830s, but by 1851 the Daniels had returned to Birmingham. Thomas trained as an electro-plater’s clerk.  At some point. Thomas met Thomas R. Arter, who had been born at Birmingham, the son of John (a plasterer) and his wife, Hannah. He began his career as a merchant’s clerk (apparently with Birmingham hardware merchant, Alfred Field & Co).

By the mid-1860s, Daniel & Arter was active as a spoon and fork manufacturer at Globe Electro-Plate & Spoon Works, 49 Lombard Street.  The factory was relocated in about 1878 to Upper Highgate Street, Balsall Heath.  Daniel told the Census in 1881 that the partners employed 194 persons. A later account of a fire at the factory claimed that the firm employed over 400 (Birmingham Mail, 3 February 1891). The company registered hallmarks in Birmingham (1882 and 1905) and in Sheffield (1906). It did not have a factory in Sheffield, but would have ‘bought in’ steel cutlery from Sheffield makers.  However, it had a London showroom at Holborn Viaduct, which was transferred to Hatton Garden in 1896.

From Daniel & Arter’s Globe Nevada Silver Works (a name adopted in the late nineteenth century) flowed a wide range of low to middle-grade flatware and holloware for hotel and shipping companies and customers in South America, Japan, China, and the Colonies. Besides its silver mark, ‘D & A’, the company had a string of trade names: for example, NEVADA SILVER, BURMAROID, ARGENLINE, BENGAL SILVER, BRAZILIAN SILVER, and LAXEY SILVER.  However, apart from a few electro-plated lines, these stamps did not denote any silver content. For example, NEVADA SILVER spoons and forks were made of a metal alloy that could be polished to look like silver.

Thomas Richard Arter, of Mariemont, Park Hill, Moseley died on 4 April 1897, aged 64. His newspaper obituary carried the notice, ‘Australian papers please copy’, which indicated the importance of one of the firm’s export markets (London Evening Standard, 6 April 1897). A Conservative councillor of Balsall Heath, a JP, and a freemason, he left £34,841. He was interred at St Nicolas Churchyard, King’s Norton. Daniel remained the senior partner, but the next generation in the enterprise was provided by Arter’s sons. He had married Jane Selby in 1856. Their sons included: Frederick Stephen Selby (1857-1904), John James Bedney (1860-1922), Thomas Richard (1862-1925), Millward Selby (1864-1940), and Alfred Henry (1867-1936). They all joined the firm. Frederick (until his death in 1904) also had a seat on the board of James Cycle Co Ltd. Millward supervised the London office (a Daniel & Arter hallmark was registered in London in 1913).

Thomas Henry Daniel died from pneumonia on 12 January 1916 at his residence, Ingoldsby, Wake Green Road, Moseley. He was aged 80 (Birmingham Daily Mail, 13 January 1916). He was buried at Moseley Old Church, leaving £59,153 (over £5m at today’s prices).  Daniel’s son, Thomas James, was an architect, so the Arters assumed control of the firm. By 1918, the company was said to have over 300 employees. In 1920, it became a private limited company, with £15,000 capital, and Thomas Richard’s four surviving sons as directors (Birmingham Gazette, 21 June 1920).

The firm struggled in the difficult trading conditions of the interwar years, as the aging management passed from the scene. Thomas Richard Arter died on 31 December 1925, leaving effects of £13,648.  He was buried in the family grave at St Nicolas Churchyard, beneath a huge monument in pink granite (which also carried the names of his father and brother John James Bedney, who had died in 1922). When Millward S. Arter died on 29 February 1940, aged 76, he was the last surviving son. He was still associated with the firm and also a director of James Cycle Co Ltd. He left £65,131. In 1941, the firm went into voluntary liquidation and the goodwill, dies, and designs were offered for sale (Birmingham Gazette, 26 June 1943). The dies were acquired by W. J. Baker & Sons Ltd, stampers and piercers of Moseley, Birmingham. Daniel & Arter’s collection of old silver, which had been bought for the use of the firm’s designers, was sold at Christie’s.