Dunedin people are surrounded by the products of Samuel Barningham's Victoria Foundry, which was situated opposite the original hospital in Great King st. The foundry made the "zealandia" kitchen stove and also cast the iron columns which sold by the thousand. Those columns can be found supporting the verandah of the Mayfair Theatre entrance. Walk up High Street, Manor Place, or other streets in that area and they can be found supporting the balconies of houses there. Samuel Barningham, however, also had a talent for more delicate constructions.
PERSONAL.
Mr Samuel Barningham, who died on Wednesday and was buried in the Southern Cemetery this afternoon, was one of the most modest of men — not given to talking at any time, never wishing to push himself into prominence — and probably there are very few, even amongst those with whom he did business, who know that he was an accomplished mechanic with the inventive faculty. From his boyhood days in Ballarat he delighted to think out mechanical and mathematical problems. He made, amongst many other things, two microscopes, grinding the lenses himself; of a large assortment of clocks, his own product, the most remarkable is one that works by electricity; and he also constructed a seismograph. To the public he was known as head of a prosperous range-making firm, established here many years ago. He was a patternmaker by trade. Like many other thoughtful and original men, he was very kind and charitable, one who thought no ill of his neighbor, and was ever ready to help a needy one without advertising his bounty. Those few who had the privilege of knowing Samuel Barningham will always think of him with sincere respect and affection. -Evening Star, 1/9/1911.
THE LATE MR S. BARNINGHAM
By the death last Wednesday of Mr Samuel Barningham Dunedin has lost a notable, if unobtrusive, citizen. Mr Barningham during his long residence in the city never sought to push himself to the front in municipal or other public matters. That, perhaps, was a pity, as men of largely practical character such as was his are too often conspicuous by their absence from the conduct of such affairs. But Mr Barningham was eminently and actively practical in his own good way. It is not too much to say that as senior partner in the well-known Victoria Foundry Company he was held in genuinely loving regard by every one in the employment of the firm. To them he was at all times more a brother than a "boss." Indeed, his natural bent was entirely in the way of a pleasantly good-humoured outlook upon the doings of the hour or day. In keeping with this attitude, his active aim always lay in the direction of doing "the fair thing" by those working with or for him. This outflow of ever-genial and kindly qualities of mind endeared him not alone to his fellow workers but to all who came in contact with him in whatever relation. In short, to know "Sam" Barningham was to love and esteem him. Death has snatched him untimely away, and he will be mourned by both friend and employee as it is the hap of few to be mourned by those left behind. Sprung from a good old Yorkshire family, Mr Barmingham came to Australia as a child. In Victoria he learnt the pattern-making trade, and about 35 years, ago came to Dunedin, where, with one or two partners who survive him, he laid the foundations of the business now known as the Victoria Foundry Company (Limited). The limited liability principle was adopted some four years since, and this arrangement added to the prosperity of the concern.
Mr Barningham was not only a master craftsman in his own line; he was in his leisure hours a master hand at the most delicate, mechanical and optical work imaginable. Microscope of perfect construction, and fitted with lenses of his own grinding and polishing, microtomes, micrometer rulers, and many other delicate machines only to be appreciated fully by workers in science, were among his products. The present writer remembers one beautiful clock movement of his make so finely calculated as to be actuated by an electric battery consisting solely of a piece of common road metal in a jar of water. As those mechanical and optical creations have already been described in these pages it need only be remarked here that the fine qualities of head and hand which went to their making are very rare in any population. Mr Barningham was, in fact, a fine example of the master workman at his best. Naturally temperate, in every regard, he was a man who really enjoyed life by never being idle. And, because he was free from the lust of gold, he enjoyed life in far larger degree than does the man whose chief aim is to acquire material riches. Twice married, Mr Barningham leaves a widow to mourn her loss, but there are no children of either marriage. -Otago Daily Times, 2/9/1911.
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