Alexandra Iron Press

Hi,

Alexandra Press, made by W H Lockett & Co, named their press Alexandra in honour of Princess Alexandra of Denmark, who married the Prince of Wales in 1863. The cap being a bunch of ostrich feathers from the Prince of Wales’ badge. F.T. Wimble an Australian firm made a machine which survives bearing the date of 1878. And W. Notting made an Alexandra Press which looks a little like an Albion. (This taken from James Morans book - Printing Presses)
Your Alexandra will be fairly highly decorated, with columns etc., A Figgins Albion of about 1870 vintage came up on Ebay recently which looked identical to the Alexandra but had reverted to the Albion name, the linkage being identical to an Albion.
I would be interested to hear where you got your press and see some pics of it. Incidentally I have a friend who owns a table top Alexandra.
Jeremy.

Hi Jeremy
I’ll take some photo’s in the next couple of days, thanks for the info on the press.Your right, it is well decorated and has the name W Notting of London

I too have an Alexandra. Photo attached

alexandra restored open corrected resized512 kb.jpg

My Albion style Alexandra iron hand press (pictured above) was made in 1881 by Bonnewell & Co, 16 Old Baley, London England. It somehow made its way to Egypt where it was used—badly— for what appeared to be a long time. Its previous owner purchased it and brought it to New York and then to Long Island about ten years ago with the idea of fixing it up.

When I purchased it last summer, many parts were missing; all the lever mechanisms, the drum and crank arm, all wooden parts, support leg, etc. But having purchased it virtually sight unseen, remarkably none of the castings were broken. It was covered in light rust, but no severe pitting except on the tympanum.

The biggest problem was that the tennons that secured the legs to the frame were broken off, and an old I-beam was used as an intermediary part to bolt the legs to and then the I-beam was bolted to the frame. New tennons had to be made and bolted to the frame to return it to its original configuration.

The restoration took six months. The press works wonderfully, and is a delight to use as well as to look at.

I’d like to get more information about your Alexandra press for my North American Hand Press Database — I assume it’s still in North America! It’s a gorgeous example of the press.

The North American Hand Press Database attempts to record all hand presses of this type (flat-bed) in North America. I have records for about 860 presses to date, and I’d like to add this one. Please contact me: bobtheham@adlib press.us.