Frederick Sage & Co.

Origins

The founder, Frederick Sage (1830–1898) was born at Freston, a small village near Ipswich in Suffolk, the son of the village carpenter. Following his father's profession, he showed great ingenuity when young, for instance designing a velocipede to make it easier to sell small items of joinery he had made around the neighbourhood. After working for local firms of builders, his ambition took him to London in 1851 where for three years he continued working for builders, studying in evening schools to remedy his lack of education. Having married, and finding work hard to come by, he started his own shopfitting business in 1860 in Hatton Garden.

By 1870 Frederick Sage owned buildings in Gray's Inn Road, including show rooms and "steam works" nearby in Portpool Street. In 1876 he received an award along with many other British firms at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia for an exhibit of "air-tight showcases &c". In 1879 he was offering to warehouse showcases from the Paris Exhibition for the forthcoming one in Sydney.

1920s

In 1921 the Galeries Lafayette in Regent Street was thought a spectacular triumph for the firm, and other work was done in connection with the controversial rebuilding of that prestigious shopping street. In 1926 the Peterborough temporary building was rebuilt and branches were opened in Leeds and Glasgow. Belfast eventually had a branch too. But the Great Depression of 1929 onwards, which spread rapidly around the world, caused a severe jolt to the firm. The Argentina operation, already suffering from a strike in which the local director was stabbed in the back, was particularly badly hit. Sage's were so affected by the depression that they made losses for four years running and did not pay a dividend again until 1936.

To meet the wartime need for seaplanes in 1915 the company was one of six selected by the Admiralty to build the Short Type 184 under sub-contract. Originally 12 aircraft were ordered but the company went on to build more than 80 Short 184s. The Peterborough factory which had been acquired in 1910, conveniently by the Great Northern main line railway, with sidings, also used its woodworking skills to build cabins for non-rigid airships. The company also went on to build large numbers of Avro 504K trainer in a factory at Holborn in London, with a total of at least 408 completed. Orders were also placed for 130 Sopwith Camels, but this was cancelled due to the end of the war.

Not content with building aircraft on sub-contract the company also set up an aircraft design team which from 1916 included the aviator and aircraft designer Eric Gordon England.

Sage Type 1 was a design for a twin-engined bomber that was not built.

Sage Type 2 was a biplane-fighter with an enclosed cabin, the Admiralty ordered six but only one was built.