Samuel Lister, 1st Baron Masham

Samuel Cunliffe Lister, 1st Baron Masham, ( born January 1 1815 in Calverley Hall near Bradford, † February 2nd 1906 in Masham in Yorkshire ) was a British inventor and industrialist.

Lister was born 1815 in Calverley Hall near Bradford. His father, Ellis Cunliffe (1774-1853) was the first Member of Parliament, who was elected in Bradford after the Reform Act 1832.

Samuel Lister played a key role in the development of the wool processing industry in Bradford during the industrial revolution. The textile industry transformed Bradford from a small, rural village in a rich and famous city. In addition to the possession of a spinning mill, he was also doing other things, such as the development of an air brake for railroads. He was an avid hunter and supporter of the arts.

In 1838 he began and his older brother John with a worsted spinning mill in Manningham, which her ​​father had built them. Lister's Mill and its owners were well known. The Listers were thousands of them multi-millionaires and people to the employer. The mill shaped the identity of the whole region, Lister became a symbol of the Victorian business community.

Lister Lister invented the rolling ridge separating and straightened raw wool, which must be done prior to spinning. In the 19th century this was a dirty, hot and tiring process - Lister's invention was a basic relief.

Around 1855 he began to look for a way to reuse the fiber waste in the production of silk. After many years, he finally managed to develop a silk comb, which made it possible to produce good quality silk at low cost. Another important invention listers in connection with the production of silk was his Samtwebstuhl, which made him very rich. Punitive tariffs, which were introduced by the United States, away from his income considerably, put him as one of the first critics of the British policy of free trade.

In 1891 he was elevated to the hereditary nobility, he chose his title after the village of Masham in Yorkshire, near which he in 1888 the estate had bought Swinton Park. He died there in 1906.

A statue Listers, created by Matthew Noble of white Sicilian marble, stands in Bradford named after him park. It was unveiled in 1875 by the then Bradford MPs WE Forster.