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| The Wood FAMILY, | |
celebrated English family of Staffordshire potters, a major force in the development of Staffordshire wares from peasant pottery to an organized industry. The family's most prominent members were Ralph Wood (1715-72), the "miller of Burslem"; his brother Aaron (1717-85); and his son Ralph, Jr. (1748-95). Through his mother, Ralph, Jr., was related to Josiah Wedgwood, and the two names were on a number of occasions associated professionally. In 1730, Ralph Wood was apprenticed to John Astbury, and he subsequently worked with Thomas Whieldon at Fenton Low, there learning the manufacture of coloured glazes. He began producing his own salt-glazed wares in 1754 at Burslem, where he also practiced as a block cutter (i.e., a carver of the original patrix from which the potters' working molds were taken). Aaron apprenticed with the Thomas Wedgwood, Jr., firm from 1731 to 1746, when he left to work with Whieldon. He opened his own pottery four years later. |
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