Josiah Wedgwood - Stoke, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire. - Grave of a Famous Person on Waymarking.com

Josiah Wedgwood was an innovative designer, a manufacturer of high-quality pottery and a campaigner for social reform. He was buried in the grounds outside the original church of St Peter Ad Vincula in Stoke because as a Dissenter he was not allowed to be interred inside.

The Tomb of Josiah Wedgwood I is Grade 11 listed.
The tomb Circa 1795 is in a squared paved area with edge coping probably covering a vault, with a central raised panel inscribed:
Josiah Wedgwood 1730-1795
It is surrounded by black metal railings. (visit link)
(visit link)

Josiah Wedgwood was born in Burslem, Staffordshire, the eleventh and last child of Thomas Wedgwood (d. 1739) and Mary Wedgwood (née Stringer; d. 1766).
Josiah was raised within a family of English Dissenters, he was the grandson of a Unitarian minister and was an active Unitarian. By the age of nine, he was proving himself to be a skilled potter. He survived a childhood bout of smallpox to serve as an apprentice potter under his eldest brother Thomas Wedgwood IV. Smallpox left Josiah with a permanently weakened knee, which made him unable to work the foot pedal of a potter's wheel. As a result, he concentrated from an early age on designing pottery and then making it with the input of other potters.

In his early twenties, Wedgwood began working with the most renowned English pottery-maker of his day, Thomas Whieldon, who eventually became his business partner in 1754. He began experimenting with a wide variety of techniques, an experimentation that coincided with the burgeoning of the nearby industrial city of Manchester. Inspired, Wedgwood leased the Ivy Works in the town of Burslem. From 1768 to 1780 he partnered with Thomas Bentley, a potter of sophistication and astute taste. Over the course of the next decade, his experimentation (and a considerable injection of capital from his marriage to a richly endowed distant cousin) transformed the sleepy artisan works into the first true pottery factory.
Source: Wikipedia - Josiah Wedgwood. (visit link)

Description: Josiah Wedgwood was an entrepreneur and the founder of English pottery manufacturing, and is world famous for his designs. Wedgwood was born in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, and is the most famous of English potters. In 1759 he was able to set up his own business with money that he had saved. After many failures, he produced such an improved form of ware that it came into great demand. He engaged Flaxman to make classical designs for him, and his pottery became the fashion, leading to a great extension of the Staffordshire earthenware industry. Date of birth: 07/12/1730 Date of death: 01/03/1795 Area of notoriety: Other Marker Type: Horizontal Marker Setting: Outdoor Fee required?: No Web site: [Web Link] Visiting Hours/Restrictions: Not listed

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Date Logged Log   06/30/2017 Mike_bjm visited it