John Dickinson began his business life as a
stationer in the
City of London in 1804. But around 1802 he had already started to experiment with papermaking machinery and obtained a first patent for cutting paper in 1807. Two years later Dickinson patented a new continuous mechanized papermaking process. In the same year he gained financial backing from
George Longman, whose family controlled the
Longman publishing firm, and formed a new company, called Longman & Dickinson. In addition a considerable sum of money was borrowed from the printer and MP
Andrew Strahan (1749–1831). Dickinson bought his first
paper mill at
Apsley, Hertfordshire (
Apsley Mill, a former flour mill) in 1809, and a second nearby (
Nash Mill, formerly a mediaeval corn-mill) in 1811; both took water from the
Grand Junction Canal (opened in 1800 and joined the
Grand Union Canal) which also provided transport for materials and product. Between 1828 and 1830 he built a third mill at
Croxley, also on the canal. The mill-house at Nash Mill, called Nash House, became the family home of Dickinson and his new wife Ann (née Grover), whose father Harry Grover supported this business development through his Hemel Hempstead Bank (later part of
Lloyds Bank) in
Hemel Hempstead. Soon Nash Mills was renowned for its production of tough thin paper for Samuel Bagster's "Pocket Reference Bible". A major fire in 1813 was a setback, but, being covered by insurance, enabled redevelopment towards large scale production. The brand is named after
Basildon Park, where some of Millington's directors were staying, and they liked the alliteration of "Basildon" and "
bond". The name "Basildon Bond" was used by comedian
Russ Abbot for one of his characters.
Innovations John Dickinson patented a method of
papermaking in June 1809 that rendered his rivals' techniques (principally the
Fourdrinier machine) obsolete. In 1850, the company started mechanical envelope manufacturing, with gummed envelopes for the first time. The production of fine rag paper on electrically driven machines was a successful innovation at Nash Mill.
Second World War The company produced various paper and cardboard products for the war effort, and also branched out into engineering, producing items such as fuel tanks for long range fighter aircraft, 20 mm cannon shells, aircraft fuel pumps,
magnetos and spark plugs. The company made the foil strips codenamed
Window used by the
RAF to blind enemy radar.
Dickinson Robinson Group Dickinson Robinson Group Ltd (DRG) was formed out of
E. S. & A. Robinson Packaging of
Bristol and
John Dickinson & Co Ltd. in 1966, creating one of the world's largest stationery and packaging companies. In 1989, the
asset-stripper Roland Franklin (Pembridge Investments) acquired DRG (including the Royal Sovereign group acquired in 1978) in a leveraged buyout worth £900 million.
Fate Pembridge Investments carved the Dickinson Robinson Group up and sold its parts for a profit to various other companies: • In 1990 it sold the paper mills in the group – Nash Mills, Keynsham Paper Mill and Fife Paper Mills – to
Sappi of South Africa. These mills were subsequently closed by Sappi as were all other acquisitions (Kymmini Oy, Blackburn Mill and Wolvercote Mill) they had made in the UK. • Also in 1990, DRG Stationery was acquired by Biber Holding AG of Switzerland and renamed John Dickinson Stationery. After Biber became insolvent in 1996, John Dickinson Stationery was sold in the same year to
Spicers Ltd, then a subsidiary of
DS Smith, and moved from Apsley to the village of
Sawston, south of
Cambridge. In 2005, John Dickinson Stationery was purchased by the French stationery manufacturer
Hamelin Group. Rebranded in 2008 as
Hamelin Brands, the company moved to
Red Lodge, Suffolk. == Frogmore Paper Mill ==