Thorne’s of Leeds: From Mustard to Toffees
In the early 1980s Andrew Littlewood bought in Chesterfield an old tin and this led to him researching the story of Thorne’s toffee. Quaker Henry Thorne started business as a mustard miller and began experimenting with cocoa production, opening a works on Lady Lane, in Leeds. Contemporary with confectionery royalty Cadbury and Rowntree, Henry started to market his own cocoa and his business grew, but poor fortune meant Thorne’s never became the national name achieved by their competitors. Thorne’s is a story of business personalities rather than family achievement. Who were these people and why was that Thorne’s tin in Chesterfield? And what of the products – mustard, chicory, cocoa, drinking and eating chocolate, sweets and toffee? Andrew tells the story of his research and the fascinating history he has discovered of Henry Thorne and Company.
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