[Retlaw]

Originally Posted by Pudwoppa

I found a different theory about where the NORI name comes from some time ago. It seems more plausible than the others I've heard, and would also explain why it isn't common knowledge. Text is taken from the Penmorfa Old Bricks website.

"There are two places in the British Isles where you get a particular bed of clay containing alumina (refractory ore), lower red marl and iron ore all in the same measure. They are Broseley in Shropshire and Accrington in the Darwen Valley in Lancashire. Both areas are renowned for their very high quality and extremely resillient bricks. At one stage or another on the Broseley clay beds there were around 45 brickworks. One of these was the works of Capt. John Anstice: confusingly named The Madeley Wood Tile Works. Set up in 1851 this works produced bricks, roofing & floor tiles, also chimney pots and land drain pipes. It closed in 1956.

The brand for this company was IRON, as they also owned several ironworks and blast furnaces. When the Accrington Brick Company began mass production, they also branded their bricks IRON. Capt Anstice got to hear of it and threatened them with court action for breach of his brand copyright. So in an excellent euphoria of marketing, Accrington spelled the name backwards on their bricks and advertised that their brick was "Iron whichever way you put it." Hence today the Accrington NORI is well known and the IRON BROSELEY is forgotten."
If that supposition is correct, then Nori must have made some bricks with Iron on them. for Broseley to get uppity, how come some of those have never surfaced in all these years.

This seems more likely than all of the popular local theories I've heard (several listed on this thread). I contacted Tony Mugridge who runs the website to see if he had reference material for this, and unfortunately he didn't, but said that it was considered relatively common knowledge amongst those who know.


He was also able to reasonably discredit the 'muddled mould' theory:

Quite from common sense: To put the letters in the wrong order on a brick would never matter. Only brick collectors and historians are interested in what it says in the frog [the frog is the indented bit at the top and bottom that carries the logo] . But to put the letters in the wrong order in the foundry, well that would never happen as even apprentice work is checked! No business after all, is going to suggest that they changed the brand on their product because they were threatened with legal action because they copied a brand name.
Not only in the Frog some bricks had the name on the face
So my question is, does anyone have a copy of one of these "Iron whichever way you put it" adverts? I haven't been able to find one so far, and I think it would help to finally clear up the mystery.

As for the muddled letters theory, having spent the first 12 years of my working life as a pattern maker at Lang Bridges & Bulloughs, no way could that have got thro, several patterns would have been needed before the product reached the brick makers, misspelling on so many patterns, never.