Page 7 - pp-Suter-Miscellany

Thomas Suter and family in Bruce Grove, in the 1911

census

It seems business as an electrician was unkind to
Thomas for a time (one recalls the parallel case of John
Thomas Norman junior a couple of decades earlier).
But after an initial setback, apparently he returned to it,
since his shop featured “electrical and mechanical
equipment”. Whether or not the shop sold Richard
Suter’s mounts is unknown. Thomas’ entrepreneurial
instinct was strong: by 1911 he had moved three doors
away, to a shop now specialising in bicycles – then
very much an up and coming commodity. That
business must have prospered – in 1926 the electoral
records show Thomas continuing business at Bruce
Grove but living at 686 High Road, so he probably
owned one or both of those premises. (His son
continued the business, and the bicycle shop still
existed in 1986, now moved to 686 High Road and
offering mopeds as well as bicycles.)