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NOTTINGHAM PAST & PRESENT: NOTED BUILDINGS
J. LEAVERS' HOUSE, St. Helen's Street, (formerly York Street) Derby Road, 1902
J. Leavers' house which is shown on the right of the drawing is situated in an unimportant street between Derby Road and Ilkeston Road, and is little more than a cottage : but from such small beginnings has grown the great lace trade; for it was within the walls of this house that Leavers set up his first lace machine. He was a frame-smith setter up, and was born in Sutton-in-Ashfield in 1786; he must have been a man of a very secretive nature; for two years he shut himself up in this house experimenting in the construction of machinery for making point, net and warp lace, and so taciturn was he that t ven his own family had but slight knowledge of his work. Although his inventions have been of the utmost importance to the lace trade they do not appear to have benefited him financially to a very great extent. His life closed in voluntary exile at Rouen in the year 1848, and he lies buried in that ancient city.