Lived in High
St, Prahran at the time of his fathers death.
Took up the old Wade and Wright brickworks in Stamford Rd, Oakleigh in the late 1890's.
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Within 5 years he had turned it into a successful business. The machinery took time to
recommission and an astute investment for Ethell was the purchase of wire-cutting machinery. By 1903 a dozen workers were able to produce 10,000 to 12,000 bricks per day, for delivery to metropolitan and country markets. The clay pit being worked proved to be of excellent composition for bricks and pipeclay. The extracted material was conveyed by trucks on railed track to the hopper and fed into a mill where it was ground,
sieved, worked into a plug, and then forced into dies, emerging to be wire cut into bricks. These were lifted to a drying area and stacked until ready for the Kiln. Three kilns operated with capacities to accommodate from 40,000 to 60,000 bricks. Ethell's brickworks was sold in 1908 a year prior to his death to Abraham Baxtor and John McKell.
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