FURPHY, JOHN (1842-1920), engineering blacksmith, was born on 17 June 1842 at
Kangaroo Ground, Victoria, the eldest son of Samuel Furphy, farmer, and his wife
Judith, née Hare. His parents had arrived from County Armagh, Ireland, in 1841 as
bounty immigrants; his father was then described as an agricultural servant and
his mother as a dressmaker. He was educated first by his mother and then at
government schools at Kangaroo Ground and Kyneton. He was later apprenticed to a
Kyneton firm of blacksmiths and implement makers, Hutcheson & Walker, who
were pioneers in the local manufacture of farm machinery. In 1864 he set up as a
blacksmith in Kyneton and stayed there until 1873 when he moved to the newly
surveyed township of Shepparton in the Goulburn valley, where he opened the first
blacksmith's and wheelwright's shop. His business expanded into ironfounding and
by 1888 his establishment was the most extensive of its kind in northern Victoria.
At the foundry he produced a variety of agricultural implements and specialized in
modifications to suit local farming conditions. One of his patents was a grain
stripper which won first prize at the Grand National Show in 1884 and had a wide
sale before the manufacture of the combine harvester. At the International
Exhibition in 1888-89 his entry of a grain-stripping machine, a furrow plough and
iron swingletrees was among those gaining the highest possible award.
View the full record at
Australian Dictionary of Biography
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