Chimney Sweep Weymouth

The American actor Dick Van Dyke played a chimney sweep in the movie Mary Poppins. His portrayal depicts a man who is independent and happy in his job, but unfortunately this portrayal unrealistic. The sad truth is that in the past a chimney sweep was considered a lowly, dirty job which is a far cry from the regard that modern chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth are experiencing.

For at least two centuries being a chimney sweep was considered not only a dirty job but also a dangerous one. Then to make matters worse there was no union and being a lowly job, it was poorly paid. Today however the opposite is true. People now recognize the necessity of jobs like chimney sweep and value companies like chimney sweep Weymouth and the services they provide.

The history of chimney sweeping.
Anthropologists have discovered evidence of chimney sweeps dating back as far as the early 13th century. In the 13th to 15th centuries chimney sweeps were limited but then in the 16th century the number of people who had chimneys increased as did the corresponding need for chimney sweeps. These were the humble beginnings of today’s chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth.

In the 13th to 15th centuries the English ruling class were the only people who had chimneys. Then in the 15th century the English middle class began to develop which meant an increased number of chimneys and an increased demand for chimney sweeps.

Chimney sweeps have never been unionized but the increase in the number of chimneys has led to the formation of professional chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth who are often members of the (NCSG) National Chimney Sweep Guild.

Chimney sweeps were initially individual operators and companies like chimney sweep Weymouth didn’t come into existence until the 20th Century. As the middle class developed in England in the 16th Century so to did the demand for chimneys in people’s homes. The middle class equaled greater prosperity in society and with that prosperity came a greater demand for chimney sweeps.

Chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth were not around in the 17th Century, and the prevailing government in an attempt to raise revenue, initiated a tax on chimneys where the more chimneys a house had the higher the tax was. To avoid the tax home owners started building multiple flues connected to a single chimney. This was a far cry from the chimneys of today that chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth are cleaning. As a result of multiple flues being attached to a single chimney, chimney’s became structures containing pitch dark, confined tunnels and were dangerous for chimney sweeps to clean.

In the 18th Century people started burning coal rather than wood in their fires and this created a whole new range of problems for the humble chimney sweep. Burning coal produces substantially more soot than wood, so when this started it increased the need for chimney sweeps.
Unlike the professionals of today working for chimney sweep companies like chimney sweep Weymouth chimney sweeps were mostly children. The chimney sweep was a lowly paid job requiring people with small frames to crawl into confined places and remove carcinogenic soot. The children chosen were mainly orphan kids between the ages of 5 and 11, or children who were sold to chimney masters by parents who couldn’t afford to feed them.

Today’s chimney sweeps are nearly always employees of a specific chimney sweep company like chimney sweep Weymouth rather than being individual operators.