Born: Amos Hinton was born in Tring, Hertfordshire on 14th September 1844.

Educated: He attended a private school in Tring. In 1862, at the age of 18 he went to work at John Birks’ shop in South Street, Middlesbrough where he leant the finer points of the grocery trade.

Married:  Amos Hinton married Ann Kirtland. Like her husband, she was born in Tring.

Family: Amos and Annie had four daughters: Isabel, Ida, Florence and Lilian, and two sons: William and Amos

Home: Amos Hinton’s first home in Middlesbrough was above John Birks’ shop in South Street. Later he lived in a villa on Southfield Road, another on Marton Road and Hilda House, across from the main entrance to Albert Park

Known for: In 1871, Amos Hinton took over John Birks’ grocery shop in South Street, Middlesbrough. By 1874 he had opened two more shops in the town, in Linthorpe Road and Newport Road. By the time of the First World War, Hinton’s company had branches in South Bank, Grangetown, Redcar and Haverton Hill as well as the Middlesbrough shops. However, the pride of the company was the store on Corporation Road, at the corner of Albert Road, with its highly successful “Oriental Café”. Hinton’s shops were famous locally for his own blends of tea and coffee and for the high quality of his cooked meats. Amos Hinton was elected to Middlesbrough town council in 1874. He became mayor in 1886 and was made an alderman in 1892. From then on he was often referred to as “the Alderman”. He donated part of the land on which the Middlesbrough central library was built and he officiated at the opening ceremony in 1912. The Alderman also contributed to the purchase of the land where Park Wesley Methodist Chapel was built in 1904. He was active in the temperance movement.

Died:  Amos Hinton died on 26th September 1919 and was buried in Linthorpe Cemetery.

Further Information: “The Case of the Jamaican Banana: or How to be a Successful Grocer in Nineteenth Century Middlesbrough” David Taylor in Bulletin of the Cleveland and Teesside Local History Society, vol. 42 (1982)

“Amos Hinton “Fifty Years Hard in a Corner of Yorkshire” Carol Cook (ed.) in Cleveland History vol. 80 (2001)