Alexander Williamson Dobbie (12 November 1843 – 18 July 1912) was a Scots-born South Australian brassfounder, engineer, inventor, lecturer, mesmerist, businessman and travel writer.
The articles exhibited included the brass level used by the Prince in laying the foundation stone for the Victoria Tower,[9] and a pair of "transit Y"s used by Charles Todd in his role as Government Astronomer.
The business suffered two serious incidents that could have had tragic consequences: Among the articles cast by Dobbie was a set of handbells, to patterns made by George Marshall of Waymouth Street.
[13] Also produced in the factory were highly-finished brass "church furniture": crosses, candlesticks, vases, alms dishes and lecterns.
During a visit to the United States at the time of the 1876 Philadelphia Exposition, Alex Dobbie became an enthusiast for their technology, with the result that the Gawler Place shop began advertising a diverse range of American "tools, novelties and general machinery".
[22] Alex's younger brother James, who had training as a machinist (perhaps with A. Simpson & Son), joined the firm some time before August 1873.
[25] The shop in Gawler Place diversified even further, selling Swedish "Domo" cream separators, Zonophone gramophone records, American Mason & Hamlin organs and Chickering and the cheaper (German) Fritz Kuhla pianos, and much else.
American Waterbury watches, English Brinsmead and German Neumeyer pianos, and Wertheim sewing machines were popular and profitable lines.
[27] The Western Australian factory closed in the 1920s after adverse rulings on tradesmen's and apprentices' pay, and retail operations were taken over by Arthur W. Lushey in 1932.
[30] His home in College Park was well known for its profusion of mechanical and scientific gadgets and curiosities, and his garden, where he grew an abundance of prize-winning flowers.
He ground and silvered (to a method expounded by John Browning) the mirror himself, and cast and turned the mount and all the mechanism, all in brass of course.
Dobbie used his 12-inch and 6-inch reflectors with special long focal-length cameras to record the sun's coronas, a subject of intense interest.
[39] Alexander Williamson Dobbie died at his residence, "Rothesay Villa", Baliol Street, College Park.
[42] In 1940 A. H. Dobbie and William "Bill" Bardon ( – October 1972) established "Dobbie Dico Meter Co." (DDMC) a brass foundry in Wittenoom Street, East Perth to manufacture water meters for the Western Australian market, and also had useful contracts with the US Navy dockyards in WA during World War II and later.