National smoke

In the crush of modern day George Town, it is easy to forget that these areas were at one time considered outside the city; that is, when the 'city' was Fort St George. Even later, during the 20th century as well, it was accepted that north of the Fort was the rough and ready industrial Madras, while the genteel folk drift southward. Not that it was really true in those days - north Madras was the go-to place for Carnatic music as well as other performing arts - and it is probably less so today. 

So, it was a surprise to see this sign proclaiming a factory making beedis in the middle of this commercial/residential district, at the end of Coral Merchant Street. Undoubtedly the factory has been shut for a long while, but going by the neon tubing on the signboard, it must have once been a prosperous business. I cannot remember hearing about Spade Clover Beedis; my memory stops with Dinesh and Mangalore Ganesh Beedis. My father tells me that he has heard of the "தா-னா பா-னா பீடி" (TP Beedis) of North Madras, but Spade Clover was a new one on him as well.

Spade Clover was owned by Khan Sahib Mohammed Oomer Sahib; when he died intestate in 1942, his widow Luthfunnissa Begum and Noorullah, his son by an earlier wife, agreed that the business be run jointly while the property suit was being settled. Spade Clover did make beedis in that fashion until November 1946, when Noorullah bought out the other heirs and became the sole owner. There seems to have been some fracas over the taxation of the income from the business during those years and that is the last I have been able to find of the Spade Clover Beedi Factory. The neon lights however show that the business must have been conducted well into the 80s at least, if not beyond that. Maybe my father and I made an error in thinking about North Madras beedis; according to one advertisement (click here), the Spade Clover Beedi was a "National Smoke", which was "of the people, by the people, for the people"!

Precious coral

For almost a hundred years, from 1688 to 1786, Anglo-Dutch Jews moved to Madras and played a major role in the trade of precious stones. Strange as it may seem, the 'natives' were fascinated by coral and were willing to trade even diamonds for it. The Jewish traders typically had an arrangement where one brother was a free merchant near Fort St George, another was based in London and a third in Amsterdam. That helped: coral from the Mediterranean, which was much sought after by the people of India, was shipped to Fort St George through London. (In return, the merchants of Leghorn, Naples and other cities on the Mediterranean seem to have been paid in pepper). Diamonds obtained as payment for this coral were sent to Amsterdam for cutting and polishing.

It appears that the Jews played a significant role in moving the centre of the coral trade from Goa (then with the Portugese) to Madras, which would explain their pre-eminence in this trade in the early days of the city. However, with the discovery of diamonds in other parts of the world, their value fell and the trade became less lucrative. Also, there appears to have been a shake-up in 1765 with the bust of a diamond smuggling ring, in which 3 Jewish agents from Madras (and the governor of Madras) were alleged to have been involved. 

The trade was then taken over by the Nagarathars. Whether they continued to trade coral or not, they took up offices in the street vacated by the Jewish traders. By this time, the street was itself so closely associated with the coral trade that it was called Pavazhakkarar Theru - Coral Merchants' Street. It is likely that anyone commencing trading activities there would be dubbed a Pavazhakkarar, whether coral was part of his bill of materials or not. And in keeping with the fascination for red coral, this gift from 'Coral Naiker Madras' to the city's Corporation, has been topped off with bright red paint!

The book "Diamonds and Coral: Anglo-Dutch Jews and Eighteenth-Century Trade", by Gedalia Yogev seems to have some fascinating accounts of the Jews of Madras, going by excerpts found here!