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Thomas Wedgwood IV (1716 in Burslem – 23 February 1773 in Burslem) was an English master potter who taught his illustrious youngest brother Josiah Wedgwood the trade. [1] Following the death of their father, potter Thomas Wedgwood III, Josiah was apprenticed to his eldest brother Thomas for five years, starting in 1744. [2]
He was the fourth-generation Thomas Wedgwood to live in the Churchyard House until 1756, when he took up residence at the Overhouse, which he inherited from his cousin Katherine Egerton. [3] Prior to that, he had already been leasing the Overhouse Potworks. [3] Although he was not as commercially successful as his brother Josiah, his pottery business achieved more material wealth than previous generations of Wedgwoods. [3]
The eldest son of the potter Thomas Wedgwood III (1685–1739) and his wife Mary Stringer, Wedgwood was also the great-uncle of naturalist Charles Robert Darwin.[ citation needed ]
He married twice, first to Isabell Beech (1722–1750), who had five children, two of whom died in infancy. His surviving children with Isabell included Thomas Wedgwood V (c. 1745–1787), [3] master potter of the Overhouse, from whom descends the famous ceramic designer Clarice Cliff.[ citation needed ] After the death of his first wife, he married Jane Richards (1715–1785), with whom he had three children. [3]
Josiah Wedgwood was an English potter, entrepreneur and abolitionist. Founding the Wedgwood company in 1759, he developed improved pottery bodies by systematic experimentation, and was the leader in the industrialisation of the manufacture of European pottery.
Thomas Whieldon was an English potter who played a leading role in the development of Staffordshire pottery.
Josiah Spode was an English potter and the founder of the English Spode pottery works which became famous for the high quality of its wares. He is often credited with the establishment of blue underglaze transfer printing in Staffordshire in 1781–84, and with the definition and introduction in c. 1789–91 of the improved formula for bone china which thereafter remained the standard for all English wares of this kind.
The Darwin–Wedgwood family are members of two connected families, each noted for particular prominent 18th-century figures: Erasmus Darwin, a physician and natural philosopher, and Josiah Wedgwood FRS, a noted potter and founder of the eponymous Josiah Wedgwood & Sons pottery company. The Darwin and Wedgwood families were on friendly terms for much of their history and members intermarried, notably Charles Darwin, who married Emma Wedgwood.

Josiah Wedgwood II, the son of the English potter Josiah Wedgwood, continued his father's firm and was a Member of Parliament (MP) for Stoke-upon-Trent from 1832 to 1835. He was an abolitionist, and detested slavery.
The Staffordshire Potteries is the industrial area encompassing the six towns Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, Tunstall and Stoke in Staffordshire, England. North Staffordshire became a centre of ceramic production in the early 17th century, due to the local availability of clay, salt, lead and coal.
The Huxley family is a British family; several of its members have excelled in science, medicine, arts and literature. The family also includes members who occupied senior positions in the public service of the United Kingdom.
Francis Charles Bowen Wedgwood, 2nd Baron Wedgwood of Barlaston was a British artist and hereditary peer.
Francis Wedgwood a grandson of the English potter Josiah Wedgwood
John Wedgwood, the eldest son of the potter Josiah Wedgwood, was a partner in the Wedgwood pottery firm 1790–1793 and again 1800–1812.

Major Cecil Wedgwood, DSO was a British soldier and partner in the Wedgwood pottery firm. He was the first Mayor of Stoke-on-Trent.
Clement Francis Wedgwood was an English businessman, a partner in the Wedgwood pottery firm.
Wedgwood is an English fine china, porcelain and luxury accessories manufacturer that was founded on 1 May 1759 by the potter and entrepreneur Josiah Wedgwood and was first incorporated in 1895 as Josiah Wedgwood and Sons Ltd. It was rapidly successful and was soon one of the largest manufacturers of Staffordshire pottery, "a firm that has done more to spread the knowledge and enhance the reputation of British ceramic art than any other manufacturer", exporting across Europe as far as Russia, and to the Americas. It was especially successful at producing fine earthenware and stoneware that were accepted as equivalent in quality to porcelain but were considerably cheaper.
Enoch Wedgwood (1813-1879) was an English potter, founder in 1860 of the pottery firm Wedgwood & Co of Tunstall, Stoke-on-Trent. He was a distant cousin of the famous potter Josiah Wedgwood, of Josiah Wedgwood & Sons but their two businesses were separate concerns.
Laurence Wedgwood was a director of the Wedgwood pottery firm.
Henry Allen Wedgwood was an English barrister.
The Wedgwood Institute is a large red-brick building that stands in Queen Street, in the town of Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. It is sometimes called the Wedgwood Memorial Institute, but it is not to be confused with the former Wedgwood Memorial College in Barlaston. It achieved listed building status in 1972.
Ralph Wedgwood (1766–1837) was an English inventor and member of the Wedgwood family of potters. His most notable invention was the earliest form of carbon paper, a method of creating duplicate paper documents, which he called "stylographic writer" or Noctograph. He obtained a patent for the invention in 1806.
John Philip Elers and his brother David Elers were Dutch silversmiths who came to England in the 1680s and turned into potters. The Elers brothers were important innovators in English pottery, bringing redware or unglazed stoneware to Staffordshire pottery. Arguably they were the first producers of "fine pottery" in North Staffordshire, and although their own operations were not financially successful, they seem to have had a considerable influence on the following generation, who led the explosive growth of the industry in the 18th century.
The Wood family was an English family of Staffordshire potters. Among its members were Ralph Wood I (1715–1772), the "miller of Burslem," his son Ralph Wood II (1748–1795), and his grandson Ralph Wood III (1774–1801). Ralph I was the brother of Aaron Wood, father of Enoch Wood. Through his mother, Ralph Wood II was related to Josiah Wedgwood.