This week’s Echoes of the Past has a family feel to it, with a look at the ‘Like father, like son’ feature on the Burnett Hodd family in the December 5 edition of Optician from 1975.
The Moorgate, London, practice was set up by George William Hodd in 1905 with his partner Mrs Burnett. All children born into the family were given the name Burnett as a middle name.
William was joined by his son Frederick, who worked with him for nearly 20 years and later became a partner in the firm. William Burnett Hodd’s grandson, Nigel, worked at the practice for a short while before managing another branch and eventually took over the specialist contact lens practice at the company’s Devonshire Street practice.
The article looked at some of the differences across the generations of Burnett Hodd practitioners. Education and career paths were markedly different. William left school at 14 and served an apprenticeship with Newbold and Bulford in gold frame making before moving on to a jewellers and silversmiths, where he learned indirect ophthalmoscopy and retinoscopy. It was only later that formal training took place.
By contrast, son Frederick stayed in school until sixth form before qualifying as FBOA and FSMC. Frederick was said to have been nurtured into following in his father’s footsteps and as a child, practised sight testing on his grandmother. Nigel, the third of four sons, was said to have been the only one with any interest in optics, and studied at City University.
Nigel now runs the practice with his daughter, Caroline Burnett Hodd, who is the fourth generation of optometrists in the family.