John Cassis

1891 Business Directory - Advertising

c1837-1929

"John Cassis, Jamaica's unrivalled shoemaker;" Jamaica Advocate

John Cassis "was one of the largest leather merchants and boot and shoemakers in the Island in his early days and carried on business at the corner of Church Street and Water Lane before the earthquake. After the calamity of 1907 he continued business at the West Parade . . ."
from brief obituary, Daily Gleaner, October 29, 1929

A recently located reference indicates that John Cassis was a half-brother of Charles Philip Lazarus, his mother being Rachael Francis, while his father was Pedro/Peter Casis/Cassis.

Impressively both men appear in a list, made by James Gall, of Jamaican success stories, viewed from the end of the 19th century:

'Jamaica had her Lazarus in the engineering trade, her McKenzies, Guys and Adams in the building line, her Sadlers and Logans as Agriculturists, her Josephs, a Barrister, her Henderson-Davis a preacher, her DaCosta as physician, her Burkes and Gideons as statesmen, her John Cassis as shoemaker and tanner, Messrs Verley and Robinson as bakers and her shipbuilders.'
James Gall, writing in the Gleaner, December 30, 1899

His reputation had apparently spread beyond the shores of Jamaica!

and in an editorial comment on the difficulties confronting the island's artisans -

Daily Gleaner, March 31, 1903
Our Mechanical Industries.
We have seen the model of a tower clock which Mr. Neuman Tobias is making, and we must say we are impressed with the fact that after all that is said as to the dearth of good mechanics and artisans in the island, we do possess some who are masters of their callings, but whose full usefulness to the community is not allowed to develop by the tendency now-a-days to send abroad for every thing we need. In a small place like Jamaica there is at best very little scope, but when the field is further restricted by local talent being denied the opportunity to get into competition with the foreign article, the wonder is that men who are capable of good work or who are ambitious remain in the island at all. It seems most regrettable that men like Charles P. Lazarus, John Cassis, Neuman Tobias, John Morrison, E. J. Steinke and others that we could name, should be so hampered by foreign competition or the tendency on the part of local patrons to go abroad for their requirements that they are unable at all times to keep a full staff of apprentices, and so pass on to, or perpetuate in the upcoming generation those habits of industry and knowledge of the mechanical arts which they respectively possess in so marked a degree.