Born to a farming family in Altrincham. His early education was gained at technical schools. After completing his early education, he briefly worked for Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Co and then H W Kearns in 1919, where he served his apprenticeship. He entered the Drawing Office of the company and enrolled at Manchester College of Science and Technology, where he gained his Higher National Certificate in Mechanical Engineering in 1926. He worked for Kearns, later known as Kearns & Richards after a merger with another local machine tool maker. He went on to become firstly Chief Designer in 1938 and then eventually Managing Director of the company in 1969. After his retirement, he continued as a consultant with Staveley Industries Ltd, who had taken over Kearns & Richards, until 1971. Following this he became a consultant to Budenberg Gauge Co Ltd and Fairey Engineering of Stockport. Dr Sparkes gained an MSc at Victoria University of Manchester in 1988 and at the age of 86 gained his PhD, the oldest person in Britain to do so.

H W Kearns & Co Ltd was a machine tool manufacturing business set up by Henry Ward Kearns in 1907. The company went public in 1955, before becoming part of the Staveley Group in June 1967. The Group closed the George Richards factory and combined the two companies under the one roof at the Kearns factory, under the name Kearns-Richards.

Machine tools manufacturer formed in 1967 when Staveley Industries bought H. W. Kearns and Co. Ltd and merged it with George Richards and Co, key companies in the Broadheath machine tool manufacturing industry. It became part of Staveley Machine Tools.

Manufacturer of machine tools, founded in 1880 by George Richards. The business was taken over by Tilghmans in 1896 but continued to operate as a separate company. George Richards and Co. Ltd. merged with H. W. Kearns and Co. Ltd in 1967, when Kearns was bought by Staveley Industries, who by then owned George Richards. The new company was named Kearns-Richards.

Frank Pearn & Co was a pump manufacturing and hydraulic engineering company based in the West Gorton area of Manchester. Brothers Frank and Sinclair Pearn formed the company in 1880 as a partnership with Thomas Addyson. The company had previously existed as a partnership between the two brothers, beginning around 1871, before Arthur Collings Wells joined as a third partner, and the company became known as Frank Pearn, Wells & Co. It is not recorded when Wells joined the partnership, but it is estimated to be around 1878 or 1879. Under its new name, the company continued to manufacture pumps, supplying to waterworks across the United Kingdom. From 1886, Frank Pearn & Co was also the maker of the Clarke's railway signal wire compensator and developed designs for patent universal horizontal surfacing, boring, milling, drilling and tapping machines, which the company licensed to George Richards & Co. The machines were advertised under the name Pearn-Richards. Following Frank Pearn's death in 1914, Sinclair Pearn continued as chairman and managing director until his death in 1933. Sinclair Pearn was succeeded by his son Harold Walker Pearn, who had been joint managing director with his father. Harold Walker Pearn died in 1954, and the company was wound up the following year. Its business was absorbed by Holden & Brooke Limited.