Plymouth County, Massachusetts - Chapter 5 (2 of 3 so headed), 1884

Chapter 5

Mills and Manufactures, - Ea.-.t Bridgewater ha.i been somewhat remarkable on account of its number of mill-seats, of which there appear to have been nu less than twenty-two. Some of them not of great water-power, and after continuing a longer or shorter terra of years discontinued. Others have been in operation ever since they were established. The first mill here of any description was a saw-mill built and carried on by Robert Latham, the date not precisely kaowii. but, as supposed, several years prior to KiQ;^ Pliilip's war, possibly as early as 1GG7. It was located on Satucket River, a little below the lodiau Dam.

Josepli Shaw's grist-uiill was erected on Salisbury River suiuewhat earlier than 1700. Subsequently a saw-mill was built on the same dam. In recent years both mills have been removed, and the privilege has been occupied by a rolling-mill built and run by Reed Brothers, of Brockton.

SuoU Meadow Saw-Mill, several rods above the upper bridge, over Forge Pond, was built, probably about 1700, by John Whitman, whose house was a short distance south of it, on the east side of what is DOW Union Street. He died in 1727, and the millseat was overflowed by the Forge Pond, Capt. Jonathan Bass having built a dam and a forge further down the stream, on the land which he had bought of Lieut. Josiah Byram in 1726. The wheels of the forgo were built on the outside. The first forge building Was destroyed by Ore, and another was built on the same i-ilc. Capt Buss, dying in 1750, bequeathed the forge to his son, Jonathan.

George Keith conducted the work of the forge in the Revolution. Silvanus Luzell was the next owner, who sold out to Capt. David Kingman and his son, Capt. Ezra Kingman, in 1801.

In 1828, William Mitchell, from Yorkshire, England, bought the establishment and introduced a new method of forging, which proved successful, and forge-work is still done there.

In 1740, Hugh Orr, a Scotchman, built a dam on Jlattield River, where the bridge is, near the Reynolds place, the same now owned by Joseph H. Mills. He erected a trip-hammer shop and manufactured scythes as well as various other edge-tools, also muskets. During the Revolution large quantities of cannon, iron and brass, cast solid, were there bored out and furnished for the armies. There, too, machinery for cleaning flux-seed, for carding and spinning cotton, and weaving cotton cloth were produced. These different manufactures proved of inestimable value to our nation.

Hon. Hugh Orr, son of Robert and Margaret Orr, was born in Lochwiuioch, in the shire of Renfrew, Scotland, Jan. 13, 1717 (new style). Ho learned the trade of a gunsmith. Of an active turn of mind, full of enterprise, when but twenty years old, he determined to emigrate to New England. Though shipwrecked on the passage, he, nothing daunted, found his way to Easton, Mass., where he worked for a while at his trade, but, better prospects opening before him, he was induced to settle in Eaat Bridgewater in 1740 ; there he married Mary, daughter of Capt. Jonathan Bass.

His large house, raised on the day of his marriage, Aug. 4, 1742, though somewhat changed in appearance, is still standing, and is owned and occupied by William Vinton, one of his descendants.

It baa been said " that there was no branch of iron manufacture that did not at some period become the object of his pursuit, nor was there any obstacle too formidable for his perseverance to surmount." He established the first trip-hammer in this part of America. His manufacture of scythes and axes became famou.-, and led the way for similar works in neighboring States. For years he was known an the only manufacturer of edge-tools in a territory of many miles' extent.

As early as about the year 1748, he was employed by the authorities of the Province of Massachusetts Bay to make for them five hundred muskets.

The narrow policy of the British government served but to spur him od to still greater exertions for the prosperity of his adopted country. After the Revolutionary war broke out, he went vigorously into the manufacture of cannon, and abundantly aided the patriot cause; his method of casting cannon solid, and then boring them out, being, as it appear.s, the first work of the kind applied in America.

The war with the mother-country being ended, Mr. Orr's attention was again turned to the arts of peace. By his endeavors, machine.s - the first of the kind in America - for carding, spinning, and roping cotton were built as early as 1786 ; the General Court of Massachusetts readily furnishing means Ibr the encouragement of such skillful efibrts.

He advocated the production of flaxseed for exportation (though on the part of some much opposition was manifested), and was the inventor of a valuable machine for cleansing the seed, quantities of which he exported to Scotland, and a source of profitable forei'-n trade was thus opened.

Samuel Rogere, sod of Tlioniaa and Penelope j (Hutch) Rogers, was born in Marslifleld, Mass., July i IG, ITGG. At an early age he manifested much i niechauical ingenuity. When but fourteen years of | age he made a clock of wood auj brass. He served ; his time as an apprentice to John Bailey, clockmaker, ] at Hanover. His apprenticeship being ended, and having made all the tools needed for his business, he I came to East Bridgewater in 1788, and began work | in a shop near where the " brick store" now stands. Soon after beginning business for himself, it occurred j tu him to try making a nail-machine. He studied i the matter so thoroughly that he, at length, wrought out a machine which would cut and head a nail at one operation. Tliis has been supposed to be the first machine of the kind in America, and possibly in the world.

When the nail- factory in Plymouth was established (about the year 18U6) the machines were all made by Mr. Rogers. About 1802 he made two silver watches complete in every respect, with the exception of mainsprings ; one of them is still preserved in the Rogers family. They are suppo.sed to be the first watches made in America.

The tack-machine, called the " double cutter," was invented by Mr. Rogers. All tools ever used by him after starting in business were of his own making. Few, perhaps, have been his equals in inventions of which they could execute all the work up to his time. He died July 17, 1838, aged seventy-two.

In 1835, a new firm began operating under the name of the Keith Iron Company. They built a large dam above where the old rolling and slitting-mill had stood, and, with considerable increase of waterpower, erected a new rolling-mill. This establishment is now prospering under the firm-name of the East Bridgewater Iron Company, Rogers and Sheldon, proprietors.

In 1822, Samuel Keen and Charles Mitchell built on Matfield River, a little distance above Elmwood Bridge, a mill, in which for many years Samuel Keen, Jr., has manufactured shoe machinery, the different kinds of which have been his own invention.

In 1844 and 1845, brass pins were, to a considerable extent, manufactured there, but it was found difficult to compete with large establishments of the kind in other parts of the country, and the business was abandoned.

In 1829, on Beaver Brook, Capt. Abram Washburn, of Bridgewater, by digging a canal some fifty rods long, and turning the stream through a valley, was enabled to construct a dam with twenty feet fall of water. The valuable water-power thus gained has been turned to good account in the sawing of logs into boards and shingles, in box-making, carriage-work, the manufacture of doors, sashes, blinds, and tacks. Charles H. Goss, who deceased in 1883, manufactured boxes there for many years.

Feb. 10, 1814, Jacob Dyer, Daniel Perry, Jonathan Stetson, Oakes Tirrell, Isaac Tirrell, Jr., William Vinton, Abisha Stetson, Benjamin Bates, David P. Reynolds, Eleazer Keith, and Allen Whitman were incorporated as the Matfield Jlanufacturing Company, for the purpose of manufacturing cotton and woolen goods, the location near the site of the Orr Wurks, wilii the same water-power. The cost of the building and eiiuipments was twenty-eight thousand dullars. This factory was destroyed by fire in 1830.

About 1724, the saw-mill at Latham's dam, the first in East Bridgewater, was removed some distance from its old location, and set up near where Satucket bridge now is. A grist-mill was soon after erected on the same dam, and the mills were owned for many years by Deacon Thomas Whitman, who deceased in 1788, and was succeeded by his son, Lieut. Peter Whitman, who died in 1801. The mills were subsequently owned by Arthur Harris, Benjamin Harris, Nahum Mitchell, Barzillai Allen, and others. In 1814 a new compaDy was formed, a factory was built, and nail machines were set up in 1815. The owners in 1816 were Silvanus Lazell, Nahum Jlitchell, Alpheus Allen, and John M. Goodwin. The manufacture of nails was carried on for ten years. In 1827, another building was erected in addition to the others, in which Zebina Kelt manufactured tacks for many years, and was succeeded in the same department by his sons, Zebina, Jr., and Samuel, who carried forward the business successfully till the destruction of the mills by fire, in 1872.

In 1827, a new company having purchased the Satucket works, the nailing business was given up, and the manufacture of cotton goods took its place.

In 1828, Nathaniel Wheeler, Wallace Rust, and Allen Whitman were incorporated as "The East Bridgewater Manufacturing Company," for the purpose of manufacturing cotton goods. Capt. Seth Allen, Samuel Rogers, Deacon Samuel Keen, and corporation. In 1843 a new company bought the privilege and began the manufacture of cotton-gins. They were Eleazer Carver, Caleb S. Hunt, Franklin Dexter, Caleb Reed, John Reed, and Sampson Reed. This establishment, the Carver Cotton-Giu Company, has been and is doing a very successful business, a hundred hands being at times employed in the manufacture of their excellent cotton-gins, which are

Many years ago, in the northerly part of Beaver, ou Beaver Brook, Ziba Bisbee, a skillful artisan, made valuable cast-steel siiovels and hoes. Tliis was at a date prior to that of the shovel manufactory in Easton. 5Ir. Bisbee removed to the Western country.

We have spoken of a part of the manufactories located on water-privileges iu East Bridgewater. The catalogue may be too long for further details. Among Other iron manufacturers, Gen. Silvaous Lazell deserves to be mentioned. Before cut nails were in general use he employed a great number of men in various neighborhoods in the manufacture of wrought nails, the little nail-shops being then very numerous. He was thus enabled to produce eighty tons of nails in a year. It was said that at one time he had in this department the whole control of the Boston market.

Other iron manufactures have been located here, which did well for a time, but whose continuance was brief. Locomotive engines were built iu 1851. The chain-works of Fearing, Rodman & Swift began operations in 1870. About twenty-five hands were employed, and from fifteen to twenty tons of chain per week were wrought ; but though a prosperous business was done here, the establishment, after the lapse of a few years, was removed to Boston.

From fifty to sixty years ago, and many years since, tack- and nail-making were carried un here to a great extent. In 1829 there were thirteen waterprivileges iu operation, in many of which tacks or nails, if not both, were made. At present the number of uailmakers employed there is about fortyseven.

The iron foundry of Joshua Dean has been in operation for several years at the steam works near the railroad station in the Centre Village. Thirty-two hands are employed, and much valuable work is done there.

Melville Otis was the son of Dr. Josiah and Susanna (Orrj Otis ; born in East Bridgewater in 1778. Mr. Otis devoted his life to the perfecting of machinery for the manufacture of nails.

The lives of inventors are in themselves lessons. Some one has said that " those who have labored in the department of mechanical invention may truly be termed the nuirtyrs of civilization." Artless, honest, unsclfiah, he persevered through obstacles, and probably much more credit is due to him than may have ever been acknowledged, or even known to the public. He is known to have more than once so ingenuously related the particulars of his inventions in

Mr. Otis' earliest patented invention was in company with Samuel Rogers a machine for rolling iron and cutting nails, Dec. 7, 1813. Other patents awarded him were for - Dec. 17, 1817 - manufacture of nails ; March 20, 1834, nails made at one operation; Dec. 3, 1850, nail plater, feeder, and turner.

At one period manufacturing companies had invested a large amount of capital in nail-machines, when a machine was brought forward which made nails with a flat yripe. This invention would have led to the abandonment of the various machines which had been in use up to that time, but Mr. Otis invented a " spring nipper," as it is called, by which the nails of the flat gripe could be made on the old machines as well as on any, and they (the old machines) are mostly in use now.

At the time of his death, Dec. 30, 1852, Mr. Otis was engaged in inventing a feeder by which one person could tend two or three machines at the same time, and had it, as he thought, nearly completed, when death " laid an injunction upon his labors," and no one, as far as we are aware, has carried forward his project. On the morning of his decease he had just left the house of his son, and seated himself in a neighbor's wagon with a piece of machinery in his hand in order to go to his place of business, when his countenance was suddenly seen to change. He was carried into the house and died almost instantly, at the age of seventy-four.

Eleazer Carver, son of Dr. Eleazer and Sarah (Keith) Carver, was born in the South Parisii of Bridgewater, April 9, 1785, and died in East Bridgewater, April 6, 1866. Possessing an inventive genius, and having acquired the trade of a millwright, he very early went to Ohio. Continuing there a short time only, he proceeded to Natchez, where, in repairing sugar-mills, cotton-gins and presses, his services were highly appreciated. Here began his improvements in the cotton-gin, a manufactory of which he commenced at Natchez in 1807. To the manufacture and improvement of the gin he devoted tlie remainder of his active life in Natchez, in Bridgewater, and in East Bridgewater.

The cotton-gin, a machine for removing seeds from cotton, was invented by Eli Whitney, a native of Westboro', Mass., in 1793. The production of cotton in the United States that year did not exceed ten thousand bales. In 1859 the product was over five

What James Watt was to the steam-engine Eleazcr Carver may, perhaps, be truly said to have been to the cotton-gin. If neither of them was actually the inventor, surely each of them was a great improver. In 1838, Mr. Carver obtained a patent for hi.s improvements on the gin, which was a new grate so constructed as entirely to prevent the cotton from clogging. Again, Aug. 12, 1840, he secured a patent for " a machine for cutting the teeth of circular saws," said to have been a very valuable improvement. Another patent, bearing the same date, was for " a machine for filing or smoothing the teeth of saws." In 1843 he, in company with Caleb S. Hunt, Franklin Dexter, Caleb Reed, John Reed, and Sampson Reed, i bought the establishment of the East Bridgewater ^ Manufacturing Company (the Whitman Mills), and began the manufacture of cotton-gins in East Bridgewater.

In 1845, Mr. Carver secured another patent for an in)porlant improvement, which was a cylinder brush having yi/HS on its ends in connection with the cottongin. Thi.s contrivance was such an addition to the power of the gin as " greatly to enhance the value and price of the cotton ginned on it." In 1853 the government of India awarded a prize of two thousand five hundred rupees and a gold medal to this company for their excellent machines for cleansing cotton from the seed.

As the infirmities of age came upon him, Mr. ' Carver expressed a strong desire to spend the remnant \ of Ills days within sigiit of the manufactory which 1 had borne witness to so many fruits of his industry and skill. Accordingly, in 1865, he erected a small addi- | tiou to the house of his niece, Mrs. Joseph Warren ' Bennett (the house formerly occupied by the lute : Deacon William Harris) from one window of which tlie mill privilege was in view. Here he quietly '. awaited his departure. On Thursday, April 5, 18GG, , the day of the annual fast in Massachusetts, he sent for Mr. Charles Jordan, one of his skilled workmen, and asked him how .soon a new and peculiar roller-gin Would be ready. '' In one week," was the reply. I can live but a little longer, but do wish very much to see its operation," .said the venerable man. His wisli was not granted, for he died the next day. Had he | survived till the fulluwing Monday, lie would have completed his eighty-first year. Thus died one of whom , those who knew him well bore testimony that he was ! an honest man. He possessed a genial temperament, and took pleasure in aiding the advancement

Ezra Kingman, Esq., son of Capt. Ezra and Susanna (Whitman) Kingman, was born in East Brid'/ewater, July 20, 1789, was prepared for Harvard University, but did not complete the course of study there. He read law with Hon. William Baylies, of West Bridgewater, and for a while practiced law in Livermore, Maine, but the profession not being congenial to his taste, he relinquished it, and, returning to his native town, engaged in trade with his father. He married, Dec. 13, 1S12, Frances, daughter of Col. Edward and Abigail Howard, of West Bridgewater, and had twelve children, viz. : Frances, Frederick, Elizabeth, Susan, Ezra, Edward, Hanfiah, John, George, Susan, James, and Nathan. He was a uiau of unflinching integrity, and possessed a largo share of native sense. He was an exquisite player on the flute, and greatly aided the church music uf his native parish.

He taught the centre school of East Bridgewaterseveral years, and thoroughly performed the duties uf that office. His government was firm, and many can testify to the benefits of his instructions. His own large family were carefully trained to become useful members of society. He represented East Bridgewater in the General Court six years.

He was town clerk and clerk of the First Parish, both which offices he held at the time of his decease. He died suddenly, of heart disease, while riding in the cars from South Abingtou to Ea.-^t Bridgewater, Feb. 13, 1852, aged sixty-two.

Shoe Manufactures. - For many vears, auion^' the different departments of business in East Briilgewatcr, shoemaking has occupied an important place. The tanning of leather, it apj)ears, was in successful operation here at a very early date. In the southwest part of the town is the vilhige of J'Jlmwuod. Until 1872 it was named Joppa. The latter appellation arose from the circumstance that a tannery was located there, the operation of which perhaps began as early as 1700 or earlier, on the estate ul" Jvisign Edward Mitchell, wlio died in Joppa in 1717, ugud seventy-one years. Tradition says that the first tanner in Joppa was named Simon. Whether that Was liis actual name is uncertain. Gain Robinson, who settled in East Bridgewater about 1726, the ancustur of most of the Robinsons in the Bridgewaters and vicinity, and his son-in-law, Christopher Erskiiie (sometimes written Askins), were employed in this tannery. Subsequently, Col. Edward Mitchell, son of Ensign Edward, carried on the business, and after him his sons. In later limes Charles Mitchell, a grandson of Col.

Histoky Of East Bridgewater

Edward, continued the business of tanning leather till about 1835, wiien it was given up. Some years after the tannery was started in Joppa, Josiah Whitman, liviot; on Whitman Street, not far from Joppa, an enterprising, well-educated young man, was extensively engaged in the manufacture of shoes. He died in [ 1754. This was probably the earliest attempt in East Bridgewater to manufacture shoes more extensively than in the ancient and ordinary mode of furnishing custom-work.

In 1822, Charles Mitchell and Jonah Edson tried the experiment of making sale shoes. That year Seth Bryant made a shipment of about three thousand pairs of shoes to New York. This is said to have been the largest shipment which had ever been made in that part of the country. In 1825, Mr. Bryant, in company with his brother-in-law, Warren Keen, began to manufacture shoes in the Joppa currying-shop. The next year they transferred the business to the " Brick Store" in the Centre Village.

The first building constructed in East Bridgewater for the manufacture of shoes on a large scale was erected in Joppa in 1829 by Gushing Mitchell and Seth Bryant. For several years they carried on their business in this establishment on the southwest corner of Bedford and West Streets. In later years Mr. Bryant conducted the business alone. In the Rebellion he supplied the Union army with about three hundred thousand pairs of shoes.

Solomon Ager went from South Weymouth and settled in Joppa in December, 1829. In 1830 he began the manufacture of shoes. He had about five hundred workmen (shoemakera) and three hundred women fitting shoes. At one time he made a thousand pairs of shoes per day for six weeks. The average amount of his manufactures was large for the times. He paid out seventy-five thousand dollars per year and fifteen hundred dollars per week.

For many years Ezra and Edward Kingman extensively manufactured shoes in what is now called Elmwood. They had an excellent establishment, and " the goods made by this concern were favorably known throughout the trade." Samuel Shaw and son began the manufacture in Elmwood in 1853, eniployitig some tilty hands and having a full supply of machinery. The senior partner died in 1874, and the business is still conducted by the junior member of the firm.

Hon. James S. Allen had a manufactory of shoes for a long time near his residence in Matfield village, but the attractions of Brockton held out so strong inducements that a few years ago his business operations were all transferred to that young and thriving city.