USA > Connecticut > Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial; representative citizens, v. 11 > Part 36
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centrated his attention on the intricate ยท engineering and management details of electric lighting and power undertakings. He has participated in the designing of over one hundred electric lighting and street railway generating stations, of which some were erected under his per- sonal supervision. Some of the more im- portant of these plants were: The early Edison stations in New York City, Bos- ton, Philadelphia, Chicago, Cincinnati, St. Louis, San Francisco, New Orleans, Kan- sas City, Topeka, Milwaukee, Detroit, Providence, Brooklyn, Wilmington, and many others. In electric street railway work he was connected with the construc- tion of the Richmond street railway-the pioneer of the old Sprague Company-the street railways of Scranton, Brooklyn, Jamaica, Hoosic Falls, Poughkeepsie and Wappingers Falls, New York's first ex- perimental road using the surface contact plates, and many others.
In the autumn of 1905, representative citizens from all parts of the Nation were called to New York City to attend a spe- cial convention of the National Civic Fed- eration, assembled at Columbia Univer- sity, in response to the demand of the American people for real facts relating to the advantages and disadvantages result- ing from applied public and private own- ership of public utilities. This vital issue had become a topic of serious contention between privately owned public serving utilities on the one hand, and those people who believed that the public should own and operate its own utilities. A commit- tee of twenty-one commissioners, of whom Mr. Winchester was one, was by vote named and given the necessary power and finances to thoroughly investigate this subject under operative conditions, both in this country and abroad, aided by a picked corps of experts in engineering,
management, accounting labor economics, and civic efficiency. The list of names is too long to include in this article, but it comprises men recognized the country over as leaders in their respective fields. In recognition of his experience and qual- ifications, Commissioner Winchester was also selected as one of the two electric lighting and power experts of the foreign investigation committee. He sailed for England in the early spring of 1906, and for five months his time was wholly occu- pied in a minute investigation of the elec- tric, gas, and street railway undertakings of the large cities of England, Scotland and Ireland, and afterwards devoted much of his time in this country to aiding in the compilation of the vast amount of data included in the commission's report. This report was given to the public in 1907, and still stands as the most com- plete work of its nature, and is the world's best authority within its field.
During Mr. Winchester's stay in Lon- don, in 1906, Superintendent Hamilton, of the London Fire Brigade, gave a spe- cial demonstration of fire fighting in his honor as a visiting active fire chief. A building was provided especially for that purpose, to which fire apparatus was called from a distance as great as three or four miles, in order to establish a time record for response. Prominent features of the exhibition were the scaling of buildings and life-net rescues.
While abroad, Mr. Winchester was also a United States delegate of the Amer- ican Institute of Electrical Engineers to the International Congress of Electrical Engineers at London. Professor J. H. Gray, in his report on the South Norwalk plant, speaks characteristically of Mr. Winchester, as follows :
Although the present superintendent, Mr. A. E. Winchester, was originally chief promoter of the
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plant, the constructing engineer, and for nearly ten years one of the Commissioners-resigning July 1, 1902, and from four years previous to that date up to the present time superintendent of the plant-and although he takes a very active part in Republican politics and always has done so, I have not been able to find that political considerations have at any time had any influence in the promo- tion, disciplining or dismissing of any member of the force or with the operation of the plant. It ought also to be said that a large part of the success of the plant and of the enthusiasm with which it is regarded by the public are due to the personal activity and character of Mr. Winches- ter. His character in connection with the plant and his dominating influence over its fortunes are unique, so far as my observation goes. I under- stand that Mr. Winchester, in the early days, served the city in connection with the establish- ment and management of the electric plant with- out any salary at all, and in recent years has served as superintendent for a smaller compen- sation than he could command elsewhere. I be- lieve also that every extension and enlargement of the works recommended by him has been speedily authorized by the city, and that in no case has the expense of the work exceeded his estimate as presented to the city meeting. In fact, he has come well within every special appropria- tion made for investment, except one for $5,000 for motors, in which the original estimate was not exceeded. (Schedule I., volume II., pages 667-8, report entitled "Municipal and Private Operation of Public Utilities").
In his early career, Mr. Winchester took up the contrasting study of private and public ownership of public serving utilities from the standpoint of civic bene- fits and economies. He had heard much strong argument on both sides of the con- troversy by his associates and others whose opinions were shaped by connected interests, so seldom substantiated by clearly demonstrated facts, that he be- came interested, not as a radical either way, but in the belief that the question was of such importance that it should be given deeper and broader consideration, from a purely practical and unbiased point of view, than the opposing sides
seemed able to agree upon. He wanted to know the real truth, and although already possessed of a fair insight into the methods of private ownership, he felt sure that a close investigation on both sides of the question would fail to demonstrate either the fallacies or the virtues of either side to the extent alleged, and that the best results for all concerned depended not so much upon the title of ownership, as upon the degree of honesty in the policy of management and the perfection of business methods and efficiency of opera- tion. When fully convinced that the question of ownership was secondary to service rendered, and that no up-to-date reason existed why a well handled pri- vately or publicly owned undertaking in the service of the people could not oper- ate with equal satisfaction, Mr. Winches- ter accepted the opportunity to prove his hypothesis in South Norwalk, with the backing of the people and the best type of business men as his associate commis- sioners in the upbuilding of this enter- prise. The resulting plant owned by the city, as previously mentioned, was de- signed by him, even to the details of its business methods, its system of rates and accounting, and has always been under his charge. From every point of view and from its earliest existence this plant has made good. Not only has it expanded to many times its original size, but it is famous all over the country for its long continued undeniable success, and be- cause it paid up its entire investment of borrowed capital, of over two hundred thousand dollars, with interest, from its own earned profits and has never cost the citizens one cent of taxation, but has paid money into the municipal treasury in- stead.
That Mr. Winchester is not biased as to ownership of public utilities is evident
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from the fact that while busy pushing the it was published in the Annals of the South Norwalk municipal plant to suc- American Society of Political and Social Science, in January, 1915. His advice has also been largely sought by both private undertakings engaged in public service, and by municipalities that he has become known for his broad judgment through- out the United States, as a safe authority on public service problems. His mother's charge, "My son, be a good citizen," has been Mr. Winchester's inspiration since boyhood. cess, he was also busy in the same way as president of the private water and electric service company, in the adjoining town of Westport. Mr. Winchester holds that public ownership has a legitimate field of its own, and that no well conducted pri- vate enterprise in the same line that gives its community a square deal need fear civic competition. Public ownership, in his opinion, is the people's alternative of the present time against an unjust mo- nopoly armed with iniquitous power to force unsatisfactory service and unrea- sonable rates upon its following, simply because, being a monopoly, it can. He is confident that such abuse of dominion through lack of proper control-not the rule, and when evident is mostly the pub- lic's fault-will in a not remote to-mor- row compel society to assume its dormant power and demand irresistibly that pro- digous change be made in current laws, establishing equal, just and sufficient protection against infringements both ways, between publicly owned common weal and privately owned public service monopolies.
To-day applied success is possibly our most convincing factor, representing its public ownership phase, on the one side, in the model South Norwalk plant, and on the other, private ownership in the progress of the Westport Company, both more or less influenced by the same mind.
Mr. Winchester has said much upon the subject of public utilities, in print and from the lecture platform. He read a notable paper before the Conference of American Mayors, held at Philadelphia in November, 1914, covering the subject of municipal ownership of an electric plant as exemplified in the South Norwalk ven- ture. The paper was of such merit that
Many who know the subject of this sketch call him "Colonel." Mr. Winches- ter claims no title to military rank. Some time previous to the Spanish-American War, he served as confidential adviser to agents of the Cuban revolutionists in . electrical and engineering matters, with particular regard to the laying of mines. Having been in Cuba, and speaking Span- ish, and heartily in sympathy with the struggle for "Cuba Libre," he was se- lected as a member of a proposed military engineering corps, with the rank of col- onel, to be sent to Cuba. As the United States had not at that time become in- volved in Cuba's struggle, Mr. Winches- ter declined the appointment, in the inter- est of maintaining neutrality, but many friends still apply the title, much to his embarrassment.
Mr. Winchester has been married twice. His first wife, to whom he was married on October 24, 1888, was Carrie Augusta Davenport Whitlock, daughter of Augus- tus Whitlock, in whose academy Mr. Winchester had prepared for college. She died childless on September 24, 1894. Mr. Winchester married for his second wife, February 1, 1896, Elizabeth Grant Bray, who was born in Lincroft, New Jersey, April 8, 1876, daughter of David H. and Stella C. (Van Schoick) Bray. He was a farmer for many years in the vicin-
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ity of Red Bank, New Jersey. This union has been blessed with the following chil- dren: 1. Louis Dennie, born August 4. 1897, died July 2, 1898. 2. Herbert Dav- enport, born July 30, 1900; he left the freshman class at Stevens Institute of Technology to enlist as a volunteer in the United States army, 1918; he was not sent overseas, but was honorably dis- charged from the service in 1919 and returned to college. 3. Edward Van Schoick, born July 8, 1901 ; at the age of seventeen he tried three times to enlist in the United States navy, but was re- jected on account of his youth; he took a position in the New York Division Su- perintendent's Office of the New York & New Haven Railroad Company.
Mr. Winchester's favorite pursuits are the study and practice of those sciences involved in his vocation, the study of po- litical science, economics and philosophy. His patriotism is intense, which to his mind finds its best expression in rendering efficient public service for the sake of the results rather than for personal reward. He believes in constructive rather than destructive criticism; in bringing har- mony out of confusion ; in attracting peo- ple to each other by showing the good that can always be found in everyone, if it is appealed to sympathetically; in set- tling disputes by man-to-man and heart- to- heart conferences; in telling the good that can be told of others, with emphasis ; in helping the needy without their learn- ing the source of the benefaction. He is greatly interested in everything that per- tains to his fellow-man, and his special interest in boys finds an outlet to their advantage in his activities in connection with the Boy Scout movement, already referred to. Mr. Winchester is a strong believer in Divinity, and is convinced that all things are controlled and actuated by
a positive, authentic, supreme purpose of concentrated right, which is perfect power and action eternal. Though non- sectarian in his own views, he honors and respects all creeds and those who en- deavor faithfully to live up to them.
EMERY, Albert Hamilton, Celebrated Inventor.
The derivation of names, which is al- ways an interesting study, proves that places of abode and occupation were the most frequent sources of their origin, but very often we find one derived from either a personal characteristic or similar qual- ity. The surname, Emery, is derived from Almeric, a Christian name signify- ing "of obscure origin." It was gradu- ally changed to the present English form and spelling. In the Italian it is Amerigo and is forever represented in the word "America."
John Emery, founder of the American branch of the family, was born September 29, 1598, in Hampshire, England, and was the son of John and Agnes Emery. On April 3, 1635, John (2) Emery sailed in the "James," of London, for Boston, Mas- sachusetts, landing on June 3, 1635. Soon after, he removed to Newbury, Massachu- setts, where he received a grant; was made a freeman on June 2, 1641, and re- ceived a further grant on April 19, 1644. He served as selectman in 1661 ; as fence viewer in 1666; and as grand juryman in 1666. He married (first) in England, Mary -, who died in April, 1649, in Newbury. He married (second) Mrs. Mary (Shatswell) Webster. His death occurred in Newbury, November 3, 1683, and he was survived by his widow until April 28, 1694.
Six generations later the father of Al- bert H. Emery was born and he was Samuel Emery, son of Joshua and Ruth
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(Nott) Emery, born July 14, 1792, and traveled in an ox-cart to Mexico, Oswego county, New York, at a time when there were but three houses in that settlement. Undeterred by this, however, he built the fourth house and made the place his home, following his calling, which was that of a farmer. He married (first) Jan- uary 2, 1820, Catherine Shepard, who was born August 19, 1795, in Alstead, New Hampshire, and died July 27, 1854. The death of Samuel Emery occurred January 24, 1876, in Mexico, New York. He and his wife were members of the Presby- terian church.
His son, Albert Hamilton Emery, was born June 21, 1834, in Mexico, New York, and was next to the youngest of eight children. He grew up accustomed to a farm environment, attending school dur- ing the summer and winter from the age of five years to that of ten, and also the two winters when he was eleven and twelve years old. From that time he at- tended school no more until the winter of 1851, when he studied for three months in the Mexico Academy, devoting special attention to surveying. He had been, meanwhile, employed on his father's farm.
After studying surveying during the winter of 1851, Mr. Emery worked at it throughout the following summer, and in the autumn of 1852 attended the acad- emy for another three months. In the winter of 1852-53 he taught a school in Union Settlement, and then engaged in surveying on a proposed Syracuse & Par- ishville railroad. He later worked at surveying on the proposed Oswego & Troy railroad. In the autumn of 1854 he returned home and made a copy of a map of Niagara Falls from the State Geologi- cal Survey. This map, which was a fine piece of draughtsmanship, was destined to play an important part in shaping Mr.
Emery's career. In the autumn of 1854, desiring to perfect his knowledge of civil engineering, he entered the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, studying for five or six weeks before the close of the winter session. The course covered a period of four years, but Mr. Emery was at the institute only a little over two years and a half, not in- cluding the year when he was absent on account of an attack of typhoid fever. In 1858 he graduated with the degree of Civil Engineer in the first section of a class of forty-eight. He defrayed part of the expense of his course by teaching topographical drawing in the school, his pupils including the graduating class.
The first professional work which en- gaged the attention of Mr. Emery was the erection of a church steeple in his native town of Mexico, New York. This was considered by local contractors almost impossible, but Mr. Emery did not find the task a difficult one. In the summer of 1859 Mr. Emery went to Washington and took out two patents on cheese presses. In the fall of 1859 he became acquainted with G. B. Lamar, of Savannah, Georgia, for whom he built a cotton packing press and also designed two compressors for compressing cotton. They had a capacity of two thousand bales in twenty hours with a pressure of five hundred tons on each bale, but Mr. Lamar's needs changed and the compressors were never built. Later Mr. Emery formed a partnership with Mr. Lamar, by the terms of which he was to furnish the patents and Mr. Lamar the money to build and sell cotton packing presses and compresses. This was in the autumn of 1859. The first press was built in Brooklyn, whence it was shipped South. They were planning to put one hundred agents in the field, but Mr. Lamar was conscious of the fast ap- proaching upheaval and desired to pro-
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ceed slowly with their enterprise until after the next presidential election. Mr. Emery, not being willing to wait a year for the turn of political events, returned home and during the summer built cheese presses on his own account.
In the autumn of 1861 Mr. Emery asked Professor Drown, of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, for a letter to the Secretary of War, Mr. Cameron. Edwin D. Morgan was then governor of New York and he also gave Mr. Emery a letter to Mr. Cameron. Mr. Emery was desir- ous of obtaining a position as engineer in the army, a position which could ordi- narily be held only by a West Point graduate. Mr. Emery obtained an inter- view with General Richard Delafield, who had charge of all the fortifications in the State of New York. General Delafield requested Mr. Emery to make copies of drawings of all these forts for him, which he did. He also made drawings of several batteries of field guns for the United States Government which were built un- der the superintendance of Mr. Emery and paid for by the State of New York. From 1861 for several years Mr. Emery spent much time experimenting on guns and projectiles for the War Department. Mr. Emery designed several sizes of pro- jectiles, submitted his plans to Admiral Dahlgren, and made a number of projec- tiles for several sizes of naval guns, Lieu- tenant Mitchell having charge of firing them. During this time Mr. Emery was also making cotton presses and had em- barked in a venture to extract materials from southern light wood or fat pine. He worked out and patented a process by which from one cord of that wood the following products were obtained : Forty- three gallons of turpentine, two barrels of tar, one barrel of pitch, twenty-five barrels of charcoal, five thousand cubic feet of illuminating gas, six hundred gal-
lons of crude pyroligneous acid. Before the enterprise could get well under way the works were burned and with no in- surance, so he was without funds to re- build them. This was an early attempt to utilize by-products which has since come into such general use in many industries, but at this time (1865) was much ahead of common practice.
The next important work undertaken by Mr. Emery was the designing of a new system of scales. Mr. Philo Reming- ton, of Ilion, New York, advanced the money to build the first three scales un- der this system, which, as has been most truly and forcibly observed, was one of the first great stones in the foundation of Mr. Emery's fame. These three scales were built in the Remington shops. One of them was set up and loaded with seven thousand pounds of iron. Its capacity was twenty thousand pounds and with a load of seven thousand pounds it was sen- sitive to one-half an ounce. In 1873 Mr. Emery met Mr. William Sellers, who was reputed to be one of the best mechanical engineers of his day. He saw him in Philadelphia and showed him his scale drawings. Mr. Sellers became much in- terested, especially in one feature of the invention, the absence of knife edges, these scales differing in this from the ordinary balance or scale which has knife edges which are rapidly injured by wear and rust. Mr. Sellers was a manufac- turer of machine tools and it was he who introduced Mr. Emery to Mr. J. H. Towne, father of Henry R. Towne, who later became famous as the head of the Yale & Towne Manufacturing Company. Mr. Emery said it would require $800,000 to develop the manufacture of these scales in the way he contemplated.
Meanwhile, Mr. Emery had designed a great one-thousand-ton testing machine to go to Seller's bridge works. There was
ODD-8-17
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a delay in closing the negotiations, and Mr. Emery returned home. Mr. Sellers introduced Mr. Emery to Colonel Laid- ley, of the Ordnance Bureau of the War Department. He met him at the Reming- ton Armory in Ilion, New York, by ap- pointment and gave him a demonstration with the scales that he had there. As a result Mr. Emery was asked by the Ord- nance Department to design a large test- ing machine while Colonel Laidley was investigating the testing machines of this country and Europe. He then designed a system of testing machines, from little ones to big ones. While he was working on these designs, Colonel Laidley re- turned from Europe and gave him an order for a four-hundred-ton machine. This was on December 23, 1874.
In February, 1875, Mr. Emery was called to Washington and there met Gen- eral Benet, chief of the Ordnance Depart- ment. It was decided to try to get an increased appropriation from Congress, which was obtained to cover additional work, and President Grant appointed a board to take charge of the matter and to this board Mr. Emery's designs were sub- mitted. The supervision of the contract was turned over to the board, Colonel Laidley acting as its president. Parts of the machine were built in different places, the whole being assembled at the Water- town Arsenal. In order to build this test- ing machine it was necessary to design a number of new and novel machines, one of these being a twenty-ton scale to standardize some weights with which to calibrate the testing machine. When this was finally tested with a load of forty- five thousand pounds, it was found to be sensitive to half an ounce under all loads. This demonstration greatly delighted the board. The completion of the testing machine was delayed by various difficul- ties, but in 1879 it was finished, and in
1880 went into government use, constitut- ing a wonderful monument to the genius of the inventor.
When this machine was tested by the board for acceptance, a bar of iron, having a section of twenty square inches, was pulled in two with a tension load of 722,800 pounds, and immediately follow- ing, two horse hairs were tested, one breaking with a load of one pound and the other with a load of one and three- quarter pounds. This second hair was tested on a small dynamometer and broke with the same load of one and three- fourths pounds, showing the great sensi- tiveness of this large machine, which in 1920 was as sensitive as ever, and is still in service. The testing machine while in operation at the arsenal in 1881 was con- sidered part of the exhibits of the Massa- chusetts Charitable Mechanic Association Fair, held in Boston, on Huntington ave- nue, and as such was awarded a large gold medal of honor, which cost $500 and was awarded for "That exhibit most condu- cive to human welfare." A second gold medal was at the same time also awarded Mr. Emery on this same machine for "The best scientific apparatus."
In 1882 Mr. Emery moved from Chicopee, Massachusetts, to Stamford, Connecticut, and the Yale & Towne Man- ufacturing Company took up the manu- facture of his scales, gauges and testing machines, and three one-hundred-and- fifty-thousand-pound, and two three-hun- dred-thousand-pound testing machines, for tension, compression and transverse loads, were constructed. One of these went to the University of Toronto, an- other to McGill University of Montreal, and one to the University of Vienna. One of the large ones went to the Cambria Iron and Steel Works in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, and the other to the Beth- lehem Steel Company.
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