USA > Connecticut > Windham County > Danielson > Sketches concerning Danielson, Conn > Part 6
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8
In the south angle mads by the junction of the Five Mile and Quinebaug rivers there stood in the thirties
. . .. We shall referto the picture of the borough that Albert Conant made in 1864 on the assumption that it is a perpetual fx. ture on one of the walls of the Public Library where it can readily be inspected. The roof of the village saw-mill is shown in the " picture as you look (so to speak) over the west half of the west of " the two Danielson millg.
>
and forties andinto the fifties, a small woolon factory while for alonger period:an old grist-mill ocompled" the other angle made by the two rivers.' No one would; suppose now that a manufactory of any kind had ever: stood, upon this small area of stones, brambles and weads. .. The mill was presumably built about 1880 by .: Isaac. Cundall, father of s. well-known Danielson ; lawyer of the last half of the nineteenth century. The ' mill.was said to have been. a four-sett matinet mill." [ts basement corresponded with its wheel-pit, in'the" north end of which revolved quite a large wooden i. Theol .: The walls were built up a story above ground and. whatever was above.this ground story was wooden - built .. Belonging to the mill property there were a couple of small storage buildings on low ground near itsamall mill pond; a honse on the west side of Frauk ... lip street near the present stone arched bridge, anda . small.barn mear Water street .: The "mill employed only a few hands. : In the early fifties it was operated." byjNosh Shumway, but it was owned by the widow ... of Isaac Candall, who bad died April 14, 1846. ~ In ite. end the. mill went by fire, sometime in 1865."' At the . timp.of its destruction.a. man named H. R. Fargo waa. operating. it ... Nothing was ever built on its Bite." "a .:
Two other water-power establishments of the times: under discussion were the old: grist-mill : mentioned»: and. the: Tiffany mill, bothirun by Quinebang river water .. ",The location of the grist-mill : has already>
The Cundall mill had been destroyed nine years when the Library picture was made, yet ita ground story, walla were .still standing, also the two small storage buildings mentioned above- These, with the house tenanted by the man who operated the millpato included in the picture !!!
81
REK OMOPI AND MILLO
been indiested. It was only of moderato dimensione one etory and an attic high, but a part of its ground door was lowered about six feet on account of running the grista directly from the mill-stones down into bags suspended on the side of this lower space that was nearest the stones. This lower Aoor was reached by stepo. The sets of mill-stones, of which this mill .. had two, were usually placed upon a raised floor some two feet higher than the ground floor. Tho griste brought to the mill were shelled corn for meal, the same mixed with oats for animal feed, rye and more rarely buckwheat for which there was a bolting apparatus in the attic. A horse shed projected from the north side of the mill. In regard to the date of the mill a few facts may be reviewed. In December, 1808, the town took some action towaic building a dry bridge at the east end of the Quipebing bridge near Gen. Danielson's residence. Evidently st that date there was no dam above the bridge (p. 85) and no tranch for a grist-mill across er under the road where a low place needed to be bridged over to render more easy the passing of loaded teams. Subsequently a tranch crossed the road there, which, with some filling. in to raise the road, was arched over. By the year 1820 the Tiffany brothers likely already had their dam in existence, which rendered useless and sub- merged the grist mill dam above the bridge. It would appear . that the grist-mill bad then been built at" least several years, probably in 1813 or 1814.
Comfort and Ebenezer Tiffany appear to have run the Danielson factory store some ten years before beginning to put into effect the project of 1807 (p. 35) which had for its objeet the erection of a cotton-mill
BK 0
on the Brooklyn side of the Quinebang . river, . Any water privilege rights connected with the matter appear to have been purchased with a considerable body of land by the Tiffany brothers. If our .com jecture be correct, the parties just. named built the grist-mill that has baon described in the interval. between 1810 and 1820. The Quinebang Mill office- bas no records that show when the Tiffany, mill .. was built, except some insurance papers indicating the interval from 1820 to 1825. The first mentioned date. probably saw the mill in process of erection.
When the mill was built the cotton factories had passed out of their spinning o ill stage and had what for that time were full complements of machinery. The mill was wooden- built, the body part measuring 72 by 32 feet, which would seem to have been a sort of standard measurement for the emall ectton-mille of that time, of which several hundred had been built in the eastern states. The n.ill wat provided with two full stories, a basement and attio. Part of the base- ment, at the south end, was utilized by a large wooden wheel which furnished the motive power to operate the machinery. Centrally located on the west front there was a bell-tower which contained the stairways. A long one-story annox of less width than the body partextended from its north end parallel with the mill ditch, and this contained two Icrg machines called "dressers." In the late sixties thie sort of machine began to be displaced in Americsr mills Is one of English ,manufacture called a "slasher." . It le prob. able that the annex or dresser room of the Tiffany mil was of later date than its body part. In front of the mill and just across its. ditch there were two storage
.....
buildings resembling cow barns. The mill ditch a small one in comparison with the modern troneh. Its spillway for waste water was near the southwest corner: of the mill.
.Besides the factory and its two storage buildings ero was but little that comprised the Tiffany mill village during the decades of the thirites and forties. The Tiffanys chose for their village site the eastern end of a low, flottish ridge projecting into a largo bond made by the river, for about a third part of a milo and from the higher ground on the west. Theo ridge isabout a quarter of a mile wide near its eastern termination. Its northern side, lese elevated above the river meadows then the southern, is traversed by the main village street which was merely called in the middle part of last century the "Brooklyn road." The withern side of the ridge is more pronounced in regard to height than the northern, with a tendenoy to be corregated with spur-iike projections. In the forties.part of the ridge was still covered with hasel brush and scattered trees, while the pasture lend south of it was not locking in pines and birches.
The Tiffany residence stood on what is now Main and Tiffany streete, its north end being about twenty feet from the first and close to the latter. The body part of the house was two stories and an attie bigh; s one-story addition projected south and jogged out from the main part as much as four feet. Some five rode further south there stood a small barn with an addi. tion to it. The premiser, comprising lawne, orchard and garden originally extended down a gentle slope to the edge of the river andwere closed in by & tight board fence seven feet high, painted white,
Still further south the roadway was fronted by three tenement houses and these being built on a gentle hill slope admitted having a basement to each one of them, the three capable of sheltering nine families; but the north tenement of the row was used for the fustory boarding house. On the north side of the main road there stood the Tiffany store on the site of the present Quinebang store, and which bad a horse shed'at its west end of less width than the store; then a little farther west there stocd s two-family house stillin existence supposedly built for a superintend- got's or overseers' residence, and a tenement or two along the road. In the early forties a man named lathrop who had charge of the Tiffany store occupied part of the residence mentioned as an overseers' house, Aud that was about all there was belonging toths Tiffany mill village, exclusive of a few private. Is owned residences and a school house scattered farther up the Brooklyn road .*
We come uow to a more detailed account.relative to tha once old landmsrka of the borough commonly called in their time the Danielson mille. Their date
We have referred on page 78 to a picture of Danielsonville in Barber's Connecticut Historical Collections. The Quinebang bridge then had only a single driveway. Near its west end and south side of the road there stood in 1836 a small one-story build- Ing which may have been used for a shoemaker's shop. Having moved to the Brooklyn side and occupied part of the overseers" house that has been mentioned, Dr. Samuel Hutchins used the building in question for an office. About 1855 he had it moved to the west side of the house be occupied. In 1869 it was again moved, this time to the angle of'a terrace wall close northeast of the house where Conant sketched it. The publisher saw it there 1g 1910, and it may still occupy that position.
DANIELSON
feet in diameter; but generaly overshot wheels word' magre fect,in height than in horizontal length .. There, Ras,one pair of mules in the basement operated by. Howard Branch, . The story on the street level and the one above that constituted the lower. and upper weaving rooms, and hence the east mill was spoken of; by the operatives as the "weare shop." The lower room contained forty- one looms and the same arrange- ment also pertained to the room above. The weare ; rooms. were in charge of James Ladd, as overseer.
In connection with the weaving rooms it was stated that this mill was badly sagged in the middle and rested so weak on its foundation that if a pail of water was, placed on the floor of the attic story, and most. of tha looms below got into the same boat, the building would away from side to side. until half of the water had slopped out; yet the mill was nover.considered by the,operatives as unsafe.
The attic story with its monitor. windows was asod for the dressing and "drawing in" room. There was no overseer over the dressing room as there were only two men who worked there and rarely but two . women in the drawing in part of it. "Mr. Zebina Adams," our informant stated, "was porter between the two mills, carrying roping for the mules in the basement, filling for the weaving rooms and also sup- plying coal and sifting ashes, although I think as Isto at 1850 coal was not used."
George Danielson was agent of the mill corporation; Marcus Childs, who lived on Cottage street, was the superintendent and William H. Chollar, who in 1862 was chosen & deacon of the Congregational Church, . had charge of the store and was also book-keeper .for .
. AND KILL.
It will now be in order to ipost of matters portsin- ing to the interior of the Danieleon mille and hero wo are indebted to C. W. Wilson of Worcester, Mass., an operative in the mille during the early fifties, for the particulars. First in regard to the west mill. As stated, this jutted out somewhat beyond the natural .slope of the rise of ground at that end of the mill, thereby permitting an entrance door in this instance to the basement, and on the north side belew the bulkhead at the termination of the conduit. Part of the basement was used for the machine sbcp of the . mills, and was then in charge of Andrew S. Wilson, father of C. W. Wilson. The remainder of this room . was taken up by the covered-over upper part of the large overshot wheel that ran the mill which project ed from its wheal-pit above the floor. It was a large and powerful wheel some twenty feet in diameter and twelve feet fas .. It ilicharged its wster directly into the river close below the Whitmore mile den.
The floor above or first on the Main street level ... was used for the spinning room and in the early .. Ofties was in charge of Lillibridge Burdick. The next story above was mainly the carding room, but also contained in the west end a picker and lappera. This room was in charge of Christopher C. GrandeH who, a few years later, kept a grocery store in a building south of the depo !. The attic story with its monitor windows was a mule room containing four mules, Israel Plummer, overseer, at that time.
At the easterly mill one half of the basement was atilized by the waterwheel and belt pulleys. The wheel was of the overshot type twelve or fifteen feet face (horizontal menaurament) and as much as twelve
the aheds there were three storage buildings near the mills. Two of these were upon the low area that bordered the Whitmore mill pond and the third located a little west of the westerly mill.
The water that ran both mille was drawn from the upper mill poud. A ditch walled on the sides con- ducted it to a point about opposite the stone built mill where the ditch turned west to the south end of the old factory store, this being as far as it remained opan. Hore underground conduits carried the water both south and southwest across the street to each of the two mills. Above the turn in the ditch the same ran near the top of the slope of the river bank, but. with space for a path partly abaded by trees growing on the bank. On the west side of this part of the ditob the ground was somewhat higher and cecupied by an apple orchard. Enough rater was carried unden Maple street and the surface of the Danielson pram- ises to form a small brook, end thonce as an open ditch it turned northward and was used in dry weather to irrigate pasture land on the gentle slope between the road and Quinebang river. Presumably the line af the ditch is still traceable.
After crossing the Quinebaug bridge and ascending g riso of ground, as existing prior to Civil war times, people who passed or drove by the mills were familiar. with the sound of humming spindles in the westerly mill'and the clattering of looms in the easterly mill, more especially noticeable in summer time when some of the windows were apt to be open. Occasionally, too, "Elisha Danielson might be seen, rake in hand cleaning leaves and flostage stuff from large gratings of the ditch close south of the old store.
MILL
has already been discussed. It was an advantage i sagard to the early shops and mills designed to operated by water-power to locate them on ground that sloped either directly to the river or to low land adjacent to the stream. This permitted the construc- tion of basaments, and, no small item in those times, isusened the cost of excavating wheel-pits, and many of these had to be, in part at least, blasted out in Jedge rock. And hence the mills in question wore located at the southern termination of the low ridge or swell of ground between the rivers. The westerly of the two mills in fact, was partly built into the south western shoulder of the ridge so that its west end jutted over the bill slope there toward the Quine- haug river. Each of these mills, was provided with two full stories, a basement and an attic. Both were of the same length and width, probably 72 by 32 feet."
The two mills were in line with each other and wore separated by a space of about forty feet, this being mostly utilized by a couple of narrow sbeds et the top of a piece of terrace wall, the easterly shed. being a little higher than the other. Between the sheds there was a passway three or four feet wide and steps in the terrace wall leading down to a small area of ground between the mills and the Whitmore mill pond. The west end of the easterly mill joined the higher sbed in which an office part was partition- ed off; then the east end of the westerly mill came close to the nearest end of the other shed. Besides
. C. W. Wilson of Worcester, Mass,, an operative in the mfile during the early fifties and a close observer of matters connected with them, estimated their size as about 75 by 80 feet and spat both mills were of the same dimensions .:
... .
₹ IKOP. AND MILLO
the mills, sucocoding Joseph D. Bates in 1848. Mr. Chollar remained until the end, at one time residing in the ell part to the old Danielson homestead.
All of the buildinge that belonged to the Danielsoa Manufacturing Company were of wooden construction. There were nine tenements on Water street owned by them, three on the east side large enough to shelter four families each; two on the same side of the street pach for two familice; two other Danielacm tonements on the west side of the street near the bridge, and two more on Main street where the Evans and Hyde blocks now stand. Still another mill tenement stood below the old Danielson house near the old grist-mill trench.
The Whitmore mill operatives lived in four tone. mente, two on Franklin street near the mill, and two os Water street; one each on either side. A. further helping to make up the factory village, there were a few houses of private ownership on Cottage street, a shoe shop, the old Conference hatte (11. (8-64) and the Danielson factory boarding house, all west of the raliroad. Then there were the Whitmore and the Ely residences, Ely Brothers dry gocde store, and the Hutchins tavern, the last two establishments being' located nearly on opposite sides of Franklin street. Ely Brothers, Edwin and Jesse, started in business in 1837, buying out an earlier occupant of the store, so that their location was determined by that of the factory village. The tavern was begun about 1881 by Randall and John Davis but was not finished by them until a couple of years later. When the railroad was being graded they boarded the botser of the working gangs until they moved on. About 1888 they sold the tavern to Silas Hutchins. A grocery store wee
9.0
maintained in an addition joined to the west end of the tavern. A path led down the green slope to the Cold apring which then issued from beneath the roots of a maple tree upon the back above it and in warm weath- er during Civil war time, an elderly man who wore a call stiff hat might occasionally be seen wending his way down the path with a pitcher to the spring. Presumably he was Henry Hutchins, one of the sons Silas Hutchins.
Having given some account of the early shops and mills of the Danielsonville that was of a time anterior to the Civil war, we will next take a passing glance at the various kinds of wheels that furnished the motive power to operate their machinery. We have spoken of most of the ante-bellum shop and mill wheels as belonging to a type called brezet. wheels on account of the water being let into their trough- like "buckets" abreast of the body of the wheel. This form of the old-fashioned wooden waterwheel varied greatly in respect to size, say, five or six feet in diam- eter upward to thirty feet or perhaps ncre in some · cases, but usually moderate sized wheels were in usd, much deperding urer ilf rail, the amount of water available and the power desired.
In attempting to describe one of these wheels from memory let it be supposed that one of large size is taken as an example. To begin with the center sbatt; this was worked out of the straight trunk of a tree shaved down to an octagonal form, except that the ends were made round and banded with strong hoops probably made of wagon wheel iron. The center shaft was all of sixteen inches through and in the
91
TAR SAXLY ·HOPE AND MILLO
enda were set large iron pinions, the bearings of the wheel, which revolved in boxes bolted to the top of the masonry of the wheel pit, or in some cases to large squared timbers. Arma in rows of four oman- ated from the center ehaft correrforcing with the spokes of a wagon wheel. There were as many as eight rows of them, two end arme to each separate row, and two between these, at equal distances apart, making thirty-two separate arm pieces in all. What corresponded with the separate fellces of a wagon wheel, curved timbers of similar shape were bewn or worked out, making a circle of them around the wheel into which the cuter ends of the arms were âtted. The circle of felloes so made was by no means single; another and overispireret was spliced against the first circle of them and there were trebled at the gear end of the wheel, all of the pieces being strongly bolted together. The fellces were as much as five inches thick and as spliced together at the ende of the wheel were called its rims. All this constituted the frame of the waterwberl. Now se to its covering. The frame thus formed # as sheatbed all around with plaok work running horizontally. Each plank was shaved and planed so as to be slightly convex on the outward side and coneste on the other to conform with the curvature of the circumference of the wheel, the whole thus far constituting a great drum or cylinder. Upon the outer surface of the latter and running lengthwise was fastened the this plant work (the planks were about 1} inches thick) of which were formed the buckets or troughs arranged all around the outer circumference of the great drum and set both edgewise and tilted so that these troughs could
82
BKKICHAS CONVERSING DARIKLOON
bold the water as long as possible before discharging it Into the wheel-pit.
It took a large amount of water to run one of these wheels. This was let into the buckets from the upper eighteen inches level of the water in the trench, pass- ing first through a slitted rack covered with thick leather that unwound from rollers which rolled down when the wheel was started, allowing the water to rush through the elite in the rack where uncovered by the leather "gates." The slits, ore below another were all of two inches in width; the water passing cbrough the rack and into the buckets in sheete alant- ød a little downward, being let in upon the wheel a little bigher up than its center. There could have been no very forcible impact to the water as it flled the buckets, such as it has under a bead pressure, for this type of wheel was mainly propelled by the weight of the water or force of gravity during their motion downward. While the wheel was running the water was constantfy filling the buckets and ao constantly emptying them in a flood into the wheel-pit.
In respect to the application of the power thus pro- duced to a large iron wair shaft with one or more belt pulleys, it wie efected by gearing. Corrected sections of cast iron gearing were bolted to one of the rims of the wheel on its outer circumference by which a circle of gearing wer formed of the same diameter as the body of the wheel itself. This notched into a gear some two feet in dismeter on the main shaft. I do not suppose that the larger waterwheels of the type here described made more than four or ave revolutions per minute, but the main shaft men, tioned appeared to whirl rapidly. To the boys twelve
98
THE KAELY CHOPS AND MILLE
or thirteen years of age who worked in the mills, at with others, there was a sort of fascination in standing in the wheel-pit of one of theee wheels and watching its slow, but effective motion. There was the impres- sive roll of the great wheel itself; the sound made by descending waters, the roar of heavy iron gearing and noise of the whirling main shaft; then amidet the general din of the enclosed place there could be distinguished a rapid chich-chiel- chil sound caused by the bucket planks striking into the upper- most sheets of water pouring ibrough tho rack.
In regard to length the small wheels of the type here described were longer horizontally than their vertical height or dianeter. With the larger wheels matters in this respect stood differently. A wheel 24 or 30 feet in diameter might not measure more than 18 or 20 feet horizontally. There was once a mill on Fall brook on the west side of the Plainfield road about a mile south of town which was of the breast-wheel type and of corriceretle beişlt but was barrow faced horizontally like an overshot wheel.
The large wheels were built in their wheel-pits, but the wooden materials which went into their construc- tion were put in shape upor acne level spot outside. So many of them were built for cotton and woolen mills and shops that in the first half of last century a claes of mechanics were developed called "wheel- wrights." During the sway of wooden wheels in this country the breast wheel war preein heith & cotton mill wheel. Nonaile were used in their constructici, all fastenings being of the nature of bolt work. large number of bolts went into the construction of any one of these wheels of different lengths and sizes,
. ks ..
14
INLOON
shoagb aona probably exceeded thres-quarters of an inch in diameter.
The next largest type of wooden whee) was called the overabot. Ite motion was the reverse of that of the breast-wheel. While the latter revolved in direction that was upstream, the water that ran an orarabot wheel was carried in a trough over its top aad plunged in a cascade into its buckets on the down stream side. As in the case of the breast-wheels, they varied in size, but were apt to be narrow across the face or horizontally. Their construction and con- ditions attendant upon their use were much the same as in the case of breast wheels. Where the water limited like the dow of a brook, but with fall of com. siderable height, this type of wheel could be adyan- fagsously used. They possemed a double force; the weight of the water shat keps alling the buckete together with the impact force derived from the falling cascade mentioned. In proporticu to the amount of water used the overshot was the most powerful of the old-fashioned wooden wheels.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.