USA > Massachusetts > Berkshire County > History of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, with biographical sketches of its prominent men, Volume I pt 2 > Part 15
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Prior to the year 1800 there were few attempts to establish manufac- tures. No bank notes were then in circulation in Adams-the first bank. the "Massachusetts," at Boston, not having been incorporated until 1785-and hard money was so scarce that, as has since been remarked of a western community, when two dollars met it was necessary to introduce them to each other. This early and long continued scarcity of money necessitated a general system of bartering. The tradesmen and farmers went " swop, swop, swopping " everywhere and in almost everything.
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Most of the circulation was silver and copper coin; money was most em- phatically a "cash article." No bank of issue was nearer than Troy or Northampton; the first bank in the county, the "Agricultural," at Pitts- field, not being chartered until 1818, and the Greenfield bank until 1822. A man with $25 in his pocket was looked upon as a citizen gloriously fa- vored by fortune. The usual resort, for many years, of those who were compelled to raise even so small a sum as ten dollars for immediate use, was to sell a good promissory note-" accommodation paper" as would now be termed-to a wealthy neighbor at Williamstown. There were no capitalists in Adams. Every man was actively engaged in trying to sup- port himself and family and seldom had any money to lend.
In the year 1800 Marshall Jones, a son of Israel Jones, built a house and store on the hill west of Main street bridge, in North Adams. He kept store there for several years. Charles Brown also sold goods in a small building located on the site of the Adams National Bank building. Mr. Brown was a man of fair capacity, and was elected town clerk in 1802, which office he held four years. He finally removed to South Ad- ams, which was then the larger and more thriving settlement, and was supposed to afford the best field for Yankee shrewdness in bargaining. In 1803 there were only two stores open in town, the one kept by Mar- shall Jones and one kept by Dr. James Cummings, on Main street, di- rectly opposite the North Adams Savings Bank Building. Dr. Cummings , was a man who combined world-wisdom with religious zeal in such pro- portions as gave him great influence in the community. He was a con- spicuous member of the Baptist church organized in 1808.
It is interesting to compare the prices of goods sold at that time with those of the present day. English calicoes were sold at 50 to 75 cents per yard ; Bohea tea, 75 cents a pound ; cotton shirtings, 25 cents per yard : molasses, 67 to 75 cents per gallon ; cut nails, 123 to 17 cents per pound. Calicoes were sold at an earlier date, also during the war of 1812-15, when importation was stopped, for $1.00 per yard. It must be remem- bered, however, that only six yards were then required to make a lady's dress, as against several times that number at the present day.
The wages of a farm laborer at this time were from SSO to $100 per year; mechanics' wages including board, $1 per day. The ten hour system was not then in vogue anywhere, and carpenters were obliged to work during the long summer days, from as early in the morning as they could see the head of a hammer to as late at night as they could see the head of a nail. Corn and rye were sold for 42 to 50 cents a bushel; oats for 20 to 25 cents; pork, $3.50 to $4.00, and beef. $2.50 to $4.00 per hundred. Prime cows in the spring were worth $15.00 to $20.00; and the best horses brought $80.00.
Mountain land adjacent to the town was not salable, and as there were but few owners of real estate at this time, and no particular induce- . ment for speculation, in the fertility of the soil or the rapid development of business, Adams was a narrow field for speculators or trading men.
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The scarcity of cash made swopping. bartering, or credit necessary in sales of real estate. As a type of this period was Mr. George Whitman, an excellent citizen and a man of honor and integrity in all his dealings. He was one of the most conspicuous "trading men " of the times, and being of rather infirm bodily health, he had to rely on his brains rather than his muscles for a livelihood. From 1807 to 1829 he owned eleven different dwellings and lots, and removed fifteen times. Sometimes his wife would hardly succeed in getting her goods unpacked before he would make another trade, and then the summons would be issued to remove again. Mr. Whitman owned, at various times, four farms; the entire lot of land forming the " Union," and large parcels of land in Clarksburg and Florida. He traded a farm for the Mansion House in Williamstown; traded that for a saw mill and land; and his last trade be- fore his decease was for the valuable farm and quarry now known as the Whitman farm. About this time, 1800, Jeremiah Colegrove, who owned the land, commenced using the street now known as Eagle street, as a private way for hauling lumber, and some time afterward presented it to the town as a public highway. In the same year Peter Carver opened a cooper's shop in a small building on Main street, and Baker Jones es- tablished a brick yard near the Harrison farm.
About the year 1800 Jeremiah Colegrove built an oil mill on the west side of the river. The building was converted into a grist mill and was burned in 1854. The process of manufacturing oil was as follows. Flaxseed was crushed between iron rollers and under mill stones; it was then mixed with water, heated and steamed in an iron barrel, and then pressed with a screw press of great power, operated by a horizontal wheel which would turn the screw up or down as might be desired. The arms of this press consisted of two oaken logs of the utmost solidity and strength that could be obtained. They squeezed out the oil in nearly a pure state. It was mostly sold in Troy and Albany. The oil cake being an excellent article of food for cattle met with a quick sale in the vicinity of the mill. Flax being extensively raised in the neighborhood, and made into domestic linen, the seed was easily obtained and the manufac- ture of the oil was a lucrative business. The introduction of cotton cloth, however, and the rapidity with which it superseded home-made linen put an end to the culture of flax and the manufacture of oil, and the mill ceased to run about the year 1830. The mill was operated by vari- ous parties, among them Ezra D. Whitaker, who, in 1827, advertised in the first newspaper printed in North Adams for "300 bushels flax- seed.
The first cloth dressing was done in North Adams about the year 1798 or 1799, by one Roger Wing, from Connecticut. The fulling mill was put into Jeremiah Colegrove's grist mill, and the finishing was done in a small building situated on the present site of Burlingame block. About the year 1801 a carding machine was also put in Mr. Colegrove's grist mill. In 1801 David Estes, having constructed a dam across the north branch
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of the Hoosac, erected the first buildings in North Adams for carding wool and dressing cloth. They stood on the site of the "Estes Mill." on River street, now owned by the Freeman Print Works The price orig- inally paid for carding wool was ten cents per pound. The wool was picked by hand and greased with lard. Cloth was dressed for twenty to fifty cents per yard ; indigo blue-considered a very genteel color in those days-fifty cents. The cloth was all home-spun and hand woven. The old fashioned spinning wheel made music in every farm house. and the clatter of the loom was frequently heard. It was as fashionable then to practice on those machines as it is now on the piano. The process of full- ing cloth was as follows : the cloth was placed in a long wooden box, a stream of suds was poured in, and the pieces of cloth were pushed forward and back under the heavy blocks, which were grooved and made to move alternately over the cloth. By incessant rubbing and compression the fibres of the cloth were compacted, and the number of yards reduced one- sixth to one-quarter, according to order or quality. The rinsing was done in the same box, and by the same process, a stream of clean water being let on from the flume. The cloth was then stretched on tenter bars in the open air and allowed to remain until perfectly dry, when it was ready to be dressed or colored according to the style.
The dressing or shearing was at first done by hand shears, at least four feet long and weighing sixty or more pounds ; they were very true and nicely adjusted, costing about thirty six dollars ; but the labor of operating them was arduous, and the progress slow. The cloth was moved upon rollers and the shears applied directly to its surface. An able bodied man could dress only from forty to sixty yards a day. About the year 1801, hand shears for cloth dressing were superseded by machinery sim- ilar to that used at the present time. Machinery for carding wool had been invented and put in general use several years previous ; but the old fashioned hand cards were by no means given up. With a pair of hand cards, a spinning wheel moved by a wooden pin held in the right hand while the fingers of the left hand shaped the yarn, and a heavy loom which required both feet and hands, the women of that day were able to turn out cloth in which their families felt as complacent as broad- cloth and silks now make our stylish families feel. The finest qualities of home yarn were dyed by the art of the good housewives, and woven into various kinds of striped goods for ladies' wear. The best apparel was fashioned from this cloth and also from the finest colored and pressed cloth.
Roger Wing carried on the woolen business successfully in the above mentioned buildings for five or six years. About 1806 he removed his machinery to Granville, New York.
In 1804 Jeremiah Colegrove erected for the purposes of wool carding. cloth fulling, and dressing, a two-story building on the east bank of the Hoosac River, just north of the grist mill of M. D. & A. W. Hodge. He procured new machinery, and a large share of Wing's custom flowed to
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HISTORY OF BERKSHIRE COUNTY.
the establishment. About half of each season. from May to November, was devoted to carding "rolls " for the active, strong-armed housewives to spin ; and in the remaining or winter months the cloth dressing was mostly performed. This business was carried on by Mr. Colegrove for about fifteen years. He had to suffer the disadvantage of having had no previous experience in the business, and he had an untiring, close-calcu- lating competitor in David Estes. But the greatest evil was being obliged by the custom of the times and the scarcity of cash to trust almost everybody for everything, as many a man then, as now, cut a swell in fine garments for which he had never paid.
About the year 1802, a colored woman, who had fled from slavery in the State of New York, came to North Adams, closely pursued by some kidnappers from the town of Hoosick. She was directed to Captain Colegrove, as he was then called, as his warm sympathy with misfortune, great physical strength, and unshrinking courage made him conspicuous. She ran to his door, crying "For God's sake, save my life !" Her under lip was torn, and a large wound was bleeding on the side of her face. Her pursners were in sight, and rapidly approaching over Furnace Hill. Captain Colegrove took the poor creature by the hand, led her quickly through his house, and into the grist mill, then standing where the grist mill of M. D. & A. W. Hodge now stands. He ordered the mill stopped. and told his miller. Captain Ray, not to allow the gate to be hoisted by anybody until further orders. He then secreted the panting fugitive in the undershot water wheel. Returning to his house, the kidnappers soon arrived and demanded that he should give up the negro woman whom they had seen enter his door a few minutes before. He replied that they might find her if they could. They searched the house from cellar to attic. then the woodshed, and lastly the mill, very thoroughly. Though they looked at the water wheel, they were in such a hurry or in so tipsy a condition that they did not discover the hidden fugitive. and therefore departed blustering and swaggering to the Black Tavern. Still enter- taining suspicions of Mr. Colegrove, they again visited his house and threatened to search his house a second time. They were boldly met and refused, Mr. Colegrove telling them that one search was sufficient and that if they visited his house again it would be over his dead body. They looked at his stalwart form and his flashing eye and ingloriously re- treated. In the meantime the slave had been taken from his water wheel and secreted in the toll room upstairs; and another search being ex- pected, Captain Ray, in order to ward off the suspicion which might arise by the mill being stopped for so long a time, removed the hopper and busied himself in sharpening up his mill stones. After dark the fugitive was conveyed to the house of John Waterman, a short distance north of the village, where she lived nearly three years.
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Jeremiah Colegrove was in fact a liberal supporter of all public en . terprises and the most prominent figure of this decade. He was born in Rhode Island in 1758. He learned the trade of a blacksmith, and at the
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age of twenty-one was drafted into the Revolutionary army, where he served between two and three years as a minute man or coast guard. Nearly all this time he was employed as an armourer or gunsmith. His father and three brothers were engaged in some hard fights, and he burned . to be in the thickest of the fray, but his duty forbade. He was about six feet tall, finely proportioned, athletic, nimble, and ready to lead off in any emergency. He employed great numbers of men, but never asked any- body to do more than he did. He emigrated to Charlton, in Worcester county, about 1784, and followed his trade of blacksmith there for ten years. He made a visit to North Adams in 1703, was struck with its water power and removed there the following year. His business enter- prises have already been mentioned. His foresight and keen practical judgment were of more service in developing the town than in enriching himself. His wife sometimes repined at the frowning mountains and the rough uncultivated country, so different from her native Rhode Island, but he used to say to her. " don't fret ; this will be a city yet ; such water power wasn't made for nothing." Captain Colegrove gained his military title prior to 1800, and held it until, in 1806, his son received the same commission. He was a justice of the peace for more than twenty years and was a terror to evil doers. He held several petty town offices and might have held more but for his unpopular political sentiments. He was an ardent, out-spoken federalist, while the town was strongly democratic, giving an average majority of over one hundred in two hundred and fifty votes. He formed the then hazardous duty of challenger at the polls, and was a great tactician, or wire-puller, as it would now be called. He was a sincere Christian, spotless in moral character and integrity; of frank hospitality and of great benevolence to the sick and unfortunate. In times of trouble his political enemies (he had no others) would go to him in preference to many of their own partisans, for he was trusty, sympathizing, a man of his word in all things, and a whole sonled friend. He died in North Adams, August 26th, 1837. His wife survived him fourteen years and for the last few years of her life she received a pension from the Federal government for the Revolutionary services of her husband.
About the year 1799 Dickinson & Brown erected a forge for making wrought iron from the ore. This forge was erected east of Eagle bridge, on the site of the Freeman Print Works. Benjamin Sibley, one of the early settlers of North Adams, father of Hiram Sibley, of Rochester. N. Y., was connected in some way with the operations of the forge. The ore was procured from Cheshire, South Adams, and some from Stamford. Vt. It made a good quality of iron, but owing to some cause, perhaps the cost of transportation, it did not prove remunerative.
At a later period, about the year 1801 to 1804. during the operation of the forge by Mr. Brown, he used some ore, mixing it with pig iron, which was brought from Salisbury, Conn .. and turned out excellent wrought iron. This was called "refining." The business was superin-
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tended by Edward Witherell, an experienced, practical iron-maker. The wrought iron business paid well from the fact that the product com- manded $140 per ton. It was of a superior quality. The process of prepar- ing the ore for melting was as follows. A large hollow white oak log, halved into a trough, was placed firmly, with iron cross bar grates to hold up the ore, and a space beneath for letting the finer particles pass down as they were broken off, from whence they were shoveled out in readi- ness for the forge. The process of breaking the ore was by a large point- ed hammer. moved by a water wheel like a trip-hammer, falling upon it. The forge for melting the ore into iron was constructed in form some- what like a blacksmith's forge and chimney, only of a much larger size and with more solid and permanent stone and brick work, with a basin similar in shape and size to a large potash kettle, near the flue of the chimney. For keeping up draught, two pairs of large bellows were placed, one on each side, and operated by a water wheel. The ore. pre. pared as above, was put into the furnace and melted, the mass being oc- casionally tapped to draw off the cinders and dross. When a sufficient quantity of iron was melted to make a lump of iron called a "loop." weighing 100 to 150 pounds, it was drawn ont upon the hearth floor with a huge pair of tongs. As soon as it cooled a little, it was hammered into an oblong shape with a large sledge, wielded by the brawny arms of the workmen of those days. Then by a crane, with coupling or grappling hooks, it was lifted upon a heavy anvil, and a forge hammer of some 700 pounds safely fastened in the end of a solid piece of timber, was lifted and let fall by cogs attached to the shaft of a water wheel at the other end of the timber and a spring pole. The fall of the hammer was about three feet, and its weight rapidly shaped the red hot loop of iron. The glowing mass was first forge-hammered in the center, so as to cut it into two pieces for more easy handling and drawing out. When occasion re- quired it was reheated and drawn out into rough bars, of a size suitable for wagon tires.
Our present workers in iron, who can purchase wrought iron of almost any size and shape, made fit for all uses by machinery. can hardly realize the difficulties of early blacksmithing. For many years all the iron, even that which was imported, came in large, rough hammered, un- shapely bars ; and when small articles were needed, such as horse shoes, door hinges, and even brad nails, these bars were heated and hammered down to the proper dimensions, or split with the aid of a "striker." The strong arms and steady nerves of the smiths were severely taxed, and it was no child's play when such men as Joseph Darby, David Dar- ling, and other ingenious, hard-working mechanics labored at the anvil. fashioning articles for the manifold uses of business and common life. David Darling built a blacksmith's shop in 1802, on the present site of the Wilson House. Mr. Darling was a kind neighbor, a man of decision, with a strong sense of justice, though plain an l unassuming in his ways. On a certain occasion, the use of the village church having been denied
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by two or three of its self constituted guardians to a Universalist preacher, Mr. Darling, who kept the key, declared that it was the agreement and understanding that the church should be opened to any respectable preacher whom the people wished to hear, when it was not occupied by the Baptist society ; and he would open it to the Universalists. He did so, and the Word according to Universalism was preached possibly for the first time in the town.
Joseph Darby also built a blacksmith's shop in 1810, near the corner of Main and Eagle streets.
The work turned out from these blacksmith's shops, although strong and durable, would not compare with the work now done by ordinary blacksmiths. The greatest advance may be seen by a comparison of the vehicles now in use with those of eighty years ago. The vehicle then in general use for all purposes was the rough, strongly-made two horse lumber wagon. The wheel tires of this, as well as those of the ox-cart, were composed of several pieces, forming joints over each felloe. The art of setting tires whole did not come into general use in Adams until about 1810. The setting of the first wagon tire whole in North Adams was regarded with almost as much interest as the completion of a new railroad now excites. The villagers turned out to witness the operation.
Long journeys in those days were performed on foot, on horse-back, or in a two horse lumber wagon. Church going, pleasure rides, or visits to balls and parties were frequently made with a lady sitting behind a gentleman on the same horse-he on a saddle. she on a pillion, or sort of cushion, and with her arms around his waist. The " horseblock," to assist the ladies in mounting or dismounting from the pillion, was then an indispensable appendage in front of every man's dwelling; no man considered his premises finished without one. The ladies' side saddle soon after came into general use, and the damsels of those days became remarkably proficient equestrians.
It is probable that no wagon springs of any kind were in use in Adams until about the year 1808, when Shubael Wilmarth, father of Colonel Henry Wilmarth, purchased of the New Lebanon Shakers a two horse pleasure wagon, for $84, with what were termed "spring seats." These springs were of the simplest possible construction, two pieces of ash timber, one on each side, bolted to a bed-piece on the wagon box. They ran up at an angle of about thirty degrees, and the seat was placed upon them, the spring being imparted by the elasticity of the timber, and two persons would find it easier riding than one.
The first regular wagon shop was opened by Monroe Dickinson. in 1798, about twenty rods north of Eagle bridge, and Samuel Brown com- menced wagon making about 1808, on Eagle street, and in 1812 he built a shop on Center street. Abont the year ISD) a new era commenced by the introduction of the one horse lumber wagon. Though without springs. this vehicle was gladly welcomed. This was followed by the one horse pleasure wagon, with springs of wood, supposed to have been mannfac-
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tured at Belchertown. The first wagon of this description was probably brought into town in 1812 or 1814 by Shubael Wilmarth, jr. This vehi- cle cost $60 and was painted yellow throughout. The wheels were very small, the felloes were narrow but heavy, and the framed and paneled box was set on a rocker, with a king-bolt through the axletree. The wheels were held in place by wooden linchpins. The seat was raised high on wooden springs as above described. The next improvement was the "grasshopper spring," made of wood, and probably so called from its resemblance in shape to the bent legs of that insect when ready to leap. Then came the short thorough brace composed of several thicknesses of leather sewed together, bolted to the bottom of the wagon box and around the rocker. Soon afterward followed the long thorough brace, so generally used on stage coaches for many years. The present elliptical spring was not much used in town until 1828. The old fashioned sleighs were constructed with very high backs, and scallops at the sides extend- ing almost to the bottoms. The dashboard was also very high, and a small man would be completely hidden from behind, and would almost need to rise from his seat to see his horse. The runners were sticks of timber selected for their natural crook, or more rarely they were sawed out -the art of steaming and bending wood being little used until 1828. The sleigh shoes, when not of wood. were of wrought iron, and the sleighs were usually painted of one color, with the initials of the owner's name, in letters like handwriting, surmounted with a scroll, painted on the sleigh backs. Some of the early one horse sleighs were called "pungs," probably because instead of thills, there was a tongue mor- tised into the roller at one side, and the horse was attached to the neap, or the end of the tongue, by a neck-yoke made of wood or iron.
Traveling in those days was no pleasure affair. The journey from Adams to New York city, now a mere pastime, was then a serious affair, not only as to expense but from the danger from the winds and waves on the Hudson River.
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