USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Clinton > History of the origin of the town of Clinton, Massachusetts, 1653-1865 > Part 18
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In 1860, an application for the extension of his most im- portant patent on the ingrain carpet loom was made by E. B. Bigelow. This was printed in a bulky volume of between five and six hundred pages, from which many valuable facts may be derived. The first suggestion of the idea of an in- grain carpet power loom seems to have arisen from a conver- sation with Alexander Wright, shortly after the invention of the coachlace loom. On account of previous lack of success in power looms, all Mr. Bigelow's "applications for pecuni- ary aid * were unavailing," and he was obliged to bear the cost of the first experiments himself. At last, through George W. Lyman, treasurer of the Lowell Manufacturing Company, he made an arrangement with that company, in 1839. Mr. Bigelow was to give his time to perfect his inven- tion and the company was to construct a trial loom and in case of success build a mill for his looms and pay him a patent rent.
The problem before him was a difficult one. It seemed no less than the question: How can iron be made to think? He must make figures match, have a smooth selvage, and a smooth, even face. The hand-loom weaver could by his judgment meet all practical difficulties. He could pull the weft thread to make the selvage even if the shuttle had done its work imperfectly; he could increase or decrease the force he put into the lathe if the figure was getting too long or too short; he could make the fabric smooth by regulating the tension of the warps. How could dead matter do all these things? Mr. Bigelow taught it how and invented a
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THE COMING OF THE BIGELOWS.
two-ply carpet loom which would weave twelve yards a day of carpeting of a quality far superior to that of the hand- loom, which wove only eight. He tried again and soon produced a second loom, with various modifications and improvements, which would weave eighteen yards. A third loom was invented, which brought the product up to over twenty-five yards per day. He also produced a three-ply carpet loom which manufactured from seventeen to eighteen yards per day. The first patents were issued in May, 1842; the third and most important, in February, 1846 (antedated ); the fourth, in October, 1849 .*
Merton C. Bryant, an expert who testified in regard to this loom, said: "The Bigelow carpet power loom for weav- ing carpets, as now used, appears to me to be, as a whole, by far the most intricate and complicated piece of mechanism that I have ever known to be used, and in its inception must have called for an immense amount of analysis, combination and inventive power. When I consider the loom as a whole operating machine, I am led to the greatest opinion of the ingenuity, forethought and masterly combina- tion contained in it; the automatic working together of vari- ous movements in different directions for different purposes, seemingly at hazard because not regular, and yet all con- trolled and acting in unison. When I see the attendant with
* In Knight's American Mechanical Dictionary we find the following condensed description of the completed loom :-
"An ingrain carpet loom is one, in which two or more shuttles, one for the ground and the other for the figure, are employed. In Bigelow's, the two, after being thrown, are received in horizontal boxes on each side of the frame, and a third series, containing the different colored yarns producing the pattern, are placed in a set of vertically arranged boxes; all the shuttles are actuated by the same picker-staves; and the figure shuttles are raised and lowed as required by the pinions having a reciprocating rotary motion on a shaft, their presentation being deter- mined by a pattern wheel, having movable cam surfaces on the shaft; one vibrating cam moves the lay forward to beat up the cloth, and an- other moves it backward, while a shuttle is thrown."
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THE INGRAIN CARPET LOOM.
his pattern cards, place them upon the loom and read upon them the directions he has thereon stamped, saying to the loom, 'Give to the carpet the design the artist has painted,' and, on examining the cards separately, see one which says 'Scarlet-filling-thread here;' another saying, 'Ruby-filling- thread here;' another, 'White,' etc .; when I see these stamped directions furnished to the loom, and then the loom set to work and embroider the design, true and faithful, then, look- ing at the intricate mechanism, I have wondered at the skill and ingenuity of the inventor."
B. R. Curtis sums up the testimony as follows: "Mr. Big- elow was the first person to demonstrate the practicability of successfully weaving carpets by power looms. The loom invented by him is the product of a very high order of in- ventive genius, sustained by uncommon perseverance and industry in overcoming difficulties and reducing mere intel- lectual conception to useful and economical results."
In the later months of 1841, Mr. Bigelow went to Eng- land and became convinced that, in many important respects, English manufacturers were ahead of the American. The mill corporations of Lowell, in order to benefit by his suggestions, appointed him general adviser for the corpora- tions. During the eighteen months he held this office he made many changes for the better in the mills, and he also started and organized the first successful power-loom carpet mill in the world.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE FOUNDING OF LANCASTER MILLS .*
IN 1843, E. B. Bigelow, through his natural genius for mechanics, his study of manufacturing in America and Eng- land and his position of adviser to the mills in Lowell, had become one of the leading American authorities on mill con- struction, while he seemed to have a monopoly, as an inven- tor, in applying power to the weaving of figured fabrics. He had also formed an extensive acquaintance with New Eng- land capitalists, interested in textile manufactures. It was but natural that his attention and that of his friends who had money to invest, should be turned to the making of figured cotton goods.
An arrangement was made whereby certain parties agreed to secure capital, while Mr. Bigelow was to make plans for a mill, advise upon its construction and see that it was equipped with suitable machinery. There seems to have been an un- derstanding at first that the company to be formed should make blue and white cotton checks and that, if Mr. Bigelow could invent machinery for more complex patterns, it should be used, whenever it could be to advantage.
Where should the mills be located? The water power furnished by the fall of the Nashua River in Clintonville, and
* In addition to the authorities given on the "Coming of the Bige- lows," we would acknowledge our indebtedness to James Pitts for infor- mation in regard to Pitts Mills, and to George W. Weeks for the main body of facts in regard to Lancaster Mills.
UP THE NASHUA FROM THE HEAD OF CEDAR STREET.
217
CHOOSING THE SITE.
the cheapness of the terms on which the real estate was offered led to a decision in favor of the present site. The influence of E. B. Bigelow tended strongly in this direction. He may have felt some personal attachment to the village where he had gained his first permanent success, but his desire for the cooperation of his brother, on whom he leaned in matters of business management, must have weighed with him yet more. H. N. Bigelow's ability had been demon- strated by the remarkable prosperity of the Coachlace and Quilt Mills, and the prospect of securing his services as agent must have added greatly in the minds of those inter- ested, to the balance of reasons for establishing their plant in Clintonville.
If, in the summer of 1843, the Bigelow brothers had walked out to look over the premises where they were hop- ing the new mills might be built, the views which met their eyes as they passed along the road over the brow of the hill would have been very different from those which now attract the gaze of the passer-by. Before 1838, there had been only a rude cart-path from Main Street to the Pitts Mills, but, on the petition of the Pitts family in that year, a road had been built by the town. It followed, as the cart-path had done, the depression between Burditt and Harris Hills, a little south of the present line of Union and Mechanic Streets, and then descended the hill where there is now a foot-path on the east of Chestnut Street. It went by the Pitts Mills and the dwelling-house and crossed the river by a ford ncar the present foot-bridge and came out again into the road of to-day near what is now known as the Cameron house. The present road was laid out by J. C. Hoadley as engineer. One of the leading citizens of Lancaster is said to have de- clared in town meeting: "God Almighty never intended the road should be elsewhere than in the natural depression He had made for it." Where the Bigelow Carpet Mill now stands, lay "Slab Meadow," and most of the western slope of Harris Hill was yet covered with woods. The view of the
218
THE FOUNDING OF LANCASTER MILLS.
Nashua valley from the brow of the hill was one of forest, save where, in the intervale now occupied by the Lancaster Mills and Green Street, there was a luxuriant meadow of twenty or thirty acres, cultivated by the Pitts family .* There were two little mills, the saw and grist-mill, and another, used for manufacturing cotton goods. In both mills together there were, at this time, five men and ten girls. The dam used by the Pitts brothers was thirteen feet high, and in the same position as the present one. This dam flowed back the river about a mile and the pond was nowhere more than two hundred feet wide. Near the dam, at the foot of the Chest- nut Street of to-day, was a house, now No. I, Chestnut Street. The Sargent house was just across the river, where it is still standing.
The power furnished by South Meadow, Rigby and Mine Swamp Brooks had been thoroughly utilized before this time, and some advantage had been taken of the fall of the Nashua both here at the Pitts Mills and at the Harris Comb Shops, but most of the force of the river was yet running to waste. When the Bigelow brothers stood here on the banks of the rapidly descending stream, they must have realized most keenly the value of the force which was waiting here for some one to control it and bring it into the service of man, an available force of seven hundred horse-power, capable of doing continuously the work of a thousand men, if brains and money could be found to apply it to advantage. Here, the most important factor furnished by nature for the build- ing up of Clinton was brought into connection with the most important personal factors in her development, at a time when the course of the world's history encouraged the establishment of such industries as those on which the pros- perity of the town was to be founded.
We must remember that, up to this time, Factory Village had remained a little hamlet, scarcely larger than it had been
*See, for further account of earlier history, pages 158-160.
219
INCORPORATION.
in the thirties, when it was credited with less than three hun- dred inhabitants. It was not until after 1843 that any exten- sive enlargements were made at the Coachlace or Quilt Mills, and these, with a few other much smaller mills, like those of Pitts and Fuller, and several small comb shops, did all the business that was done except a little farming. The few houses on the west side of the river were still for the most part scattered along Main and Water Streets. There was no church, no railroad, no post-office, no hotel worthy of the name. There may have been one or two little country stores and there was a single district school. On the east of the river, there were a few more farm houses and another little school.
The next seven years, were destined to be a period of re- markable growth, changing the straggling village into a thriving town with a population of as many thousands as it then had hundreds. We have already traced the develop- ment of the Clinton Company's mills and that of the Quilt Mill during this period, under the fostering care of the Big- elows, and now come to consider a far more important elc- ment of the town's growth in the building of the Lancaster Mills, under the same management.
An act of incorporation, passed by the House of Repre- sentatives January 31, 1844, marks the beginning of the Lan- caster Mills .*
* COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS.
In the year one thousand eight hundred and forty-four. An Act to in- corporate the Lancaster Mills :
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, in General Court assembled, and by authority of the same, as follows :----
SECTION I. E. B. Bigelow, Stephen Fairbanks, Henry Timmins, their associates and successors, are hereby made a Manufacturing Cor- poration, by the name of "Lancaster Mills," for the purpose of manufac- turing cotton and other goods, in the Town of Lancaster, in the County of Worcester ; and for this purpose shall have all the powers and priv-
220
THE FOUNDING OF LANCASTER MILLS.
In addition to E. B. Bigelow, Stephen Fairbanks and Henry Timmins, who are mentioned in this act, some of the most prominent among the original stockholders of the com- pany were N. W. Appleton, Wm. C. Appleton, H. N. Bige- low, George Cummings, A. E. Hildreth, Ignatius Sargent, Amos Lawrence and George W. Lyman. Several of these names we have seen before in the records of the Clinton Company, and it may be presumed that there was for years a close connection between the two corporations. The Ap- pletons were interested in the mills as selling agents. The first officers of the company were: Stephen Fairbanks, presi- dent; Wm. C. Appleton, treasurer. These two, with E. B. Bigelow, Henry Timmins and Robert Appleton, were the directors. The capital stock of the company was made five hundred thousand dollars, divided into one thousand shares at five hundred dollars each.
On the 28th of May, 1844, the company received of E. B. Bigelow its deed of two hundred and thirteen acres of real estate, which, with the buildings thereon and sixty-eight acres soon after purchased, cost sixteen thousand eight hun- dred and ninety-two dollars and sixteen cents. About eighty acres, with the water power, the mills and the homestead
ileges, and be subject to all the duties, restrictions and liabilities set forth in the thirty-eighth and forty-fourth chapters of the Revised Stat- utes.
SECT. 2. Said Corporation may hold for the purpose aforesaid, real estate to the amount of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and per- sonal estate to the amount of three hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and the whole Capital Stock of said Corporation shall not exceed five hundred thousand dollars.
House of Representatives, Jan. 31, 1844. Passed to be enacted.
In the Senate, Feb. 2, 1844. Passed to be enacted.
THOMAS KINNICUT, Speaker.
JOSIAH QUINCY, JR., President.
Feb. 5, 1844. Approved. GEO. N. BRIGGS.
221
CONSTRUCTION.
came from the Pitts brothers, James, William, HI. W. and S. G., the rest of the first lot from R. J. Cleveland, Sidney Har- ris, William Lintell, Winsor Barnard, Mary Butler, heirs of Emory Harris, Phinehas Moore, Horace Jewett, Dolly Churchill. The later lots came from the heirs of Moses Sawyer, from John Burdett, a house and land from Eliza Sargent, wife of Stephen Sargent, lots from Sidney Harris, Alanson Chace and Franklin Wilder. This real estate was bounded much the same as that of the Lancaster Mills to- day, except that many house lots have been sold, especially on the Acre, and the flowage rights have been increased.
After the company was organized, the stock taken and the real estate purchased, the next step was construction. It was decided to build a comparatively small mill at first, but upon such a plan as to admit readily of subsequent en . largement. Since land was so cheap and plentiful, the plan of a mill of one story was adopted. The Lancaster Mills were among the first of this form, which has since proved so well adapted to profitable manufacture, and to safety of property and life. The original mill* was six hundred and fourteen feet long by forty-six feet wide, running parallel with what is now Green Street, but nearer the river. In this low, long, narrow mill, it was intended that all the processes should follow one another in order, from the carding room to the cloth room.
Among those who took contracts for the construction of this and subsequent buildings of an early date were William T. Merrifield of Worcester, wood work; Ezra Sawyer of Clin- tonville, brick work; Oliver Stone and Haskell & Cowdrey built some of the tenement houses.
The dam was among the first things to be constructed, and remains in 1895 substantially as it was built, except that it was repaired and the wooden cap was replaced by one of
* None of the walls of the original mill are now left except a portion of the engine and wheel house.
222
THE FOUNDING OF LANCASTER MILLS.
stone, in 1867. The total length of this dam is three hun- dred and twenty-one and seven-eighths feet. It is twelve and one-half feet thick. It has a rollway and wings of stone. The original cost was twelve thousand six hundred dollars. This dam held the water back nearly as far as Sawyers Mills in Boylston and caused the overflow of several hundred acres of woodland. The power was applied by means of three breast wheels, twenty-six feet in diameter, having seventy- five horse-power each, making a total of two hundred and twenty-five horse-power. Additional power and security in times of drought were secured by the immediate purchase of a steam engine of two hundred and fifty horse-power.
H. N. Bigelow, as agent, oversaw, with even more than his accustomed energy, these building operations, and E. B. Bigelow paid especial attention to the machinery. Speaking of the work he had undertaken, he said, after the works were finished: "It required much to be created; while all the parts were to be adjusted on new principles or in new con- nections. The immense amount of minute and complicated detail thus involved, the countless arrangements and per- plexing combinations which must all contribute to one result, and make up one systematic whole, cannot easily be appre- ciated by persons unacquainted with machinery. * * At the commencement of an undertaking, so novel as well as so extensive and complete as this was, no man could do more than grasp the general plan." While Mr. Bigelow was thus planning to bring all the inventions of others which could profitably be used in the manufacture they had undertaken into such harmonious relations as to insure the best results, he was also devising new looms of his own which should en- able the company to make ginghams of more complex pat- terns as well as simple cotton checks. Up to this time, ginghams had been for the most part made on hand looms in the homes of the weavers, who having received a certain number of pounds of yarn from the manufacturers, returned a proportional number of yards of cloth. On the 10th of
223
PATENT OF GINGHAM LOOM.
April, 1845, Mr. Bigelow received letters patent for an inven- tion which was to revolutionize the making of ginghams almost as much as his previous inventions, which were power looms for figured fabrics, had that of coachlace, counter- panes, and ingrain carpets .*
This was Mr. Bigelow's main invention bearing on the
* The following are the specifications of his patent for weaving plaids, etc .:-
I. What I claim for my invention and desire to secure by letters patent, is regulating the delivery of the unwoven warps, as required for the weaving of the cloth by the tension of the said warps in combination with a brake or stop motion to prevent the tension given to the warps by the beat of the lay from affecting the delivery motion.
2. I also claim, in combination with the method of regulating the de- livery of the warps by their tension and controlled by a brake, the tak- ing up of the woven cloth by a regular and positive motion, that the figure produced thereon may be regular and well matched, the irregu- larities of the weft threads being in this manner taken up in the thick- ness instead of the length of the cloth.
3. I also claim in combination with the roller of a positive and regu- lar take up motion of a weaving room, the measuring wheel and hand or pointer, whereby the quantity of cloth woven is at all times indicated.
4. I also claim communicating the shifting motion for shifting the shuttle boxes up and down when a change of color is required in the weft by the gravitating force of a weight or the equivalent thereof where- by all injury to the mechanism is avoided should anything be interposed to arrest the motion of the moving parts.
5. I also claim arresting the motion of the shuttle and relieving the picker from the end thereof preparatory to the shifting of the shuttle boxes by combining with the lay and picker a spring lever, one arm of which moves in a slot or the equivalent thereof to give it the required motion.
6. And, lastly, I claim stopping the loom and arresting the momentum of the moving parts, at a given and determined point, by means of the lever which, when the weft thread is not carried through, is brought into contact with a spur on the crank shaft, or the equivalent thereof, which forces it back to shift the belt, when this is combined with the fingers, which enter into the recesses of the lay and which, when the weft threads are carried through, are pushed forward to prevent the lever from stop- ping the loom,
224
THE FOUNDING OF LANCASTER MILLS.
manufacture of ginghams, but we must not forget that the whole process from beginning to end was thoroughly over- hauled by him, and many minor patents were taken out for improvements in various details. Indeed, this collateral work must be taken into consideration in all Mr. Bigelow's inventions, if we would rightly understand the service he did to the world. As he himself has stated; "It is a well-known fact that complex inventions have not, as a general thing, come at once into use. In many cases, this has been because they were not immediately brought into harmony with other things. In a state of natural progress, things move on to- gether and become naturally adjusted. An important inven- tion often disturbs these adjustments, and cannot be made to work efficiently until other inventions and new arrange- ments have brought all the processes into accordance with it. This arduous duty I have endeavored to perform for all my looms.
"Lee's hand stocking-loom was invented several years before it was reduced to practice, and even this was not effected by the inventor. The comparatively simple power loom for weaving plain cloth was of very slow growth. A long time elapsed before its organization was so harmonized as to work at all, and for several years afterward, successive improvements only gave it a more moderate speed. Its capacity, in this respect, has actually been doubled within the last fifteen years. If my own more complex machines for the production of figured fabrics have attained at once to so high a state of perfection, I attribute it, in part, to the fact that my attention has also been given to those processes which are subordinate, preparatory, and collateral, and that these have been made to accord with the main invention. That this claim of success is not extravagant will appear, I think, when it is considered that the cost of weaving coach- lace was at one stride reduced from twenty-two cents to three cents a yard."
The first loom of Mr. Bigelow's ran about one hundred
225
ENLARGEMENT.
picks per minute, while those of the present reach one hun- dred and sixty picks. The value of these carly looms is shown by the fact that, notwithstanding the vast improve- ment in every kind of machinery since the time of their con- struction, all of the original looms remained in service until ISS7.
Before the mill already described had been completed, the company, encouraged by the readiness with which their first stock had been taken, the high manufacturing profits which prevailed at this time and the invention of the new gingham loom, decided to carry out the entire plan of the inills at once and to devote them especially to the manufac- ture of ginghams. This new arrangement meant the build- ing of mills with five times the floor room of the original structure or one hundred and thirty-six thousand and thirteen feet. Between the first mill and Green Street, a mill of one story, three hundred and fifty-six feet eight inches long, by one hundred and seventy-four feet four inches wide, was built. This was all in one room. lighted by skylights. It, with a portion of the first mill, was to be used for carding, spinning and weaving. When completely finished it con- tained twenty thousand seven hundred and eighty-four spin- dles and five hundred and fifty looms. Southeast of the main mill there was a "packing house" one hundred and eighty-one feet by seventy-two feet eight inches, three stories in height. There was also a dye house one hundred and cighty-two feet eight inches long, by ninety-six feet eight inches wide, and one story in height. All the wooden tene- ment and boarding-houses now belonging to the Lancaster Mills, with the exception of one upon Cross Street, and one on Green Street, belong to this period. There were also several others on Green Street which have since given way to brick buildings. The number of these tenements was necessarily large as the operatives with few exceptions must come from outside of the village and could not therefore have
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