USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Professional and industrial history of Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Volume III > Part 37
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Salem gradually lost this trade, and the great hide importing houses have, since 1830, been located at Boston and New York. In 1835 Bryant & Sturgis, of Long Wharf, sent vessels to California for hides. Richard H. Dana, jr., went as a sailor in one of the early voyages, and
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SUFFOLK COUNTY.
printed his experience in " Two Years Before the Mast." At that time it took eighteen months to pick up a cargo of 40,000 hides on that coast, and they were sold in Boston for twelve and one-half cents a pound.
James Packer was one of the oldest morocco manufacturers in the State in active business when he died. He was apprenticed to Guy Carleton & Co., in 1819; commenced business for himself in 1832, and occupied a factory on Tremont street for thirty-five years. He died in 1889, aged eighty-seven years. His brother, Charles Packer, did busi- ness in Boston and Lynn for sixty years, and died in 1890, aged eighty- five years.
The following table shows the number of tanning and currying establishments in Massachusetts, and the growth of the industry in forty-five years:
LEATHER.
1845
1855
1865
1875
1885
Number of establishments.
772
851
667
529
699
Capital invested.
$4,744,933
$3,720,067 $6,430,272
$7,690,245 $14,382,897
$12,258,831
Value of stock used.
$19,713,559
Persons employed.
2,691
4,808
5,321
6,620
9,228
Wages paid.
$3,383,054
$4,313,674
Motive power (horse power).
5,450
9,177
Value of goods made.
$4,259,45I
$13,790,107
$12,062,046
$21,899,262
$28,008,851
It is estimated that the cost of production of leather at present is about as follows: stock, 78.95 per cent. ; wages and salaries, 17.80 per cent. ; rent, taxes, etc., 3.25 per cent. ; total, 100.
The bark used in tanning in Massachusetts, and indeed all the northern section of the country, is hemlock. Oak grows at so great a distance that it is unavailable, on account of the expense of transport- ation. Hemlock leather is well adapted for plain, substantial shoes, but for the more tasteful and expensive kinds, oak is used. Formerly all the oak leather the shoemaker cut up was brought East from Phila- delphia and Baltimore, in which cities it was tanned somewhat exten- sively. About 1845, A. I. Schultz, the father of Jackson S. Schultz, of New York, conceived the idea of producing leather having the com- plexion and general appearance of oak leather, but tanned partially with hemlock and partially with oak bark, the former greatly predom- inating. This was called union leather, and after it had been in use a short time in New York city factories, it was adopted in Lynn and Haverhill. It is trimmed differently from hemlock. It is crapped;
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE.
the best part of the hide is detached and tanned separately from the offal portions. The leather is limed, which renders it soft, suitable for working under the machines, and susceptible of a fine finish. Fully 2,500,000 of these backs are tanned yearly.
Scoured oak backs are in use for bottoms of the finest shoes. They are made from green salted hides. When tanned, or partially tanned, they are trimmed and scoured on the grain. The backs of whole hides are tanned and trimmed for belting.
In 1850-2 Perry Newhall, of Lynn, began to cut soles for the trade. He was for some time the only person engaged in the business; now the cut sole trade is one of the largest industries. David Knox, of Lynn, invented a machine for cutting these soles in 1854. Others fol- lowed, and millions of pairs of soles are prepared for the trade by the use of machinery.
About 1865 grain leather began to be used in shoes. Cow hides are the raw material. These are split when partially tanned and then finished on the grain side in imitation of goat or seal skin. This leather was sold at first for high prices, but machinery was introduced and other methods that cheapened it so as to admit of its use in low grade shoes.
Buff leather is a substitute for calfskins, and a good imitation. It is finished on the grain side, and the top cuticle of the grain is then buffed off, so as to give a perfectly smooth surface.
Calfskins have been used ever since shoes were made. There is usually a pretty plentiful supply of calfskins, and they are finished by various methods. Wax-calf is stuffed with tallow and blackened, patent calf is finished with a varnish. Ooze calf is prepared by secret process and finished over an emery wheel. Calf kid is tanned with alum and softened by staking. All these are used in shoes.
About the year 1867 Col. Charles F. Harrington, at that time of the house of Johnson & Thompson, of Boston, went to England with sam- ples of buff, grain and splits. He showed them in London and Leeds, but shoe manufacturers said the leather wasn't suited to the class of shoes they made. He left the samples with a London factor. The London factor could find no buyer for them, so he gave them away. However the seed thus sown bore fruit. These fabrics are now used in most every part of Europe. Almost all of it is shipped from Bos- ton.
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SUFFOLK COUNTY.
'The following table shows the value of our upper leather exports for nine fiscal years:
Year.
Value.
Year.
Value.
1884
$2,062,651
1889
$3,143,699
1885
.
2,578,991
1890
4,249,110
1886
2,405,456
1891
5,161,211
1887
3,073,833
1892
3,880,475
1888
2,849,208
Exports of sole leather for eight years were:
Year.
Pounds.
Value
Year.
Pounds. 28,713,473
Value.
1884
22,421,293
$4,613,106
1888
$4,959,363
1885
27,313,766
5,416,830
1889
35,558,945
5,890,509
1886
24,256,880
4,825,615
1890
39,595,219
6,420,134
1887
30,530,488
5,695,151
1891
37.501,278
6,168,362
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Hides that come from the Argentine Republic and Uruguay are the best dry hides we have. They are known in the trade as "straight," while most all others that are imported are termed "common." Some of the tanners import hides. The heavier weights are sent to tanneries in the Middle States, Pennsylvania principally, where the forests abound with hemlock. The thin, or light hides are tanned into upper leather. Much of this is done in Woburn, Winchester, Salem and Peabody.
Boston merchants have been in the Calcutta trade during most of this century. They import hides and goatskins from the East Indies. The Calcutta buffalo hides make sole leather of a coarse grade. The cow hides are used for mill and lace leather, and patna butts for upper leather.
The leather splitter was an important invention. Alvah Richardson and Luke Brooks, of Boston, made the first one about 1829. In 1863 an endless knife splitting machine for whole hides was introduced.
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE.
CHAPTER IV.
Leather Machinery-A Roster of Prominent Tanners-Salem-Woburn-Peabody -Hide and Leather Statistics-Cut Soles and Scrap Leather.
WITHIN a quarter of a century valuable labor saving machinery has been introduced in every department of leather finishing. Scouring, whitening, fleshing and unhairing processes can now be done by machines. A leather measuring machine came in use in 1878. Upper leather is mostly sold by the foot. It was formerly measured by a frame, with strings set in to indicate squares of a foot in size. Many disputes arose over the correctness of these measurements. By these machines all this is done away with.
E. D. Brooks & Co. are the oldest house in this country dealing in leather machinery. In 1825 Luke Brooks went to Boston and com- menced trading in leather. In 1826 he formed a copartnership with Josiah M. Jones. They did business on India Wharf up to 1832, at which date Luke Brooks, Moses Hunt and Edward T. Noble formed the firm of Moses Hunt & Co. They made and sold the Richardson splitting machine. Eugene D., a son of Luke Brooks, came into the house in 1859. The firm was Noble & Brooks from that date until 18:2, when the present style was assumed.
The Southwick family embraces many tanners. The name has been associated with the industry for 150 years. They descended from Law- rence and Cassandra Southwick, who, with their son, Josiah, and daugh- ter, Mary, were whipped, imprisoned and banished from Massachusetts in 1659 for the crime of being Quakers. A son of Joseph Southwick became a tanner. His great-grandson, Philip R. Southwick, was the largest tanner in the State in 1835. He was connected with David Pingree and Robert Upton, of Salem. In 1850 Mr. Southwick became a hide broker in Boston. He retired in 1875, and died soon after. In 1859 William E. Plummer became connected with Mr. Southwick in the hide brokerage business. During the Civil War he induced the upper leather tanners to use bark extract, and formed a company to manufacture it in Canada under the Miller patents. Bark was scarce,
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SUFFOLK COUNTY.
owing to a dearth of men to peel it. The use of extracts enabled tan- ners to fill their contracts. He became interested as superintendent with the United States Patents Company, owning scouring, whitening and other labor saving machines. Some of these have been generally adopted. Mr. Plummer was superintendent of the Shoe and Leather Building at the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia.
Benjamin G. Boardman was, in his day, a dashing operator in hides and leather. He dated from 1831. He accumulated a fortune; he re- tired in 1879 and invested his money in real estate.
The Ropes brothers, five of them, were importers of hides for years in Salem. They had houses in Boston and in New York. They did an extensive business with the River Plata. The last two of them died in Brooklyn in the summer of 1890, Ripley Ropes and Reuben W. Ropes, both men of sterling worth.
Solomon R. Spaulding was in the leather business fifty years. He was the first to establish a leather store on Pearl street. Mr. Spauld- ing was the first president of the Merchants' and Miners' Transporta- tion Company, and was a vice-president of the Board of Trade. He died September 1, 1874, aged sixty-nine years.
Major Alexander Vining, a prominent leather and calfskin dealer, died January, 1886. He was proprietor of the Mansion House at Hull. His daughter, Floretta Vining, is an authoress and lecturer and one of the large real estate owners at Hull.
Henry Poor died January 19, 1878, aged seventy-nine years. His family had been tanners for a hundred and twenty-five years. He established himself in business in South Danvers in 1830. He moved to Boston in 1845. Alexander Moseley was a partner from 1845 to 1851. Since then the firm has been Henry Poor & Son. Mr. Poor served terms in both bodies of the General Court, and his eldest son, Eben S. Poor, who died in 1844, was a State senator and member of the Gov- ernor's Council. John O. and Charles C. Poor constitute the present firm. Henry Poor was one of the most estimable and beloved of men.
Jacob Putnam was born in Danvers in 1782; died in Salem, January, 1866. When thirteen years old he was apprenticed to Mr. Endicott, a tanner. In 1805 he made a voyage to Calcutta. In 1810 he went into the tanning business, and in 1830 he imported hides from Para and the East Indies. In 1844 he built a large currying shop on Boston street in Salem. He introduced steam power in 1856, one of the first Massa- chusetts tanners to do this. His son, George F. Putnam, born in Salem
2.7. a. Nunter
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE.
July, 1832, learned the trade and then made two voyages to the East Indies in his father's ships. He succeeded to the business and greatly enlarged it.
Franklin Osborne dated from 1819. His sons succeeded to the bitsi- ness. N. W. Osgood began in 1820. Daniel C. Haskell was a tanner in 1835. Joseph R. Dalton, a colonel in the army, adjutant-general of this Commonwealth, and naval officer at Salem Custom House for some years, was a tanner of upper leather at Salem. Among those who commenced in 1845-50 were Joseph F. Walden, John Gibney, Albert Williams, J. A. Lord and John Culliton, Salem and Peabody tanners, famous in their day, who have passed away.
Abel Proctor was a Peabody tanner. He established this business about 1830, and was the first from that town to open a store in Boston. This was in 1842, at the North End, but he was one of the earliest to move to Pearl street. He had two sons, Abel, jr., and Thomas E. Proctor, who came in the firm in 1852. The oldest son, Abel, jr., died many years ago, and Thomas E. Proctor assumed the business about 1860. Abel Proctor for many years lived in retirement at his home in Peabody, where he superintended the tannery. He was a remarkable man. The older members of the trade will remember his tall form as he walked on Pearl street, towering above all his compeers, for he was six feet four in height, and of a powerful build. He was an enterpris- ing merchant. He died December, 1879, aged seventy-nine years. His son, Thomas E. Proctor, is at the head of the largest leather house in Boston.
Nehemiah C. Rice founded the firm of Tyler, Rice & Co. They did a great business fifty years ago importing Buenos Ayres hides. He died in Portland, July 22, 1880. His son, N. W. Rice, continues the business as head of the house of N. W. Rice & Co.
In 1832 J. W. Converse and Isaac Field formed a co-partnership under the style of Field & Converse. In 1837 Isaac Field went out, and John Field, who was clerk for them, succeeded, without change of style. This continued until 1848. Then Joseph B. Whall, who had been junior in the firm of Levi A. Dowley, was taken into the concern, which became Field, Converse & Co., and so continued until 1863. It was the largest commission leather house in Boston. From 1866 to 1870 the firm was Field, Converse & Allen. John Field had been special partner. Win. Henry Allen, who was a Boston boy, brought up in the house, was a partner. J. W. Converse retired in 1870. He
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SUFFOLK COUNTY
is still living (1892), and is eighty-four years old. Since 1873 the firm has been Allen, Field & Lawrence. For fifty-five years this house has grown and held a position in the very front ranks of the trade.
In Salem and Peabody for nearly sixty years tanning has been ex- tensively carried on. As bark became scarcer and dearer, the business fell off, and centered into fewer hands. In 1887 there were 17,350 hides a week tanned in the two towns. Now the quantity is much smaller. Before the war the shoe manufacturers had to journey to Salem or Peabody if they wanted leather; but this gradually changed, and the tanners established stores in Boston.
Of late years there has been a limited demand for heavy upper leather, such as the old tanners produced. Tanneries at which it was made are mostly closed, or are making lighter stock. Others at which kid and sheepskins are produced are gradually taking their places. Two of the oldest sheepskin tanneries in this country are located in Peabody. One of them was established by Thomas Carroll, in 1775; the other by William Sutton, in 1800. They are in the same place and carried on in the same name to this time.
In Peabody there are thirty-two sheepskin and kid factories. In Salem there are thirty-three firms who make insoles and heels, seven who make morocco, and twenty-three shoe manufacturers. The latter industry has grown up during a decade.
The abnormal rise in values during the last three months of 1879 applied with peculiar force to hides and leather. In December River Plata hides were sold at 253 cents and hemlock leather at 32 cents a pound. During this extraordinary inflation there were 189, 848 sides of leather imported from England. The duty paid was fifteen per cent. One lot arrived in Boston from Chili, the first ever brought from that country to ours. The bubble did not remain distended long; the leather that was sold readily at 32 cents in December was something of a drug at 24 cents the following July. It has been declining ever since; so have hides. The price of the latter in 1892 is 123 cents; of leather, 16 cents.
In Woburn considerable leather has been made for more than half a century. Abijah Thompson was one of the earliest tanners there, established in 1836. He worked over the beam in early life, but be- came a great merchant and manufacturer in after years. He was a bank president, and held other important offices. John Cummings, of Cummingsville, Horace Conn, Stephen Dow were notable tanners.
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE.
They made fortunes in the avocation. In 1882 there were thirty-three tanning and currying firms in the town. There were 221,000 hides finished and 20,000 cords of bark used. Grain, buff and calfskins were curried. The trade was subjected to strikes and labor troubles at intervals until 1888, when several of them transferred their business to Pennsylvania and other sections where bark was plentiful and labor free. It was a great loss to the town. In 1888 Woburn was made a city, and at the first election five leather dealers were elected members of the municipal government. The Russell Counter Company have a great factory in this town. Alexander Moseley, and Day, Wilcox & Co., of Boston, built tanneries at Winchester, adjoining Woburn, about thirty years ago.
The United States census contains this report of the leather industry of this State :
1870.
Number of establishments.
386
Wages paid
$3,152,399
Hands employed.
5,543
Materials used.
$26,106,013
Capital
$7,577,926
Total product
$33,457,975
1880.
LEATHER TANNED.
Number of tanners
133
Number of hides.
1,625,344
Capital.
$2,712,130
Number of skins
5,724,897
Hands employed
2,240
Value of all materials
$11,320,288
Total wages, one year
$1,093,973
Number of sides leather
3,250,688
Bark used, tons.
107,324
Value of product
$13,556,721
LEATHER CURRIED.
Number of shops
194
Gallons oil used
1,316,491
Capital
$4,308,169
Total value materials
$19,547,978
Hands employed
4,251
Total wages, one year
$1,939,122
Sides leather curried
4,951,562
Value of product
$23,282,775
Skins curried
5,178,609
This is about one-third of the value of all the leather curried in the United States. Forty per cent. of the product of the country was curried in New England.
The census of 1880 also furnishes the following statistics of industries in Boston connected with the trade :
Establishments. Hands.
Product.
Industry.
Belting and hose
3
28
$204,000
Shoe, cut stock
13
268
$352,200
Shoe findings
11
190
$389,883
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SUFFOLK COUNTY.
Establishments. Hands.
Product.
Shoes, custom work
83
1,350
$1,928,740
Lasts
3
14
$18,100
Leather curried
20
542
$2,520,792
Leather, dressed skins
20:
$579,350
Rubber goods
10
923
$2,095,460
Trunks and valises
20
164
$400,708
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The receipts of hides at Boston were 1,840, 193 in 1846, 2,463,787 in 1880, 1,945,513 in 1884, and 2,169,385 in 1891. These were foreign and domestic. The importations of hides are mostly into the ports of Boston and New York. Some of the largest importing houses are in Boston. They have branches in South American hide marts.
A little more than a quarter of a century ago Boston was chiefly a commission leather mart. A good deal of sole leather was bought in New York to be sold again, but the upper was chiefly consigned. This has all been changed. Southern and western rough and harness leather are sent here to be sold for owner's account, but producers of other kinds have stores here. The Milwaukee tanners were the first to come. There are six of them here. Their product is oil and glove grain and calfskins, and about half the leather produced in that city is sold here. Four Chicago tanners have branches here for the sale of calfskins and grains. Several New York sole leather houses, among them the largest in the country, have branch stores in Boston, and make the majority of their sales in this city. One controls eleven tanneries; two have ten each ; others four and five each. Boston firms also have a great deal of money invested in tanneries in Maine, New York, and Pennsylvania, where bark is most abundant.
The growth of the leather trade is shown by a comparison of re- ceipts in Boston at different periods :
In 1878 they were: 1,725,828 sides. 561,578 rolls. 165,040 bundles.
In 1884: 2,218,501 sides. 595,346 rolls. 230,876 bundles.
In 1880:
In 1890:
2,016,614 sides. 661,678 rolls. 276,664 bundles.
6,138,514 sides. 629,922 rolls. 384,544 bundles.
In 1891: 7,149,880 sides. 578,752 rolls. 285,414 bundles.
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Industry.
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE. 389
Receipts of hides were :
In 1876:
952,828 foreign. 914,365 domestic. Total, 1,867,183
In 1883: 1,092,342 foreign. 856,838 domestic.
In 1880:
1,168,701 foreign. 1.195,086 domestic.
Total, 1,949,170. In 1884: 1,003,603 foreign. 943,910 domestic.
Total, 2,363,787.
Total, 1,947,513.
In 1891: 1,187,558 foreign. 981,827 domestic. Total, 2,169,385.
No industry requires so much capital as that of leather production. Hides are sold for cash. At least six months must elapse before they are converted into leather. The leather is sold on credit, the term ranging from two to six months. Producers, therefore, must be out of the money they invest for a very long time.
The cutting of soles is an important adjunct of the leather trade. It was introduced in Lynn about 1853; Perry Newhall, David Estes, and Thomas A. Atwell, sole leather dealers, were the first in the business. They used oak sole leather, but it required considerable manipulation from the workmen to take the stretch out of it. The union leather- hemlock and oak tannage-has entirely supplanted oak stock. The shoemakers liked it, and when machinery was introduced it was found it worked smooth and hard under the machines. The first machine used for eutting soles was made by E. T. Ingalls, of Haverhill. An- other was patented in 1844, and later John Thompson put one on the market. None of them seemed to do the work. They were slow and clumsy. David Knox brought out one about 1858; improved in 1860, and it is practically the only one used now for cutting soles. David Knox & Sons, of Lynn, have the monopoly of making sole cutters now, owing to unexpired patents and because of their superior facilities for building them. The early machines were run by foot power.
In 1863 steam power was first adopted in connection with the Knox machine, which was then made heavier and stronger. In 1860 a Mr. Griffin brought out a machine and assigned his patent to J. D. Rich- ards & Sons, of Boston, who, in 1861, sued Knox for infringement, and
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SUFFOLK COUNTY.
this suit was remarkable from the fact that Mr. Knox contested his own case. Richards had three counsel. The verdict sustained the Knox patent and killed the Griffin. Few of the Griffin machines were ever in practical use. In the early days it was the custom of the shoe manu- facturers, in cutting up the leather they bought, to keep such grades of soles as they could use in their business, and dispose of the remainder to the dealers in roundings, who found a market for them with other manufacturers, and in this way gradually worked into the cut sole busi- ness on their own account, in time creating a separate branch of busi- ness, which has grown to large proportions. Very few manufacturers who use union leather now cut their own soles, for they cannot com- pete with regular dealers in disposing of the grades they have no use for. One side will cut up into from eighteen to twenty-eight different grades. Where formerly only eight widths were made, 350 different widths and sizes, in all kinds, from men's to infant's, are now cut. This shows how fine a selection it is possible for a manufacturer to se- cure.
Perry Newhall started in 1853 to make cut soles. He had been a shoe manufacturer in a small way. At that time two Lynn manufact- urers, Lucien Newhall and Stephen Oliver, jr., had commenced using union sole leather, which they purchased of Young & Schultz, of New York, the first firm to make and sell it. Perry Newhall used to buy it, a roll at a time, from these men, cut it up and peddle it out from a wheelbarrow. He finally got to be a large operator, purchasing the leather in New York and cutting it on the Knox machines. Theodore Atwell began in 1854. He made mostly children's soles, which were used in Marblehead, where at that time, only misses' and children's shoes were made. Mr. Atwell retired in 1877.
Edward Hulin, established in 1859, did a large cut sole business up to the time of his death, in 1864. He liked fast horses and high living. He was known as " Beatt Brummel of Lynn." Samuel Boyce, who was an old time shoe manufacturer, went into the cut sole business in 1860. Asa Mullin commenced at the same time, and retired rich in 1872.
Christopher Johnson is one of the oldest merchants in Lynn. He is eighty years old. He commenced cutting leather in 1835; retired from business in 1874. When he worked for Nathan Breed cutting sole leather, ten sides a day was a stint. Machinery was not thought of. He took his two sons, Christopher and T. C. Johnson, as partners at differ- ent times, also his brother, Peter. The latter went out, and Martin H.
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HIDE AND LEATHER TRADE.
Hood took his place. In 1868 the firm was Hood, Johnson & Co. Mr. Hood withdrew in 1886. O. H. Johnson was admitted by his father, and the present firm of T. C. Johnson & Son formed. Peter Johnson was in business alone from 1861 to 1866. Then the firm was changed by the admission of his son, H. F. Johnson, and in 1881 the father re- tired, and the two sons continue as H. F. & Herbert Johnson.
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