USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Professional and industrial history of Suffolk County, Massachusetts, Volume III > Part 39
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The first paper mill in Massachusetts was projected by men of Bos- ton in 1728. On the 13th of September of that year the General Court of Massachusetts granted, for the encouragement of a paper mill, to Daniel Henchman, Gillam Phillips, Benjamin Faneuil, Thomas Han- cock, and Henry Dering, a privilege in the nature of a patent for ten years. The mill was erected at Milton, seven miles south of Boston, on the Neponset River. The proprietors employed an Englishman, named Henry Woodman, as their foreman. They furnished the Legis- lature a sample of their manufacture in 1731, and the mill was prob- ably built early in the previous year. Henchman, who was the princi-
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pal projector, was the leading bookseller and publisher in Boston at that time, and was a man of considerable wealth. Another bookseller of Boston concerned in the enterprise was Richard Fly. The Milton mill, after having been conducted a few years by the original managers, suspended operations. It was afterwards sold to Jeremiah Smith, who wa's unable to obtain workmen to carry on the business. During 1260 it was operated for a short time by James Boies, of Boston. It then fell into the hands of Richard Clarke, an Englishman from New York, who was said to have had superior knowledge of the business, and successfully conducted it for some time. He was succeeded by his son, George Clarke, In 1496 the town of Milton had three paper mills, and there were six on the same river and twenty in the State.
The manufacture of paper hangings was not introduced into the colonies until about the middle of the last century, and was not a well established branch of home industry until after the War of the Revolu- tion. At that time there were several manufactories of the article in Boston. Three years after the war closed Boston produced annually twenty-four thousand pieces of paper hangings, not only sufficient to supply the State, but furnished considerable to other States.
The distilling of New England rum was at one time quite extensively carried on in Boston. In 1738 Burke makes the following reference to this business: " The quantity of spirits which they distil in Boston from the molasses they bring in from all parts of the West Indies is as sur- prising as the cheap rate at which they vend it, which is under two shillings a gallon ; with this they supply almost all the consumption of our colonies in North America, the Indian trade there, the vast amount of their own and Newfoundland fisheries, and, in great measure, those of the African trade, but they are more famous for the quantity and cheapness than for the excellency of their rum." On Price's Plan there are eight still-houses indicated, divided between the mill-pond and the wharves near the foot of Essex street. Drake, in his "Old Landmarks of Boston " says: "The oldest one is that now, and for some time in possession of the French family, which appears to have been improved for that purpose as early as 1?14 by Henry Hill, distil- ler, and by Thomas Hill after him. Besides this there were Avery's and Haskins'."
That the making of hats had early become quite an industry in Bos- ton is evidenced from the fact that a company of feltmakers, in Lon- don, petitioned Parliament in February, 1231, to prohibit the importa-
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tion of hats from the American colonies, representing that foreign mar- kets were almost altogether supplied from thence, and not a few sent to Great Britain. The petition was referred to a special committee, which reported that in New York and New England, beaver hats were manufactured to the number, it was estimated, of ten thousand yearly. In Boston there were sixteen hatters, one of whom was stated to have commonly furnished forty hats a week. The exports were to the southern plantations, the West Indies, and Ireland. In consequence of this evidence, and that furnished by the Board of Trade in the same session, an act was passed that " no hats or felt, dyed or undyed, fin- ished or unfinished, shall be put on board any vessel in any place with- in any of the British plantations; nor be laden upon any horse or other carriage to the intent to be imported from thence to any other planta- tions, or to any other place whatever, upon forfeiture thereof, and the offender shall likewise pay £500 for every such offense."
It was a Boston merchant, Colonel Josiah Quincy, who was the orig- inator of glass manufacture in this neighborhood. He joined with Joseph Palmer, an Englishman, and with the aid of some German glassblowers, started the manufacture of glass at the point in the har- bor to this day called Germantown, near the site of the Sailors' Snug Harbor, in Quincy. Shortly after one of the Boston Bowdoins was concerned in another glass house, as appears by his name to a petition in 1749 asking a legislative grant of wood land in aid of the enterprise.
In 1768 a type foundry was commenced in Boston by a Mr. Michel- son from Scotland, who produced type which were said to be equal to any imported from Great Britain. But he did not succeed in establish- ing a permanent business. This was twenty-eight years after the first foundry was established in Philadelphia, and only five after the first attempt was made in New York to manufacture movable type.
The brewing of beer was among the earliest products of industry during the Colonial period of our country. The business was com- menced here soon after the settlement of Boston. As early as 1637 it had become an established industry, as the General Court of that year ordered that "No person shall brewe any beare, or malt, or other drinke, or sell in gross or by retaile, but only such as shall be licensed by this Courte, on paine of £100; and whereas Capt. Sedgwick hath before this time set up a brewe house at his greate charge, and very comodious for this part of the countrey, hee is freely licensed to brewe beare to sell according to the size before licensed dureing the pleasure
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of the Courte." The "size" mentioned refers to the strength of the brew, which was not to be stronger than could be sold at eight shillings the barrel. This is the earliest mention of a brew-house in the colonies. Ten years later, however, a number of breweries had been established in Massachusetts. Hops were the principal ingredient used in the man- 11facture of beer during the earliest period of the colonies, several years elapsing before barley was raised in sufficient quantities for the home production of malt and beer. A considerable quantity of malt was therefore annually imported. This in Massachusetts was subject to a duty, which the principal importers and merchants of Boston in 1655 petitioned the Assembly to repeal, as "piuditiall to this Commonwealth and also a discorridgm't to Marchants." One of the petitions of the early Boston advocates of free trade, written by Thomas Broughton and signed by him and Robert Pateshall, represents that "the well known advantage accruing by freedome of ports and hindrance of trade proportionally according to largeness of customs imposed, that this seeming good may not bring upon this countrey a reall evell, and from customs upon one grow to customs on another, till step by step, under specious pretences, we are insensiblie brought under taxes for every- thing, as the woful experience of other nations well known unto 11s showeth;" therefore, "for the good of the present, and to prevent this evell in future ages, we are become your humble petitioners to remove the customs upon malt, that after ages may remind you as fathers of their freedome, and the present may bow before you for their experience of your care of theire welfare," etc.
At what date the manufacture of cloth for clothing was begun at Boston it is impossible to learn. Flax, hemp and cotton had been wrought into cloth as early as 1639 in Rowley, Mass., and in 1642 the author of "New England First Fruits," writing at Boston, September 26, 1642, speaks of their providential help, among other things, “in prospering hemp and flax so well that it is frequently sown, spun, and woven into linen cloth (and in short time may serve for cordage); so cotton wooll (which we may have at reasonable rates from the islands) and our linen yarne, we can make dimittees and fustians for our sum- mer clothing; and having a matter of 1,000 sheep, which prosper well to begin withal, in a competent time, we hope to have woollen cloth there made. And great and small cattel being now very frequently killed for food, their skins will afford us leather for boots and shoes and other uses; so that God is leading us by the hand into a way of
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clothing." In 1722 the General Court offered a premium for sail duck and linen made in Massachusetts of domestic material. Four years later John Powell, of Boston, presented a memorial to the same body, representing that he had found the flax and hemp of the country as well adapted to the manufacture of sail cloth as that of Great Britain or Ireland. He engaged, if suitably encouraged, to have twenty looms at work within fifteen or eighteen months, and to send home by the first ship for workmen and utensils, which would require an outlay of £500 for each loom, to produce fifty pieces of duck per annum from each. A committee was appointed to consider the proposition, and reported in June, recommending a bounty of twenty shillings to be paid out of the publie treasury for each piece of duck or canvas of "thirty-six yards long and thirty inches wide, a good even thread. well drawn, and of a good bright color, being wrought wholly of good strong water- rotted hemp or flax of the growth of New England, and that shall weigh between forty and fifty pounds each batt, and for fourteen years, as is usual in Great Britain and elsewhere, and the memorialist be allowed £3,000, he being given such security as your court may ap- point, £2,000 in hand, and the other one thousand when he has per- fected five hundred pieces of canvas, that shall pass the survey."
The manufacture of linen was largely accelerated in Boston at this time by the influx of a number of Scotch-Irish settlers, most of whom had engaged in the work in their old homes. Their superior knowledge of the art and the improved machinery which they came provided with, gave an impulse to the business, and the flax wheel became a familiar sight in nearly every household. The stimulus thus given to this industry led to a public effort in Boston to establish a linen manu- factory. A public meeting was called, at which Judge Sewell pre- sided, and a committee of seven was appointed to report on the propriety of establishing " a spinning school or schools for the instrie- tion of the children of the town." It resulted in the erection on the east side of Long Acre street, now Tremont street, near Hamilton Place, of a large, handsome brick building, called the " Manufactory House," having on its front wall the figure of a woman holding a dis- taff as emblematic of its future use. General enthusiasm prevailed at its opening. An immense concourse assembled, and the women of Boston, rich and poor, appeared on the Common with their spinning wheels, and vied with each other in the use of the instrument. Sub- scriptions were raised for the support of the project, and an Act of the
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Assembly was obtained in 1:37, laying a tax on carriages and other luxuries for the maintenance of the institution. At each recurring anniversary (it continued for three or four years) the trustees and company attended public worship, when a sermon was delivered suited to the occasion. The spirit under which it was undertaken, however. was too violent to secure permanent success, and the project was finally abandoned. The building, which stood until after the Revolution, was afterward used as a manufactory for worsted hose, metal buttons, etc. The Hon. Daniel Oliver, a merchant of Boston, also erected about the same time, at an expense of £600, a "Spinning School " for the em- ployment of the poor, which at his death he bequeathed for the educa- tion of the children of that class. In consequence of the interest which had for several years been taken in the subject in Boston, Daniel Henchman, already referred to in connection with the paper interest, about the year 1735, reprinted a work published in Dublin, entitled : " Instructions for the Cultivating and Raising of Flax and Hemp, in a better manner than generally practiced in Ireland, by Lionel Slator, Flax and Hemp Dresser." So general was the cultivation of these articles, that two years after they were ordered to be taken at the pub- lic treasury in payment of taxes. The tax on carriages was in 1:53 removed in Massachusetts for the support of spinning schools, and each town was allowed to send at least one person to be instructed in the art free of expense. In 1762 public notice was given that the spinning school in the Manufactory House of Boston was again opened, where any one who felt disposed might learn to spin gratis, and after the first three months be paid for their spinning. A premium of £18 was at the same time offered to the four best spinners.
About the year 1748 a society was formed in Boston for promoting industry and frugality, and was probably the forerunner of those associations which a few years later became the favorite mode through- out the country of sustaining resistance to the pressure of ministerial authority. To favor this design the Assembly purchased the Manu- factory House, and granted four townships of land for the use of foreign Protestants, and the use of the Provincial frigate for their transporta- tion. At the anniversary of the society in 1753, great enthusiasm was exhibited. About 300 young female spinners appeared on the Com- mon, seated at their wheels arranged in three rows. The weavers also assembled, neatly dressed in cloth of their own manufacture, and one working at a loom upon a platform was carried on the shoulders of
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men, accompanied by music. A large assemblage was addressed by Rev. Dr. Samuel Cooper.
At about this period the restrictions placed upon the growth of the industrial interest of the colonies by Great Britain had become espe- cially oppressive. The home government had from the beginning dis- countenanced every attempt to build up industries here that would either render the colonists independent of home manufactures or rivals in trade. The means by which this was sought to be done had, how- ever, an entirely different result. The repeal of the Stamp Act in 1766 was but a temporary lull in the system of unjust restrictions placed upon the colonies by Parliament. The year 1767 witnessed the imposition of a duty on sugar, glass, painters' colors and tea, providing for the quartering of soldiers in the colonies, and for the more effectual enforcement of the revenue system by the establishment of a custom house. This system of taxation was violently opposed by the colonists. Boston in town meeting commenced the system of retaliation and redress employed against the famous Stamp Act, by declaring that " the excessive use of foreign superfluities is the chief cause of the present distressed state of this town, as it is thereby drained of its money; which misfortune is likely to be increased by means of the late additional burdens and impositions on the trade of the province, which threaten the country with poverty and ruin." Resolutions were adopted to abstain from the use, after 1st of December, of such foreign articles as "loaf sugar, cordage, anchors, coaches, chaises and carriages of all sorts, house furniture, men's and women's hats, men's and women's apparel ready-made, household furniture, gloves, men's and women's shoes, sole leather, sheeting and deck nails, gold, silver and thread lace of all sorts, gold and silver buttons, wrought plate of all sorts, diamonds, stone and paste ware, snuff, mustard, clocks and watches, silversmiths' and jewelers' ware, broadcloths that cost above 10s. per yard, muffs, furs and tippets, and all sorts of millinery ware, starch, women's and children's stays, fire engines, china ware, silk and cotton velvets, gauze, pewterer's hollow ware, linseed oil, glue, lawns, cambrics, silks of all kinds for garments, malt liquors, and cheese." At the same time it was resolved "by all prudent ways and means to encourage the manufactures of British America, and more especially of this province." Retrenchment in the use of new or superfluous cloth- ing and mourning apparel was pledged. The Assembly addressed a petition to the king, and later addressed a letter to the assemblies of
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sister Provinces, stating what had been done and asking co-operation in their plan to obtain redress of grievances. Parliament in striving to replenish its treasury had done, without intending it, all that was necessary to facilitate the progress of our industries. The outspoken determination to use only home manufactured products was the only way to avoid the unjust burdens Great Britain was seeking to place upon her colonists in America. The effect of the new Parliamentary act, therefore, only tended to foster and encourage home industries.
After the passage of the act, an attempt was made to revive the linen factory in Boston, which had been discontinued. At the town meeting in Boston in March, 1167, a committee was appointed to frame a vote of thanks to John Dickinson, the author, of the " Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer," which so ably indicated the rights of American subjects. A large committee on manufactures was at the same time appointed to procure subscriptions to aid a manufactory of duck lately established in the town by John Bennett. They reported in May that only one-half the required sum (£300) had been subscribed, and were directed to renew their efforts. Many efforts were made by merchants and others to excite an interest in the subject of manufactures. In August following the arrival of the Royal Commissioner of Customs, and after the seizure of the sloop Liberty had taken place for violating the revenue laws, the Boston merchants again entered into an agree- ment not to import any British goods from January 1, 1469, to January 1, 170, except salt, coal, fish hooks and lines, hemp, duck, bar lead and shot, wool cards and card ware. A refractory merchant, not abid- ing by this agreement, was waited upon by a committee and informed .that 1,000 men were waiting for his answer. The newspapers soon published that he had voluntarily ceased importing. Goods were even reshipped from Boston. Committees of superintendence were employed who were vigilant in preventing any violation of the agreements.
The effect of the non-importation system is exhibited in the returns of the British Custom House, which gives the value of articles exported from England to New England as being only £223,696 for 1769, while for 1768 it amounted to £430,802. The consequent loss of trade in Great Britain caused widespread distress among the merchants there, and a general demand for the repeal of the imports was made. This was acceded to by Parliament by removing the duty upon all articles except tea. This concession, however, did not cause the people to abandon their policy of non-importation, because the right to tax them
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was still asserted, and the system was therefore continued in the hope of forcing an entire surrender of the right to tax them at all. This de- termination was strengthened in Boston by the conflicts which took place between the British soldiers and its citizens in 1720.
An increased attention to several branches of domestic industry was among the salutary results of the non-importation covenants. " To the good effects of these resolutions, " says Bishop in his "History of Ameri- can Manufactures," " was ascribed the encouraging facts that at the com- mencement exercises held in Cambridge, in the year 1770, the graduat- ing class appeared in black cloth entirely of New England manufact- ure." In March of the same year a memorial was presented to the General Court by William Molineaux and others, who, in consideration of the increasing number and expense of the poor, had caused a large number of spinning wheels to be made, and engaged rooms for em- ploying young females, from eight years old and upward, in earning their own support. In aid of these spinning schools, where children were instructed for two years free of cost, they had asked and received from the General Court a loan of £500, without interest. The peti- tioners state that at least 300 women and children had already been thoroughly instructed in the art of spinning, and to whom a large amount had been paid in wages. They had then on hand about forty thousand "scanes of fine yarn, fit to make any kind of women's wear."
The example of Mr. Molineaux produced great activity in spinning throughout the community, and Boston shared in the benefits it be- stowed. Its good effect extended to every branch of industry. The manufacture of cotton and wool cards was carried on extensively. The making of pot and pearl ashes was still an important industry, although it had begun to decline on account of the scarcity of wood. This in- dustry had been carried on in Boston at this time for at least a quarter of a century. William Frobisher, of Boston, had contributed to the reputation and manufacture of American potash, by investigating the principles of the process, and by demonstrating its superiority for soap making. Dr. Townsend had also published a pamphlet on the manu- facture and inspection of pot and pearl ashes. Rope making, which had formed an important part in the industrial pursuits of the town from the early days of the colony, had grown to considerable propor- tions. Part of Governor Hutchinson's estate on Pearl, formerly called Hutchinson street, having been confiscated and sold by the Common- wealth, was converted into rope walks. There were also extensive
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rope walks at the West End, others at the North End, and at the bot- tom of the Common. The bloody affray of 1770 has rendered John Gray's walk, on Atkinson street, historical. Brewing and the distilling of New England rum, which had grown to large proportions, gave em- ployment to many. The making of morocco leather, which had been begun in Charlestown, in 1770, by the afterward famous Lord Timothy Dexter, and others, was in a flourishing condition. The printing and making of books was now largely carried on, and perhaps no place in the colonies furnished employment to a larger number of persons in this branch of industry, with the possible exception of Philadelphia. At this time there were ninety-two booksellers in the town, and more than a third of them made the binding and making of books a part of their business. Ship building was the leading industry, and gave em- ployment to large numbers, while the making of hats, soap and candles, and the common trades furnished the remaining avenues of employ- ment.
The foregoing represents the main industrial enterprises of Boston at the beginning of the sanguinary struggle for independence. The energies of the people now became absorbed in sustaining the conflict, and commerce as well as the useful arts made but little progress. " The infant manufactures of the country," says Bishop, "did not escape the baleful influences which a state of warfare always exerts upon industry. Many young and feeble enterprises were entirely ruined. But the mechanical genius of the country did not slumber, and the exigency of the occasion created some new branches and stimulated others, while it developed unusual examples of ingenuity and enterprise in the arts, as it did remarkable talents in the field and in the council."
The condition of affairs which followed the war was alike unfavor- able to the trade and manufacture of the country. With a public debt of forty million dollars, exhausted in resources, and no public revenue system, private confidence fell in the wreck of the publie faith. A flood of European manufactures poured in to supply the exhausted ware- houses, and all possibility of success in manufactures was for a time excluded by the superabundance of foreign goods, some of which sold twenty-five per cent. cheaper than in London. During the Revo- lution much of the limited capital of the country had been employed in those branches of manufacture which were immediately subservient to the war. Not much beyond the household industry of the country had been preserved. A period of hard times was the natural result. An industrial problem of great magnitude for the weakened condition of
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the country confronted the people. Our political independence had been sanctioned by treaty, but we were still largely industrially depend- ent upon Great Britain. The mechanics of Boston were by no means silent under the distressing condition of affairs. The Boston Gasette, in 1788, voiced the feeling of the people in this matter in the follow- ing:
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