USA > Massachusetts > The story of western Massachusetts, Volume IV > Part 43
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Frank Julian Sprague was born into the sufficiently quiet background of mid-nineteenth century New Eng- land. His was the ninth generation of the family on these shores, his ancestor, Ralph Sprague, having come to Salem in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1628 and was an original settler of Charlestown. His father was a hat manufacturer. When, in 1866, his mother died, a maiden aunt in North Adams took custody of both him and a younger brother for a ten year period, during which they attended the public schools. It was the principal of the Drury High School, North Adams, who urged Frank Julian Sprague to take the competitive examination for Annapolis, because of his unusual mathematical apti- tude. Thus winning an appointment to the United States Naval Academy, he entered in 1874, and was graduated with the class of 1878. Even in the days of his early naval assignments there was demonstrated the active mind which was even then feeling its way in the direction of original invention, particularly in connection with that new phenomenon, electricity. The world in which the young midshipman found himself was the world of Gray, and Edison, and Alexander Graham Bell. Yet these men's announcements of dis- covery were only beginning to be heard; for Edison's electric light followed by one year Midshipman Sprague's Annapolis graduation, and the telephone was a toy, treated as much with amusement as with amazement at the Philadelphia Expostion of 1876. This exposition the young man had visited, and it had proved a source of inspiration to him, as did later the Crystal Palace Exhibition of London. These gave Frank Sprague (still on naval duty) the exhilarating
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opportunity for contact with great minds in the field of science, and these contacts too sustained him in his pursuit of the vision which was clarifying itself in his mind. It was not surprising that, in London, carried away by his enthusiasm, he had overstayed his leave, and received orders to return to his ship immediately. The importance of what he was learning, however, is thus appraised by Dr. Dugald C. Jackson, of the Mas- sachusetts Institute of Technology, in a biographical appreciation appearing in "The Scientific Monthly":
There he made out an elaborate, well illustrated report which ul- timately was published as a United States Naval Professional Paper of 169 pages plus charts and diagrams. This received the com- mendation of the engineering world in England and America. It was during these tests that features of gas engine indicator dia- grams led to operating a sixteen horse power Otto engine on a forced test with the outside ignition cut off and with only com- pression firing ; that, as he has said, was 'a recorded experiment which may be considered the forerunner of the Diesel engine'.
The young man now terminated his active connec- tion with the navy, to return to America as expert assistant to Thomas Edison. It was prophetic that his return coincided with the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge: a triumphant day for the forces of mechanical advancement. Mr. Sprague now threw himself zeal- ously into the work with Edison, contributing vastly to the technical work on distribution systems. Con- stant-voltage distribution was a problem in the solu- tion of which he shared the glory with Edison, patenting his own arrangement in September, 1885, but assigning the patent voluntarily to the Edison Company as his employer.
Now that he was well launched on his career, now that these valuable contacts, in interplay with his own mind, had afforded a starter, Mr. Sprague's growth was a predictable force which the confines of no problem could contain, tackling one achievement fresh from the conclusion of another, finding the truth in Tennyson's lines:
Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough Gleams that untravelled world whose margin fades Forever and Forever when I move.
In 1884, with little capital but with every other contributing factor to success, Sprague left Edison and founded his own company, which he named the Sprague Electric Railway and Motor Company. It was from the developments of this company that the trolley car and accompanying developments of the rapid transit systems grew. Recognition of Mr. Sprague's inventions was accorded at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, which in the fall of 1884 organized an exhibition devoted to recent electrical developments. The significance of the self-regulating, constant-speed, direct-current motor was now appar- ent. His industrial undertaking was on a firm footing.
The fruits of his developments provided electric trolley cars for a number of cities, among the first being St. Joseph, Missouri, and Wilmington, Dela- ware, and the historic Richmond, Virginia installation, a recognized prototype. His ideas contributed much to the perfecting of the rapid transit system of New York City, initially a sprawling and uncoordinated effort.
In 1890 Mr. Sprague's company merged with the Edison General Electric Company, later itself to lose its identity in the creation of the General Electric Company. In 1892, however, showing his resource- fulness with a shift in emphasis from horizontal to
vertical transportation, he formed the Sprague Elec- tric Elevator Company. The multiple-unit type of control was one of the developments of Mr. Sprague's inventive mind at this time, and it was this system which had a profound effect on the growth of ele- vated and subway transportation in our cities. In more recent years its application has been extended to rail- road locomotives. Its importance in today's economic picture can readily be seen. Only a few of Mr. Sprague's inventions and improvements have been touched upon, and many are not of such a nature that their significance can readily be grasped by the non- scientist. However, mention of the relaying of ex- press and local elevators, of application of electric current to signs, and of alternating current to smelt- ing furnaces-many of these projected far ahead of the ultimate appearance-will give an idea of the scope of Frank J. Sprague's inventive genius. His mind was equally productive of ideas needed in winning World War I, when the submarine blockade was slow- ly strangling Britain. Mr. Sprague's achievements were recognized by his colleagues in engineering when, in 1911, the American Institute of Electrical Engi- neers awarded him the coveted Edison Medal. A meeting in the Engineering Societies Building in New York, on July 25, 1932, commemorated his seventy- fifth birthday. Honorary degrees of Doctor of Engi- neering, Doctor of Science, and Doctor of Laws were conferred upon him, respectively by Stevens Institute, Columbia University and the University of Pennsyl- vania; and he received such awards as the Gold Medal of the Paris Exhibition, the Elliott Cresson Medal of the Franklin Institute, the Grand Prize of the St. Louis Exhibition, the Franklin Medal and the John Fritz Medal. He was at one time president and was honorary member of the American Institute of Elec- trical Engineers, and he held the same office in the American Institute of Consulting Engineers. All these in. recognition of a true scientist, zealously devoting his energies to the improvement of man's environment.
Frank J. Sprague married twice; first, in New Or- leans in 1885, to Mary Keatinge, by whom he had one child, Frank Desmond. His second marriage took place in 1899, when he wedded Harriet Chapman Jones, of New Hartford, Connecticut. They became the par- ents of three children: Robert C., Julian K., and Francis A. Robert C. now heads the Sprague Elec- tric Company, which had changed its name from the Sprague Specialties Company in 1944, and which had been founded in 1926. The second son of this mar- riage, Julian K. Sprague, is its vice president.
When Frank Julian Sprague died of pneumonia, on October 25, 1934, he left behind him a world vastly different because of his own efforts. That these changes wrought by him were a source of joy is proven in a letter to a friend and noted colleague, which we quote:
What a lot we have seen, and what a joy it has been to have lived in, and helped make, this electric age. I do not believe that any future half century will see such a widespread development . . . I am glad that I have been present at the laying of the corner stone, and helped to carry up some of the bricks.
That this was modest self-appraisal is shown by contrasting editorial comment at the time of his death; "Not merely as father of the trolley, but of all transportation by electricity, his name is firm."
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ROBERT C. SPRAGUE-The president of the Sprague Electric Company, located in North Adams, is Robert C. Sprague. He is one of a family promi- nently connected with the electrical industry since its inception, and is the son of Frank Julian Sprague, electrical pioneer and inventor of the trolley car, a biographical sketch of whom precedes this record. Apart from his position as industrial executive, Rob- ert C. Sprague has made, in a number of other con- nections, an active and invaluable contribution to progress in his field of endeavor.
The ancestors of Robert C. Sprague were pioneers of North Adams, Joshua Sprague, his great-grand- father, having moved there in 1836. His grandfather's name was David Cummings Sprague, whose son, Frank Julian, is referred to above. The first son of Frank Julian Sprague by his marriage to Harriet Chapman Jones, of New Hartford, Connecticut, Rob- ert C. Sprague was born in New York City on Au- gust 3, 1900. He attended the Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, Connecticut, then, as his father had done, attended the United States Naval Academy, at An- napolis, where he graduated in 1920. Continuing his naval training, he graduated in 1922 from the Naval Postgraduate School, taking the degree of Bachelor of Science. He also did postgraduate work at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, with special emphasis on naval architecture, and took his Master of Science degree there in 1924. Mr. Sprague re- mained in the United States Navy until 1928, holding the commission of full lieutenant at the time of his resignation.
In 1926, however, commenced his connection with the Sprague Specialties Company, at the time of its founding; it became the Sprague Electric Company in 1944. It was the third firm which had been founded bearing the Sprague name, the two previous having merged with other organizations in the formation of some of the giant concerns of the electric industry.
The Sprague Specialties Company was first located at Quincy, growing from a small plant to one which employed five hundred workers, and engaged in the manufacture of electrical components. Its growth was steady, and in 1930, when a new location became necessary, the firm moved to North Adams and occu- pied its present Beaver Street Plant. It is interesting historically to note that it was in North Adams that Frank J. Sprague, Robert C. Sprague's father, lived for a part of his boyhood and received his early education.
The Sprague Electric Company, as it is at present known, is a leading manufacturer of electrical and elec- tronic component parts. Its output of electrical con- densers, more commonly called capacitors, is one of the greatest in volume in the country. The variety of components produced at Sprague Electric Company include resistors, pulse networks, noise suffusion filters, ceramic coated wire, and power-factor correction equipment. Its products are to be found as a vital working part in practically every type of electrical equipment we use. The manufacture of war material occupied the company almost exclusively during World War II; not only vast amounts of electronic components, but such varied items as gas masks and incendiary bombs sped from its production lines. Now, geared to supply the needs of peacetime consumers,
and assured of continued progress through research and engineering, it is a productive member of a peace- ful community. Its location, in the pleasant Berkshire country and in a town of homes, affords good living conditions for its employees.
Julian K. Sprague, a vice president of the firm and brother of Robert C. Sprague, is the subject of an ensuing sketch.
During World War II, Robert C. Sprague was one of three manufacturers who were members of Gover- nor Leverett Saltonstall's Post-war Reconversion Com- mittee from 1943 to 1946. Concurrently he was chair- man of the Office of Price Administration's advisory committee on the radio parts industry, and has been, since 1945, member of the executive committee of the Associate Industries of Massachusetts. He was for two years a vice president of the Radio Manufacturers' Association, and chairman of its parts division. He is also affiliated with two other national bodies, being a director of Radio Parts and Electronic Equipments Shows, Incorporated, and member of Radio Parts Co- ordinating Committee.
Mr. Sprague is chairman of the board of trustees of Pine Cobble School at Williamstown, and is on the executive committee of the North Adams Hospital. He worships at St. John's Episcopal Church in Wil- liamstown, and performs the duties of senior warden there.
At New Rochelle, New York, on May 24, 1921, Robert C. Sprague married Florence Antoinette Van Zelm, the daughter of J. Louis and Antoinette (Hyatt) Van Zelm. They are the parents of two children: I. Robert C., Jr., born in Brookline on December 30, 1922; after graduation from Middlesex School, at Con- cord, he attended Williams College. He enlisted in the United States Army Air Corps in 1942, and was called into active service in 1944, serving as flight instructor and holding the rank of sergeant. Since leaving army service he has been with Sprague Elec- tric Company. Robert C. Sprague, Jr., married Doro- thy G. Wilson, of Williamstown on February 13, 1943; her parents are Mr. and Mrs. Charles Wilson of Wil- liamstown; Mr. and Mrs. Sprague, Jr. are the parents of two children: Diana Bartlett, born November 30, 1943, and Robert Chapman, III, born August 28, 1945. 2. John Louis Van Zelm, born April 5, 1930 in Boston. After graduation from Middlesex School, Concord, Massachusetts in 1948, he entered Princeton Univer- sity, class of 1952.
JULIAN K. SPRAGUE-Born in New York City, June 14, 1903, Julian Sprague was the younger son of the late Frank J. and Harriet C. Sprague. He was educated at Hotchkiss, and at Yale University.
Joining Harris-Forbes and Company, he was en- gaged in the bond and securities business from 1922 to 1924, and for the next two years was in real estate business in Florida. In 1926 he joined his brother Robert in the newly organized Sprague Electric Com- pany now located in North Adams, of which he is vice president and director.
During World War II, Mr. Sprague carried heavy governmental responsibilities, being a consultant in the Radio-Radar Division of the War Production Board.
Club memberships include the Yale Club, the Cana- dian Club and the Grolier Club, all of New York City.
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Julian K. Sprague married in New York City, on December 18, 1929, Helene Coughlin, native of Saco, Maine. They are the parents of two children: Anne Helene, born in Toronto, Ontario, December 22, 1935 and Peter Julian, who was born April 29, 1939 in De- troit, Michigan. Both children now attend the Pine Cobble School of Williamstown. Mr. Sprague also has an older son, Frank Julian, by his first marriage. Frank was born June 12, 1926, in New York City, attended Woodbury Forest Academy in Virginia, served with the United States Navy in the Pacific Theater of Operations from 1943 to 1946, and is now a newscaster with a broadcasting station in Daytona Beach, Florida.
CHARLES E. DURYEA, inventor and manufac- turer, was born on his maternal grandfather's farm near Canton, Illinois, on December 15, 1861, and died September 28, 1938, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. His early years were spent on a farm, and up to the time he was seventeen, he had never been out of the state, nor in fact more than seventy-five miles away. His parents were strong believers in education and kept him in school. Before he was eighteen, he had taught school for a year, after graduating from the high school in Wyoming, Illinois. Reading about a bicycle in the "Youth's Companion," he built one, using a forty-two inch wheel from a corn cultivator, the small rear wheel came from a boy's express wagon, and the frame was a curved sapling. He rode this for sometime before his father bought him an iron-tired fifty-two inch bicycle that cost thirty-three dollars. He took this machine with him to Gittings Seminary in La Harpe, where it introduced him and gave him the name of "Bicycle." He took two three-year courses in two years, and his graduating thesis was on "Rapid Transit." This thesis published in "La Harper" was the first of hundreds of his articles to appear in publi- cations over the years. It contained a prophecy only recently fulfilled, when it foretold-"The humming of flying machines will be music over all lands, and flights to Europe will be of half day's duration."
One summer, Duryea served as a carpenter's appren- tice building frame houses. His father left the farm and bought an interest in a store. Young Duryea worked as a clerk and janitor in this store. Later he worked with millwrights from St. Louis, who were refitting a Canton mill. He returned with them to St. Louis, taking a bicycle along with him that he used in races there, while working in a bicycle repair shop. His father died when Duryea was twenty-two, so he went back to the farm at his mother's request and organized it as a home again for his mother, two sisters and two brothers. In 1884 he married Rachel Steer, the daughter of a neighbor, and they started a home on a nearby farm. His interest in the bicycle led him again to St. Louis and to his invention of "the first hammock saddle for bicycles patented in the United States," and for nearly ten years few sad- dles were made that did not resemble the Duryea and secure the same result. His bicycle patents in- cluded a safety cycle that could be used with skirts. This is generally accepted as the first step toward cycles for women. He lived in Peoria, Illinois, before moving to Washington, D. C., where he was in charge of the bicycle repair and construction shop of
Herbert S. Owen. He studied patents and patent law at night. It was about this time that he began to work on cycle tires, to improve comfort for the rider. This led to his invention of the Duryea spring-frame Sylph bicycle that he, in partnership with Harry G. Rouse, built in Rockaway, New Jersey, and later in Chicopee, Massachusetts. Duryea was vice president and superintendent of the Rouse-Duryea Cycle Com- pany of Peoria, and besides the designing and building he also had charge of the sale of his cycles.
By this time the air tire was becoming accepted, and Duryea secured the first United States patent on a gummy liquid to be used inside air tires to stop punctures. This "Neverleak" tire fluid is still sold, although the patent expired years ago. One of his bicycle patents shows a sketch of a rim and cushion tire, forerunner of the clincher rim, and the tire wider than its base. The G. & J. Company later supplied the air tube to complete Duryea's idea. He designed a Resilometer for testing the resiliency of tires, and made improvements in tire and tire valve construction.
Duryea began the study of the motor carriage prob- lem in 1884. He served as consultant in the construc- tion of the steam buggy in 1888, and was a licensed steam engineer. While showing one of his inventions at the State Fair in Columbus, Ohio, he had a chance to study H. K. Schank's electrically ignited gasoline engine, that used a wash-boiler filled with excelsior and gasoline for a carburetor. Also on exhibition was a toy steam engine with two cylinders and one hundred eighty degree cranks. Duryea conceived his job as that of reducing the gas engine to the steamer size or nearly to it.
In 1891, while living in Chicopee, he decided that the public was ready for a horseless carriage, and started constructing his first automobile. This car, America's first gasoline automobile, was completed in the John W. Russell & Sons shop on Taylor Street in Springfield, and it was running in 1892. Although there were a few steam and electric vehicles in the United States, and the gasoline engine had been de- veloped, Charles E. Duryea was the first in America to build a light gasoline engine, and install it in a buggy, that would run. His car with later changes is now in the National Museum in Washington, D. C.
Duryea had eighteen patents before he applied for his first auto patent, and years of wonderful experi- ence. He had four policies-1. Use nothing unproved. 2. Make it light. Too light can be made stronger. Too heavy never is known. 3. Do it right. Cost soon is forgotten, the job never. 4. No towing. The cars must come back by own power.
His partner in Springfield was Erwin F. Markham, and their contract dates March 28, 1892, gave Mark- ham a tenth interest for supplying capital. This con- tract can be considered the birth certificate of the American automobile industry. Later, in March, 1894, Duryea and Markham made a contract with Henry W. Clapp, who was to raise the money to start a company to build cars invented by Duryea. Clapp failed to get a company started, after several extensions of time, so Duryea in co-operation with the Springfield Board of Trade raised $23,000 and in September, 1895, incor- porated the first American auto manufacturing com- pany. Duryea was the largest stockholder in the Duryea Motor Wagon Company of Springfield that
Chas ESDuryea
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had acquired his patent No. 540-648, issued to him June II, 1895, the two-cylinder car shown in the pat- ent, and the 1892 vehicle. The two-cylinder Duryea was the first automobile in the world to be equipped with air tires; these were made by the Hartford Rub- ber Works, later a division of the U. S. Rubber Com- pany. Using these tires, this car won the first Ameri- can automobile race, the Chicago Times-Herald Race, November 28, 1895, and was one of the two cars to finish. The first catalog distributed at the race, shows Duryea seated in his car. Duryea cars won the Cos- mopolitan Race, May 30, 1896, in New York, and were the only gasoline cars competing in the world's first auto track races held in Providence, Rhode Island, in September, 1896. The thirteen Duryea cars built in 1895-6 constituted the first auto production run in America, and these cars delivered in 1896 were the first American cars sold. Duryea cars also won the London-Brighton Emancipation Day Run, November 14, 1896, beating Europe's best on their own soil. Barnum & Bailey's Circus featured the Duryea in billboard, parade and ring.
Duryea's brother Frank was associated with him during 1892-8, with no financial interest until 1895, and he assisted in designing and perfecting the cars. Eight years younger, Duryea had taken his brother off the farm into his own home, after he graduated from high school, and had gotten him jobs in Wash- ington, and in the Rockaway and Chicopee shops that were building Duryea bicycles. Frank was mechani- cal superintendent of the Duryea Motor Wagon Com- pany, and Duryea had given him one third of his stock.
Treasurer Davis Allen Reed acquired all the stock and the company became inactive in 1898. Frank Dur- yea built four experimental cars from 1898 to the fall of 1901, when the J. Stevens Arms & Tool Company bought the rights from Reed and made a contract with Frank Duryea, William M. Remington and John S. Jones, who had remained in Springfield. The Stevens- Duryea was built in Chicopee Falls, and was very successful. Production ceased in 1914, and soon after Frank retired. Duryea also gave his brother Otho (nineteen years younger) a job and in 1899 sent him to Los Angeles with the first Duryea sold on the Pacific Coast. In the fall of 1896, Charles E. Duryea had closed out his bicycle business to devote his entire time to the auto business that badly needed capital. He sold the commercial rights to the Canda Manufac- turing Company of Carteret, New Jersey, for the Duryea Motor Wagon Company, for $25,000 plus a royalty. This agreement called for his going to Car- teret for a year. The Springfield company was more interested in selling licenses than in building cars to sell for a profit, so Duryea sold his stock in 1898, and started to build his newly-designed three-cylinder car with planetary transmission in Peoria, Illinois. This car was later made in Reading, Pennsylvania, and also in Coventry, England. It was the first American car made in England, and a few two-cylinder Duryea cars had been built in Liege, Belgium, previously.
Duryea cars were great performers, built light with lots of power. A three-cylinder Duryea won first prize at the first regularly organized American hill climb, Eagle Rock, New Jersey, November 5, 1901. A Dur- yea accompanied the New York-Boston Efficiency
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