History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 65

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358

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lishments and 608 hands, and a eapital of $1,688,350. The wages paid amount to $250,532, and the value of material used is $2,196,480.

Fire-elay rivaling the best deposits of Europe is found within four miles of the St. Louis eourt-house. The bed is fifteen feet thiek, and very extensive. An analysis shows the following elements :

Silica .. 53.94

Alumina, with some peroxide of iron. 33.73

Lime .. 1.17

Magnesia a trace

Water. 10,94

Total 99.78

Fire-brick made of this elay is capable of resisting very high temperatures. The excellence of the ma- terial recommends it for retorts, alembics, crucibles, and furnaces. The kilns of this manufacture ought to be far more numerous.

Formerly fire-rock was brought from remote States for the bloomeries at Ironton. This fire-roek, im- ported at a very heavy expense, seldom lasted more than five months. But a few years ago a geologieal examination discovered a superior quality in the im- mediate vicinity of Ironton. This fire-roek is very refractory, and often resists the hcat of the furnaces for seventeen months.

Adepts consider the plastic clay which is found at Commeree fully equal to that of Devonshire. It is as fine and almost as white as flour. The best potter's clay and kaolin exist in quantities that preclude the idea of exhaustion. All that Missouri needs to be- come famous for its croekery and queensware is skill- ful labor from the potteries of Europe. The materials and capital for the manufacture of earthenware and poreelain are abundant ; art alone is requisite.

Near Ste. Genevieve there is a bank of saceha- roidal sand which is twenty feet in height and miles in extent. The mass is inexhaustible. Two analyses give the following result :

Silica. 98.81 99.02

Lime. 0.92 0.98

The sand is very friable and nearly as white as snow. It is not oxidized or diseolored by heat, and the glass made from it is elear and unstained. One firm in St. Louis has annually exported more than three thousand five hundred tons of this sand to the glass manufactories of Wheeling, Steubenville, and Pittsburgh.

A large portion of the siliea used in the glass-fac- tories of Pittsburgh is carried from Missouri. Instead of incurring the expense of two transportations and paying to distant establishments the eost of produc- tion, local factories ought to meet all the domestie wants and supply the markets of the West.

1 Edwards' Great West, p. 288.

Poly Sitere

LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

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In evidence that the industries built upon such natural products are not neglected or misunderstood in St. Louis, the tenth census returns among the city's manufactures :

Bricks .- Establishments, 45; capital, $727,250; hands, 1235 ; wages, $307,581 ; materials, $196,588; products, $700,942.

Glass .- Establishments, 5; capital, $280,000; hands, 615; wages, $261,098 ; materials, $238,996 ; products, $597,277.

Lime. - Establishments, 4; capital, $64,500; hands, 49; wages, $13,800 ; materials, $32,925 ; products, $63,200.

Marble- and Stone- Work .- Establishments, 56 ; capital, $237,825 ; hands, 725 ; wages, $237,207 ; materials, 245,707 ; products, $707,721.

Stone and Earthenware .- Establishments, 5 ; capi- tal, $34,500 ; hands, 58; wages, $16,090 ; materials, $19,985 ; products, $46,430.

GLASS-WORKS .- The mineral resources for manu- facturing possessed By St. Louis have long had their superiority recognized and admitted. They only waited for transportation and capital to develop them. The iron-beds of Pilot Knob and Iron Mountain, for instance, have been familiar to every school-boy who studied his geography for the past two genera- tions, and some of the other valuable products have been known in similar ways quite as long.

In 1854, Hon. John Hogan, in his excellent and suggestive "Thoughts about St. Louis," insisted that the city must become a centre for the manufacture of glass, for the reason that it possessed every product and material necessary to that manufacture in its cheapest and purest form. In his own words,-

"The purest and whitest sand, for the manufacture of flint glass, is found in inexhaustible quantities but a short distance from the city, on the Mississippi River, both above and below. Here is the best lead market, both for the mines of Illinois and Missouri, and by the extension of our railroads to the West and South this latter supply is to he immensely increased, while pot and pearl ash can be obtained either from the Ohio, the lakes, or the upper Mississippi, from the asheries of Iowa and Wis- consin. These are the principal elements of the manufacture of glass, but there is still one most important matter iu the ex- pense of the establishment, viz., the pots in which the metal is melted, and which, as they are subjected to a most intense and long-continued heat, require to be made of the very best, of a peculiar elay, which the best establishments have to obtain from Europe. But it would almost seem as if nature intended St. Louis for her great glass-work shop : not only is the sand here, and the lead and the ashes easily obtained, hut she has un- derlaid a section of St. Louis County with the very hest clay of which to make the pots, equal, I am assured, to the very best European elay, and generally superior to any heretofore found in the United States, for this purpose.

"Like many other valuable discoveries, this was accidentally made in digging a well on the farm of Charles Semple, Esq.,

on the Natural Bridge plank-road, some four miles from St. Louis. And while it is so accessible to our city, it is also inex- haustible. Messrs. Seully & Co. have already subjected it to the severest tests ; they have had pots made of it which have been in use constantly for the last six months, and they have proved themselves by the trial ; they are found to be as durable as those made of the hest imported elay. The single article of coal is the only thing in which the upper Ohio has any advan- tage of us, but this is being rapidly overcome; our railroads penetrating, as they all do, vast coal-beds will soon equalize this, and furnish ample supplies at fair rates for carrying on our numerous manufactories."

In fact, Mr. Hogan, in this last sentence, refers to one of the very few instances in which St. Louis did not know or failed to appreciate her own resources and their extent.

As early as 1846, James B. Eads, of bridge and jetty fame, Mr. Nelson, of the Union Iron-Works at Carondelet, and Col. Case, formerly of the Broadway line of omnibuses, associated themselves together for the purpose of establishing a glass manufactory in St. Louis. The enterprise at that time, as all other new enterprises always are, was looked upon with a good deal of doubt and misgiving as to its success, it being regarded more in the light of an experimental adven- ture than of a promising enterprise. In this instance the unfavorable anticipations were realized ; the ex- penses and outlays attending the enterprise were much greater than its projectors anticipated, and Messrs. Nelson and Case soon withdrew from the firm, leaving Mr. Eads to manage its affairs. With an energy and spirit undaunted by the discourage- ments that presented themselves, Mr. Eads prose- cuted the business until he involved himself in a heavy pecuniary responsibility, and was compelled to abandon the undertaking. Subsequently, however, by enterprise in other directions, he liquidated every dollar of the indebtedness he had incurred in at- tempting to establish and develop this branch of manufacturing in St. Louis. The enterprise was known as the flint-glass works. £ On the failure of Mr. Eads, the works passed into the hands of Messrs. Hale and Seil, who transformed them into green-glass works, and by that firm they were conducted for some years. After passing through different hands and different stages of litigation, it being supposed that Col. Case had some claim upon the works, an arrangement was made by which James Holmes and Dr. Taylor, in 1853 or 1854, succeeded to Case's in- terest, and re-started them as flint-glass works. This firm was attended by the same bad fortune as its predecessors, and finally sold them to Dr. George W. Scully. Dr. Scully was possessed of large means and good credit, and sunk in the enterprise about eighty- five thousand dollars cash, and made debts to the ex-

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tent of over one hundred thousand dollars. On his failure the enterprise was continued by his principal creditors, under the name of the St. Louis Glass Com- pany. Bonested & Co. ran the works as grcen-glass and flint-glass works up to 1860 and 1861, when they leased the establishment to Joseph Bagot and J. K. Cummings, who conducted it altogether as flint-glass works.

The ground on which the works were built had never been owned by any of the different firms, but was leased of the Chambers, Christy, and Wright es- tates, but in 1864, Messrs. Bagot and Cummings bought the ground and works at partition sale by the sheriff. The back rents and taxes on the works and ground not having been paid up for several years, the whole concern was involved in debt. They then bought all the movable property from the parties in- terested, and became sole owners in fee-simple of the entire establishment.

From this time better fortune attended the enter- prise, and Messrs. Bagot and Cummings continued together in the prosecution of the business until the death of Mr. Bagot in May, 1868. Mr. Cummings then gave bond in the Probate Court in the sum of forty thousand dollars, and as surviving partner of the firm of Bagot & Cummings has continued the busi- ness successfully on his individual responsibility up to the present time. This, in brief, is a history of the glass manufactory now conducted and known as the St. Louis Glass-Works, at the corner of Broadway and Monroe Streets, and to John K. Cummings is due the honor of having established the first successful glass manufactory in St. Louis.

Mr. Cummings was born in Coleraine, County Lon- donderry, Ireland, and was raised in Belfast. His mother died when he was thirteen, and his father a year later. The boy had received the rudiments of an education in the schools of the neighborhood, but when left an orphan was obliged to provide for him- self, and led a varying and rather precarious life. He was apprenticed to a tailor, but soon gave that up; worked in Edinburgh, Scotland, in a soda-water fac- tory ; acted as clerk in a grocery store ; and worked in a wall-paper factory and in a ginger-ale factory in Bel- fast, but remained in none of these occupations long, or with any particular encouragement. His career was that of thousands of homeless and friendless boys. There seems to have been nobody to recognize his capabilities, or to offer him the cheering hand and give him the helpful word.

In 1854 he emigrated to America, landing at New Orleans and passing up the river to St. Louis. He first obtained a situation in one of the packing-houses

of the Ameses, and remained there about a year. He then secured a situation in the factory of the St. Louis Glass-Works, and remained there many years, entering as an apprentice to the glass-cutting trade, which he soon left to learn the glass-mould making trade. His employer, however, thought it best to transfer him from the " bench" to positions of greater responsi- bility, showing the estimation in which he was held, and allowing him to obtain a thorough knowledge of the business, such as could hardly have been acquired in any other way.

When, on the breaking out of the war, President Lincoln made the first call for troops, Mr. Cummings enlisted as a private soldier. He had served in the "Sarsfield Guards," and had marched to the Kansas border on the Southwestern expedition under Gen. Frost, when he thought his State was threatened, but had soon resigned on realizing that it was the Union of the States which was threatened by the South. He joined the Fifth Regiment United States Reserve Corps as a private, but the colonel (Stifel) soon appointed him adjutant and instructor, or drill-master. This command participated in the early military operations along the Missouri River, joining Gen. Lyon imme- diately after the battle of Boonville, assisted in the construction of the works about Lexington, patroled the river, and had several engagements with the enemy. Subsequently Mr. Cummings was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the Twentieth Enrolled Missouri Militia by Governor Gamble.

Notwithstanding the history of glass-making in St. Louis had been that of an unbroken linc of disastrous failures, as has been shown, Mr. Cummings, ever since his first experience in the business, although merely a subordinate, entertained a firm belief that the in- dustry could be made to pay, and in 1861 formed a partnership with Joseph Bagot, leased the St. Louis Glass-Works from the receiver (afterwards buying them at sheriff's sale), and resumed business at the old place, where a few years previously the friendless boy had worked his way up from his position of an apprentice.

Mr. Bagot was a practical man from the East. He had managed the works some years before, and was experienced and careful. He took charge of the manufacturing department, and in addition to the cus- tomary duties of the position made the vats with his own hands. Mr. Cummings managed the books and financial part of the business, attended to buying and selling, and spent no inconsiderable part of his time going about town and drumming up trade. Such energy as he and Bagot exhibited could not fail of its reward ; and while they had great difficulties to sur-

Wester Engraving Company of St. Louis.

yours truly J.K. Cummings

LIBRARY Of THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS.

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mount, it soon became apparent that they had mastered the secret and were on the road to success. The busi- ness grew apace, and when Mr. Bagot died in 1868 the value of the establishment was rated at thirty-five thousand dollars, and it was one of the recognized institutions of the city. The joint capital of the two upon starting was less than two thousand dollars.

Mr. Cummings then became sole proprietor, and as such has since remained in charge of the works, which have grown from the scanty two thousand dol- lars' capital of 1861 to a capital of one hundred thou- sand dollars in 1882, with yearly sales of from seventy- five thousand dollars to one hundred and twenty thousand dollars, and employing one hundred and twenty hands, with a pay-roll of forty thousand dollars annually.

To John K. Cummings, therefore, unquestionably belongs the honor. of having demonstrated the fact that the manufacture of glass could be made profitable in St. Louis. It was he who showed that the raw material found near St. Louis in limitless quantities was second to none in the world, and put upon a sure footing an industry that perhaps above any other de- mands skillful and careful management.

Mr. Cummings is a man of liberal and unselfish views, and there has been no jealous hoarding of his secret. His experiences in his business have been at the disposal of any who chose to avail themselves of them, and he has cheerfully offered advice and given pecuniary assistance to others who have been desirous of starting new works. So, also, he has been a foremost advocate of every measure that has promised to benefit St. Louis, and has been a liberal supporter even when the financial results were not promising. Among the numerous enterprises which he has assisted are the Illinois and St. Louis Railroad and Coal Company, Cahokia Ferry Company, Grain Association, St. Louis French Window-Glass Com- pany, Merchants' Exchange, Butchers' and Drovers' Bank, etc. For many years he has been a leading member of the Citizens' Committee, whose efforts in behalf of municipal and legislative reform have re- sulted in so much permanent good to St. Louis.

Mr. Cummings' excellent business qualities, sound judgment, and exceptional skill have won the re- spect of all who have come in contact with him, but he also possesses engaging personal qualities that have obtained for him the affection of all who know him intimately. He is especially beloved by his em- ployés, and is an open-handed dispenscr of charity. In private life he is the quiet and unassuming gen- tleman.

About 1850, Messrs. Henry T. Blow, Barksdale,

and others commenced in St. Louis the manufacture of window-glass. Their works were erccted on the Barksdale grounds, due west of the arsenal, and ad- joining the Concordia Park, and in them was made the best window-glass ever manufactured in the United States. The works, however, were short-lived, and the public-spirited citizens who started them soon lost all their investments. Their failure was in part owing to the incompetency of the workmen they had of necessity to bring from the glass-works of Pitts- burgh, Pa., and other glass-manufacturing points. About the year 1854-55 these works were leased by James Wallace and associates and converted into flint-glass works. They afterwards formed a joint- stock company under the name of the Missouri Glass Company, the stock being mostly held by such pub- lic-spirited citizens as Jamcs H. Lucas, Col. John O'Fallon, Archibald Gamble, and Edward Bredell, who was all the time president of the company. Edward Dailey was secretary, and James W. Wal- lacc factory superintendent and manager. This company carried on an extensive but unprofitable business, and, about 1859-60, suspended operations entirely. The company, for a part of the time, manufactured green glassware as well as flint. After this suspension the works remained idle up to 1863, when they were leased by James W. Wallace & Brother. Shortly afterward a gentleman named Cate, with some capital, succeeded to the business, and associated with him a gentleman named La- salle, from some one of the numerous glass-works in the New England States, and the firm became Cate, Lasalle & Co. In a short time Mr. Cate sold his interest to a man named Barry, and the firm became Barry, Lasalle & Co., who continued the business until their mcans were exhausted and they were com- pelled to suspend operations. They were public- spirited, energetic men, but had to yield to the ap- parent fatality that attended all the glass-works at- tempted in the city, and in about 1865 or 1866 the works were sold to the St. Louis Plow Manufacturing Company, composed of Messrs. Barnum, Markham, and others, who dismantled the works, selling part of the material to Messrs. Bagot & Cummings, but the greater bulk to Messrs. Ford & Co., who were starting glass-works at New Albany, Ind., and to which place it was removed, occupying ncarly an entire steamboat with its bulk.

The Western Glass-Works were started as a green- glass bottle manufactory, on the corner of Einmet and Columbus Streets, in South St. Louis, and were commenced in 1855 or 1856, by Messrs. Lewis and Harcum, and other practical glass-blowers from

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Pittsburgh. After the establishment had been con- tinued a short time under the management of Harcum & Co., Felix Bobe and Emil Marks joined the firm, and subsequently Justus Snyder. These parties met with the same poor success that attended all their predecessors, and the works were sold to J. B. Good- hue, who carried them on with some degree of success until he took them down and removed them to the hill north of Yaeger's Garden. Shortly afterwards he failed, and lcased them to a party of glass-blowers from Pittsburgh, and the works soon after burned down. Mr. Goodhue for some time had a small con- cern on the ground, in which he tried to demonstrate the fcasibility of a new style of glass furnace, on which he had obtained letters patent. There was also another small establishment started by William Gillender, once a manager for Dr. G. W. Scully, of the St. Louis Works. This establishment was lo- cated in an old saw-mill at the foot of Jefferson Street, but meeting with poor success, it was disman- tled and torn down a short time after its erection. Still another establishment was commenced at the corner of Chambers and Main Streets, by Messrs. Pickup, Collins & Walter, practical glass-makers, in 1865 or 1866. A limited degree of success attended this firm for a few months, when they sold out to Messrs. Bagot & Cummings, who removed the works to the establishment conducted by them.

The Mississippi Glass Company, of which George D. Humphreys is the principal proprictor, has works on Angelica Street near Second. The chief products are green glassware, such as pickle-jars, fruit-jars, sauce-bottles, etc., the demand for which is very large in the city. The company have enlarged the works to enable them to meet the demands for the wares .which are produced. There are about one hundred and twenty persons employed in the cstablisliment. The sand used comes from Franklin, and the soda ash is imported from England. The lcad used is obtained in St. Louis. This company docs not at- tempt to make clear glassware. The demand for the products of the factory is very large. It was cs- tablished about 1872.

The Union Glass Manufactory, Nicholas Schaeffer president, located on the corner of Anna and De Kalb Streets, is a French establishment; that is to say, the superintendent, foreman, and workmen are all French, and the products of the factory are equal in every respect to the best French wares. The window glass manufactured at this establishment is cqual to that made anywhere. This company is doing a large business, receiving orders from distant places. The works have only becn in operation about ten ycars,

and have been successful from the beginning. Em- ployment is afforded for several hundred persons in consequence of the crection of thesc works, and some hundreds of thousands of dollars are annually added to the wealth of the city.

The most important enterprise of the kind in the West, perhaps in America, is the Crystal City Plate- Glass Works at Platin Rock, about thirty miles south of St. Louis. This is an enterprise of great magni- tude, requiring an outlay of several hundred thousand dollars to complete the works alone. They were finished in 1875, by their then principal owner, Eben Ward, of Detroit, Mich. Experiments made with the sand of Platin show that it has all the requisite qualities for a plate-glass element, and all the ma- terials necessary except soda are obtainable in St. Louis. The Crystal City Works have attracted the attention of glass-makers not only in this country but in Europe also.

FIRE-BRICK AND POTTERY .- Tradition places the discovery of fire-clay at a period far antedating the incorporation of St. Louis, and the existence of vast beds of fire-clay, underlying almost the entire city and surrounding country, has always been popularly believed. The first record we have of the manufac- ture of pottery in St. Louis is dated April 20, 1816. At this time George W. Ferguson gave notice through the columns of the Missouri Gazette " that he has commenced the manufacture of earthenware in St. Louis," and " pledges himself that it shall be as du- rable as any brought on here, and sold on more mod- erate terms." He also informed the public that he kept on hand " a large assortment of vessels of every description," which he sold " by wholesale or retail."

We have no means of ascertaining whether this new enterprise succeeded at this early period in St. Louis, but in the next year, on August 23d, " Chris- tian Smith, near Mr. Neal's tin and copper manufac- tory, on the street leading from Matthew Kerr's store to Shope's tavern, informed the citizens of St. Louis and surrounding counties that he had on hand, and would always " be supplied from his kiln, the best milk-pots, dishes, crocks," etc.

The successful manufacture of fire-brick and pot- tery in St. Louis is perhaps due to the French com- munity that, thirty-five years ago and morc, peopled Cheltenham, now a thriving suburban manufacturing settlement. The discovery and development of these fire-clay mines werc reserved, however, for the period immediately prior to the civil war.

After the cessation of strife the interest rapidly developed until now there are six very large estab- lishments in the suburbs, with extensive commercial

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connections, and the manufacturers and dealers number twelve, representing large capital and a considerable ex- port demand. Drain and other tiling, gas retorts, blast-furnace and cupola linings, fire-brick, Bessemer tuyères, and other articles form the chief manufac- turing product of these establishments, one of which also supplies the glass manufactories extensively with "washed clay," or purified clay. Indeed, St. Louis supplies America with this through a Pittsburgh house.

In the spring of 1873, however, the fact that a pe- culiar character of fire-clay could be so burned as to be utilized for street pavements was discovered by George Sattler, the owner of some mining property on the Columbia Bottom road, ten miles north of the bridge, but still within the city limits. For some years his assertion was ridiculed, but ultimately, encouraged by President Flad, of the Board of Public Improvements, Professors Smith and Potter, of Washington Univer- sity, William Glasgow, Jr., and other experts, some experiments were made under official authority, and pavements of this material were laid where street traffic was heaviest. This has resulted in the estab- lishment of a company by a hundred. leading capital- ists, and the whole extent of the mine-sixty-three acres of river bluffs-is to be utilized in the produc- tion of this new pavement material, which after long use shows wear scarcely more than granite, and is much cheaper. The development of this new in- dustry upon so extensive a scale will add largely to the fire-clay interest of St. Louis.

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History of Saint Louis City and County, from the earliest periods to the present day: including biographical sketches of representative men, Part 65

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898 Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts Number of Pages: 1358

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1358