Civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the County of Kings and the City of Brooklyn, N. Y., Part 34

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909.
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York : Munsell
Number of Pages: 1360

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The Guta Percha and Rubber Manufacturing Compumy, of 55 Franklin avenne and 23 Park Place,

N. Y., is a very large manufactory and turns out immense quantities of rubber belting, paeking and hose, car springs, vulcanized rubber fabries, ete. It employs about 150 men, and its annual ont-put is about $300,000.

Bachrach Brothers, of Leonard and Devoe streets, E. D., are largely engaged in the manufacture of rubber elothing and gossamer goods, as are also the Johnson Rubber Works, of Flushing avenue, cor. Steuben, and, we believe, also, the A. H. Smith Manufacturing Company, of 74 and 76 Ninth street. Mr. Eugene Doherty, of 444 First street, E. D., makes hard-rubber goods of all deseriptions; and the other two are, we believe, in some branch of the rubber or gossamer goods, in a moderate way. The rubber toy ballons are, it is said, manufactured by some of these houses, and possibly other toys. No rubber shoes, boots, or arcties are made here, nor, so far as we ean ascertain, the rubber or gutta percha plates for dentists' use, nor the larger car springs.

The entire number of hands employed in the rubber manufacture at the present time is estimated at about 550; the amount of wages paid, about $260,000, and the total output, about $1,325,000.

FRANCIS H. HOLTON, President of the F. H. Holton Rubber Company, was born in Northfield, Mass., November 17th, 1831. His parents were Luther and Marcia (Mixer) Holton. The American branch of the family of Holton is descended from one of the name who emigrated from Ipswich, in Eng- land, in 1630, and located near Hartford, Conn., whence Francis H. Holton's ancestors removed to Northfield in 1735.

Mr. Holton's educational advantages were very limited, as may be judged from the fact that he began his business career at the age of thirteen, when he went to Boston and was employed in the shoe and rubber store of his uncle, Samuel Holton, in finishing for the market the crude rubber shoes imported for the American trade before they were superseded by those made under the Goodyear patents.

In 1856, Mr. Holton removed to New York and was em- ployed as a clerk by a Broadway firm dealing in rubber goods: but he soon resigned his position and engaged in the manufacture of druggists' and stationers' specialties in rub- ber, opening a factory on Broadway, near Thirty-seventh street.

In 1860. Mr. Holton removed his business to Brooklyn, where he had taken up his residence in 1856. In 1868, Mr. William Gray became his partner, and, in 1870, sold his interest in the enterprise to Mr. Charles B. Dickinson, who, in 1874, bought the entire business of Mr. Ilolton.

At this time Mr. Holton established a factory in New York, and in 1877 removed it to Brooklyn, locating at his present site at the foot of Adams street.

The business has grown, from one employing five or six hands in 1860, to such proportions that, in 1883, from eighty to one hundred hands find constant employment. The demand for the wares produced at this establishment is so great that it exceeds the capacity for production, principally owing to the fact that the large factory now in use is inadequate to the necessities of the business; and, with a view to fully meeting the requirements of the trade as to quantity, Mr. Holton contemplates a speedy removal to more commochious and advantageous quarters.

Toby Bouton

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THE MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

The enterprise of Mr. Holton is, in some sense, antecedent to any similar one in the city, and though the development of the rubber interest and improvements in rubber manu- facture have perhaps exceeded those of any others, Mr. Holton has not only kept abreast of the times, but has led some of his competitors in numerous valuable features of the industry.

In 1854, Mr. Holton married Hannah Maria Blake, of Boston, and has had four children, three of whom are dead, the oldest, Francis H. Holton, Jr., now assisting him in the conduct of this important business.

SECTION XXV.

Manufactured Tobacco, Cigars, Cigarettes and Snuff.

The manufacture of tobacco, for chewing, smoking and snuffs, not including cigars or cigarettes, is a large industry, although conducted in only ten establish- ments. These ten factories have a capital of $1,059,- 890; employ 941 hands (with an average force of 601); pay out $198,770 wages; use of the raw tobacco, $931,- 250; and produce annually $2,302,703. Some of the figures of the Census Office differ slightly from these, but the aggregates are the same. New York county, from 17 establishments, produces $4,320,972, not quite twice as much. The manufacture of cigars and cigar- ettes is not very large in Kings county, being carried on in the small way by numerous producers (341 es- tablishments, employing 923 hands and producing $977,480 dollars worth of these goods); but in New York, though many of the individual factorics arc small, the aggregate production is very great; 761 es- tablishments with a capital of $5,858,448, employing 16,988 hands and paying out $6,066,455 for wages, using $8,805,147 of raw materials and producing cigars and cigarettes to the value of $18,347,108. As these re- turns are those of the Internal Revenue offices, they are not probably overstated. The great difference in the production of the two counties is said to be duc to two causes, viz., that five or six of the largest establish- ments conduct their manufacture on an immense scale, many hundreds of operatives being employed on the production of a single brand of cigars or cigarettes, and the aggregates being sufficient to supply the jobbing and retail demand of a large part of the country, and a considerable export demand in addition; and in the second place, that the smaller manufacturers, in order to compete with the larger, farm out the manufacture to families and small companies of operatives, in Brook- lyn, East New York, Flatbush and elsewhere, they furnishing the tobacco, and the work being done often in hall bedrooms, or living rooms in tenement houses, hovels and shanties; and the finished but unstamped and unlabeled cigars, often fresh from rooms rceking with filth and disease, are delivered at the factory, where they will receive the name of some famous brand, and are put upon the market. The cigars, etc.,

made in this way, are produced at lower cost than those made in larger establishments, but command nearly the same prices. New York is credited with their produc- tion, while they are actually manufactured in Kings county. Since the reduction of the revenne tax, a large number of these operatives have emigrated from New York to Kings county, an undesirable addition to the population. The quantity of cigars and cigarettes produced in New York county is more than one-fourthi of the entire quantity produced in the whole country, while the manufacture of tobacco in other forms, in New York and Kings counties together is less than one-eighth of the whole amount in the country. The leading houses in the production of chewing and smok- ing tobacco and snuff, in Kings county, are : William Haslam & Son ; the Kehlbeck Manufacturing Co .; Buchanan and Lyall; Abram Aschner & Son; Lipman Arensbery; Sebastian H. Appel; Gabriel Schwager ; Charles Vogeler ; August Pupe, etc., etc. Morris Hirsch, though a large dealer in chewing and smoking tobacco and snuff, does not manufacture these articles very largely; confining his manufacturing mostly to cigars, in which he takes the lead in Kings county. Mr. Hirsch is a native of Austria, born in 1842, and is a practical cigar-maker, having served an apprentice- ship at the business in New York city, and subsequently conducted his cigar-making in West street, New York, till 1868, when he bought out the long-established cigar factory of J. J. Blair, at 53-55 Fulton street, which he still continues. He employs about 50 cigar-makers and contemplates enlarging his place, that he may extend his business. He manufactures over two millions of cigars, and purchases many thousands beside, for his three stores. His annual production exceeds $150,000, and his sales are much larger.

Among the other leading cigar-makers are: Harned Brothers, of 18 Broadway, E. D., whose factory is 25x75 feet and four stories high, and who employ 35 hands or more and produce cigars to the amount of about $120,000 ; Roque Fuente & Son, of 89 Fulton street, who are retailers of cigars and tobacco, but have a factory at the rear of their store, in which they em- ploy from ten to fifteen hands, and turn out from $35,- 000 to $40,000 per annum ; Andrew Boitel, of 474 Fifth avenue, also a retailer, but who has a cigar fac- tory in rear of his store, where he employs a number of hands in the manufacture of fine cigars; the Eckford Cigar Manufactory, 53 Greenpoint avenue, E. D .; Charles H. Eggert & Bro., of Kingston and Atlantic avenues; Morris M. Grodjinski, of 425 Fulton street; Edwin A. Hathaway, of 129 Grand street; John N. Grunewald, of Court street; Herman Seidenberg, 401 Fulton street, etc., etc.

The business directory reports 727 cigar dealers and manufacturers, and 123 tobacconists, or 850 in all ; not more than one-half of these are manufacturers, to any considerable extent; this would be an increase of 74

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HISTORY OF KINGS COUNTY.

establishments over 1880. The 425 employ not less than 2,800 hands, pay about $613,000 wages and turn ont over $4,300,000 of tobacco, cigars and snuff an- umnally; the amount having materially increased since the rednetion of the tax.

SECTION XXVI. Watches and Clocks.

SUBSECTION I .- Watch Cases.

This manufacture produces a large amount from a few establishments, but the cost of material is so great that the margin of profit is not large. The census of 1880 reported only 4 establishments in Brooklyn, with an investment of $156,585 as capital, employing 295 hands, paying 8249,816 wages, using $717,177 of mater- ial, and producing ammally $1,109,146 of watch cases, gold, silver and nickel.

We must confess, that we have very little confidence in these figures. In 1870 there were no watch case manufacturers reported in Kings county, though some of our manufacturers have been here more than twenty years. The Brooklyn Business Directory for 1883-4, gives the names of nine, some of whom have been in busi- ness here for eight or ten years or more to our personal knowledge. Three or four may possibly have started since 1880. The names of these manufacturers of watch cases are : The Brooklyn Watch Case Co .; James A. Carlier; Courvoisier, Wilcox & Co .; Jean- not &' Shiebler; Martin & Florimont; Jules Menegay; Charles Schwitter; Thode & Co., and Gustave Wille- min. In 1870 the census reported 33 establishments in New York city, producing $1,754,500 of watch cases. The eensus of 1880 reports none in that city, although the great house of Robbins & Appleton, the New York branch of the Waltham Watch Co., turn out about $2,000,000 worth of wateh eases annually from their factory in Bond street, and two or three other large manufacturers are known to us personally. The wonder is that several of the Brooklyn manufacturers, who have offices in New York, were not reckoned as New York manufacturers.

There are two or three difficulties in the way of the production of watch cases, which go far to make the business unprofitable. The largest producers of watches in this country, as far as their very extensive works will permit, prefer to case their own watch movements, because, especially with stem-winders, there is required so nice an adjustment of the watch to the case, that even a slight variation in the size, or in the fitting of the stem, might result speedily in a broken main-spring or a derangement of the action of the watch. One of the great companies (the Elgin), it is true, makes no cases; but it is by no means certain that the reputation of its watches has not been impaired thereby. The foreign watches, which are sent here as movements to

be cased, are of later years (especially the Swiss and French watches) of so variable sizes, that it is rarely the case that a case here, unless made expressly for it, fits ít exactly.

Then there is the large amount of capital required, and the fierce competition in all styles of eases, whiel has reduced the profit to a very narrow margin. The demand for these eases, especially for the silver and nickel, and to some extent for the gold, is very large and constantly increasing, but when the manufacturers and the importers of cheap movements are advertising them in nickel cases at $5 retail, and in silver (not very pure silver, we presume), at from $6 to $8, if the move- ments have any value in money, it may readily be im- agined that there is not a very large profit left for the watel case maker. The gold eases do not offer a mueh larger precentage of margin. Gold watches for men's use (ouly 8 or 10 karats fine, it is true), are offered as low as $20, with movements that will go for a time (if they are carried), and perhaps for even a smaller sum, at retail ; while ladies' gold watches at $15 to $20, are very abundant. The catering for these cheap and worth- less wares is demoralizing, and not all our mannfactur- ers will engage in it.

There are, of course, honest wateh movements, and honest gold and silver cases in which they are fitted, and our Brooklyn watch case manufacturers do their fair share in making them, but we fear it is true, as we were told by a watch manufacturer in New York, that there are fifty cheap watches and watch cases, to one good one.

The industry in Brooklyn, as nearly as ean be ascer- tained, employs about 450 workmen, pays about $355,- 000 wages, uses over $1,100,000 material, and produces about $1,560,000 of wateh cases. We doubt if the net profits of the manufacturers exceed six per cent.

SUBSECTION II .- The Making and Repairing of Watches and Jewelry.

Perhaps we should make this title, " The Repairing of Watches and Jewelry," dropping the idea of " mak- ing " either watches or jewelry entirely. There are certainly no manufactories of watches here, on any scale, large or small; and there are no large manufac- tories of jewelry. A single house in the Eastern Dis- trict, The Reydel and Schwcibold Manufacturing Co. have, within two years past, made an attempt on a small scale to manufacture some articles of jewelry, mainly, we believe, for their own retail sales. A few of the repairing shops may produce some articles of jewelry of special construction for customers, but this is hardly manufacturing. The census of 1880 gives us the following statisties on this subject: " Watch and elock repairing," 109 establishments; $82,668 eap- ital; 152 hands employed; $76,171 wages paid; $53,319 materials, and $221,723 annual product. This is simply absurd.

777

THE MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

The number of dealers in watches and jewelry, to which some of them add silverware and optical goods, is much larger than this-177, according to the busi- ness directory of 1883-84, or, making allowance for duplicated names, about 169. But not one of these can properly be called a manufacturer of either watches or jewelry. Many of these are large estab- lishments, and do a fine business; but they are mer- chants and dealers, not manufacturers. Not twenty of them are capable of taking a fine watch to pieces and repairing it successfully, and very many are incapable even of cleaning or repairing the finer descriptions of clocks. The repairing of jewelry is, in the best houses, attended to on the premises, but many of the shops send their repairing, if it is at all difficult, to repair shops on the back streets, or in private dwellings where a skillful though not prosperous workman attends to it. Watch cleaning and repairing (generally the insertion of a duplicated piece for a broken one, in the American watches), is also conducted in these out-of- the-way repair shops. The manufacture and sale of optical goods, especially of spectacles, eye glasses, and opera glasses, is also a part of the business of some of these dealers in watches and jewelry; bnt the manu- facture, except of the gold frames, is generally exe- cuted by the opticians, of whom there are ten or eleven in the county.

The whole estimated product of the manufacture and repair of watches, jewelry, and optical goods, so far as they can be recognized as manufacturing indus- tries, does not probably vary much from the census footings, which are certainly large enough; but the number who are entitled to the name of manufacturers, even in this small way, does not exceed thirty at the most.

SUBSECTION III .- Clocks.

In Mr. Frothingham's preliminary report of the census of Brooklyn manufactures, he specifies among the miscellaneous industries, two clock factories, but, in accordance with the rule of the censns office, gives no separate statement of their statistics. As he after- wards explained to the writer, one of these was a very small enterprise, which was soon abandoned; while the other was the large and extensive manufactory of the Ansonia Clock Co.

Since 1880, there has been no attempt to establish any other clock factory in Kings county, so that this remains the only manufactory of its class in the city or county.

The manufacture of clocks in the United States is an industry of considerable amount, but the number of manufactories is small. The census reports 22 establishments, having a capital of $2,474,900; employ- ing 3,940 hands, paying $1,622,693 wages; using $1,908,411 of material, and producing clocks annually of the value of $4,110,267. Of these, 15 were in Con-

necticut (but only five of these were of considerable size), the whole reporting $1,816,400 capital; employ- ing 2,576 hands; paying $1,206,073 wages; using $1,386,361 material, and producing annually clocks valued at $3,016,717. It is safe to say that more than nine-tenths of this product was from the five leading factories.

New York reported four establishments, with $625,000 capital; employing 1,292 hands; paying $382,620 wages; using $508,650 of material, and pro- ducing $1,037,350 in value, of clocks. We are unable to ascertain where the other three factories in the State of New York are or were; but as the published statement of the Ansonia Clock Co. at that time was that their capital was $1,000,000; the number of hands employed, 1,325; and the annual production npwards of one million dollars, there does not seem to have been much left for the other three companies.

Of the other three factories not in New York or Connecticut, one is or was in Newark, and one, or possibly two in Boston, but as the aggregate product of the three, according to the census, conld not have exceeded $56,200, they were too small to be of much consequence.

The Ansonia Clock Company was originally established at Ansonia, Conn., being one of several enterprises growing out of the Ansonia Brass and Copper Company, of Messrs. Phelps, Dodge & Co., and maintained by the capital of that great house. It was organized as a separate company in 1877, but the stockholders were partners or heads of departments in the Phelps, Dodge & Co. house. Soon after, however, there was consolidated with it the interest of Mr. Henry J. Davies, a successful manufacturer of clocks and specialties in New York city, and the new company went into operation in January, 1878, at Ansonia. Their business so greatly increased that at the end of the year it was deemed necessary to erect another and much larger factory, and it was decided to build this in Brooklyn, where the company had purchased a sitc, consisting of an entire block on Twelfth and Thirteenth streets and Seventh avenue. The immense factory erected here was finished and occupied in May, 1879, and its appointments were of the best in every respect. They were employing 1,175 hands here and 150 more at Ansonia, where the first stages of the manufacture were prepared, and were turning out about 3,000 clocks a day, when their factory in Brooklyn was burned to the ground, October 27, 1880. It was immediately rebuilt, with a greater amount of room, and all the latest improvements of machinery and appliances, and the entire force at Ansonia was transferred to Brook- lyn. The company claims that it is now the largest clock factory in the world. They turn out 3,000 clocks in a day, of all kinds, and are also engaged in the manufacture of bronze figures and in the production of those cut and engraved bronze and brass casings for

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HISTORY OF KINGS COUNTY.

their eloeks, heretofore produced only in Franee. In the quality of their clocks as time-keepers, justice compels us to say they have not yet quite attained to the excellence of some of the other eminent clock manufacturers. They may do so in time; there seems to be no good reason why they should not.

SECTION XXVII.

Leather :- Dressed Skins and Skivers; Belting, etc .; Saddlery and Harness; Trunks and Valises; Leather Goods; Leather Decora- tions.

Leather and its manufactures, other than those of boots and shoes, are not correctly represented in the census of 1880 on Brooklyn manufactures. The only entries there are: Leather-Dressed Skins: 20 establish- ments; $691,650 capital; 563 hands; $248,932 wages; $1,258,407 material ; 81,755,144 annual product. Saddlery and Harness: 88 establishments; $105,877 capital; 185 hands; $73,437 wages; $151,848 materials; $300,425 annual prodnet. Trunks and Valises: 7 establishments; $89,800 capital; 93 hands; $32,138 wages; 888,249 material: $146,344 annual produet.

Mr. Frothingham had another item, Leather Goods: 11 establishments; $138,075 capital; 120 hands; $34,782 wages; $244,800 material used, and $341,367 annual product. His other items agreed with those of the Census Office, and they, in their supreme wisdom, struck out Leather Goods entirely, as unworthy of notice. We should say that the item Leather-Dressed skins, had, in Mr. Frothingham's report, the title Leather-Morocco, but with the same figures as that of the census office, as were both the other items, Saddlery and Harness and Trunks und Valises. Wehave then, in the census report. the following aggregates of the leather manu- facture, aside from boots and shoes, in Brooklyn: 115 establishments; $887,327 capital; 841 hands; $354,507 wages; 81,498,504 material, and 82,201,913 of annual product. Adding Mr. Frothingham's item of Leather Goods, we have 126 establishments; $1,025,402 capital; 961 hands; $389,289 wages; $743,304 material, and $2,543,280 of ammal product.

We have said that these statisties of the census, even with Mr. Frothingham's added items, failed to give correctly the real facts in regard to this industry. The number of establishments may or may not be correct; we think that compared with the present it is too large; but the other items might safely be doubled without coming up to the present production and business of the various branches of this great industry. Then, also, it gives no adequate idea of the great variety and the distinet branches of the business. The term " dressed skins " does not apply to anything like all the leather manufactures of Brooklyn. There are a few tanners in the county, but they do but little, and that mostly in tanning and dressing sheep-skins. To them the "dressed

skins" deseription might apply. There is not, so far as we ean learn, any sole leather manufactured in the eounty, and very little heavy harness leather. Neither is there much moroeco, in the ordinary sense of the word. The largest manufacturers produce skivers, hatters' linings and leathers, book-binders' leather, sheep-roan, calf, Cape and Turkey moroeeo, kid, for shoe-makers' and glovers' nse, ealf, also for shoe-makers' use, and, to some extent, shoe uppers, and some goat and other skins for boots and shoes. Several of these establishments are very large, and their produets go all over the world. Their merits are such as to seeure for them a constant demand ; though most of the local dealers prefer to purchase these goods in the New York market, often buying what has been sent over there, from Kings county, rather than deal with the manufacturers directly. There are half a dozen of these large manufacturers, not one of whom would aeknowledge that his business was the manufacture of " dressed skins." But there are a number of others, to whom the epithet is still more inapplicable. There has sprung up in connection with the great expansion of the boot and shoe trade, though wholly distinet from it and carried on independently, a large business in the manufacture of shoe nypers and boot tops. These manufacturers neither tan nor dress leather. Some of them deal in leather, jobbing in a small way; but their principal business is the production of shoe uppers and boot tops. Others again manufacture the soles and insoles of boots and shoes; and some, though perhaps none in Kings county, from the seraps of leather and hemp and cement, produce a compound ealled leutheroid, which is largely used for insoles and for the outer soles of cheap shoes, and is eoming to be employed consider- ably by the book-binders.

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Civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the County of Kings and the City of Brooklyn, N. Y., Part 34

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909. Publication date: 1884 Publisher: New York : Munsell Number of Pages: 1360

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909.
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York : Munsell
Number of Pages: 1360