History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Part 139

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1534

USA > Pennsylvania > Montgomery County > History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania > Part 139

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

"George Bullock believes in having everything done in the best way ; hence he has the best of workmen, pays well and turns out the best quality of goods. As the president of a bank, he has a thorough knowledge of commercial paper and acts from a fixed principle, not asking how much a man may be worth nor how large his bank account may be, but what kind of man is he that made the note, and how does he do business, believing that certain principles of business mean success, while the reverse insures, some time in the near future, failure.

" In the successful management of his large mills he acts with decision and promptness, and at times seemingly with prospective loss, but the end is found to justify the means. As an illustration, if times are dull and goods have accumulated largely on his hands, he takes steps to dispose of them. First, his goods are exactly as represented, always up to the standard. The severest test of the market may be applied, tbe closest scrutiny of warp and woof may be made. The material, the work and the finish are all of the highest grade for that class of goods. The large stock will be placed in the market, cash realized, the wareroom cleared and his hands kept at work. If goods are low, so must the raw material be ; hence the firm and the mills are ready for new goods, new patterns and the raw material low, ready for advanced prices when the rise takes place. We at times attribute success to luck, but Mr. Bullock takes small stock in 'luck.' During the seven years of the panic, from 1873 to 1880, he kept bis mills running and his hands to- gether. He uses good material, the newest and most approved machinery, employs skilled workmen and workwomen and keeps everything in excellent order and under the most careful management. His hands are well paid, and hence feel an interest in the success

of the employers. His well-known kind and liberal disposition to all with whom he comes in contact, his especial interest in those who are in need and the great love he has for children, ail combine to make the 'Conshohocken Worsted-Mills' a name and at success in all that is valuable in that word, both in profits and reputation. Mr. Bullock maintains largely the church on his grounds, while hundreds of dollars a year are spent upon the Sabbath-school connected with this Baptist congregation. In his works of kind- ness and benevolence he has the aid and assistance of his excellent lady, the acts of Christian kindness of Mrs. Bullock, like the falling rain, blessing many around her in very many ways."

JAMES MOIR .- Mr. Moir, who is of Scotch descent and the son of Adam and Dorothy Moir, was born on the 18th of July, 1820, in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, where he remained until twenty-one years of age. He enjoyed at home opportunities for an excellent rudi- mentary education, and on its completion entered the mills of Hadden & Co., of Aberdeen, with a view to acquiring a thorough knowledge of manufac- turing. His term of service was completed with Messrs. Popplewell & Co., in the same city, after which, in 1841, he sailed for America, and located in Water- town, Jetlerson Co., N. Y., remaining two years at that point. His next location was in Cazenovia, Madison Co., N. Y., where he became superintendent of a mill, filling the position until his later removal to Eaton, in the same county.

Mr. Moir next found employment in Jones & Kershaw's mills, located in West Philadelphia, and in 1859 responded to a demand for his services as super- intendent for Thomas Kershaw, at West Consho- hocken. The mill owned by the latter gentleman eventually passed into the hands of Benjamin Bullock & Sons, and in 1871 the firm of George Bullock & Co. was formed, with Mr. Moir as an active partner, who went to England in 1881 for the purpose of prop- erly equipping the mill with what is known as the French worsted machinery. In 1881 the building known as Mill No. 1 was erected. It is exclusively devoted to the production of worsted yarn and worsted fabrics, the various mills being managed under the corporate title of the " Conshohocken Worsted-Mills," with James Moir as general superintendent. The subject of this sketch was, in 1852, married to Maria Theresa, daughter of Peleg H. Kent, of Clark's Mills, Oneida Co., N. Y., whose children are Emma (Mrs. G. R. Kite), Roscoe K. and Rosa B. Mr. Moir is a Republican in his political affiliations, but not actively interested in the public measures of the day. His sympathy with the cause of education has, how- ever, influenced him to accept the presidency of the board of school directors of West Conshohocken. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, in which he has attained high rank.

WILLIAM DAVIS, JR., & CO.'S LUMBER-YARD .- This establishment is located on the corner of Front

Ташчев ПОСіб

603

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

and Ford Streets, in West Conshohocken, and does Iron Company, whose works have added so much to the industrial wealth of the place, was organized in 1866. The erection of the plate-mill was commenced a thriving business, employing quite a number of hands. The firm have usually stocked in their large buildings over two million feet of lumber. The ! in 1863 by the late William Mintzer and J. E. business was established in 1865, and has increased to abont one hundred thousand dollars per annum.

HALL'S CARPET-FACTORY .- In a nook on the River road, through which trickles a small stream, almost unknown and unnoticed, bearing the Indian name of Arenike Creek, stands the small carpet- | Philadelphia parties in the manufacture of iron here, factory of Mr. James Hall. The building is of frame. and unpretending in its appearance and dimensions, yet here Mr. James Hall, a skilled weaver from the north of England, has for three years conducted a successful business in the manufacture of ingrain and other carpets. He employs forty-five hands, and runs thirty-nine looms. The looms are operated in the old primitive fashion of throwing the shuttles from hand to hand. Five thousand yards a week are pro- duced, and he pays two hundred dollars a week in wages.

POTTSTOWN.

THE GLASGOW IRON COMPANY. - These works , thousand kegs of nails and twelve thousand five hun- were established in 1876 in Pottsgrove township. One hundred and thirty hands are employed, with a pay-roll of five thousand dollars a month. Their specialty is plate-iron for boilers, tanks, etc., and muek-bar. The capacity is six hundred and fifty tons a month. The motive-power is derived from one one hundred and seventy-five horse-power engine and an eighty horse-power water-wheel, taking water from the Manatawny. Joseph L. Bailey is the president ; treasurer, Comly Shoemaker; secretary, S. W., Nicholls ; general manager, Edward Bailey.

ELLIS KEYSTONE AGRICULTURAL WORKS .- These works are located in Pottsgrove township, fronting on WARWICK IRON COMPANY .- The furnace of the Warwick Iron Company at Pottstown, another of the important works located at this place, was com- menced in 1875, completed in 1876 and blown in on the 20th of April of that year. The capital of the company is two hundred and twenty thousand dol- lars. The company owns valuable ore mines at Siesholtzville and Boyerstown, Berks Co., and at other places. Magnetic ore is supplied from the above- named mines and hematite from Flourtown. There is but one stack, fifty-five by sixteen feet. There are I the Boyerstown mines. Their specialty is pig-iron, of I which twenty-one thousand tons are produced an- nually. The president is Isaac Fegely; treasurer, Jacob Fegely; V. J. McCully, secretary; Edgar S. Cook, manager. a public road leading from Madison Bridge road to Klein road, with a frontage of three hundred feet and a depth of two hundred and fifty feet. The works were established in 1876, with a capital of twenty thousand dollars, raised to forty-two thousand dollars in 1881. Up to this date (1884) the specialty was the Ellis threshing-machine, of which they manufactured about two hundred per annum. They are now preparing to make fodder-cutters (Queed's patent). The main building is forty feet square, four stories in height. There is a brick building one hun- seventy hands employed at the works and seventy in dred and ten by twenty-six feet, three stories in height. and a frame building one hundred by thirty feet for storing finished work. The lumber-shed is twenty by sixty feet, and the engine-house twenty-eight by twelve feet. In 1883 the value of the finished work produced was thirty-five thousand dollars, wholesale prices. The machines made here are chiefly for the home trade, but they also ship to Canada and parts of Europe. Twenty-five hands are employed, with a pay-roll of twelve hundred dollars a month.

POTTSTOWN IRON COMPANY. - The Pottstown

Wootten, Esq., now general superintendent of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad. Afterwards Mr. Wootten sold out to Edward Bailey and Joseph Potts, Jr., and the mill was operated for some time by Edward Bailey & Co. Mr. Bailey interested several

among them the old and well-known house of Morris, Wheeler & Co., and the Pottstown Iron Company was organized and incorporated by act of the Legislature dated March 27, 1866, and was granted an increase of capital to the sum of five hundred thousand dollars by an act passed in 1867. A nail-works was built and put in operation in October, 1866. The large Anvil Furnace of the company was completed and blown in in 1867, and extensive mines and ore rights were purchased. When busy, twelve hundred hands are employed here, and the amount of finished work is three hundred and fifty dred tons of plate and other iron per annum. The buildings, yards, and store-houses cover an area of twenty-two acres. For several years Edward Bailey was treasurer and general manager of the Pottstown Iron Company, and to him Pottstown is under great obligations for the location of these works here and i for their successful management for some time. The improvements made by the Pottstown Iron Company. and the investment of so large an amount of capital here, increased the value of property, in the town, built up other interests and has been of incalculable 1 advantage to the place.

ISAAC FEGELY .- Conrad Fegely, who was of Ger- man descent, resided in Douglas township, Mont- gomery Co., where he combined the trade of a black- smith with the occupations of a farmer. He was united in marriage to a Miss Fox, and had sons- Jacob and John-and daughters,-Mrs. Daniel Miller, Mrs. Jacob Fillman, Mrs. George D. Heiser and Mrs.

604

HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY.

Jacob Binder. Jacob Fegely was born on the 5th of Jannary, 1794, in Douglas township, but early re- moved to Berks County, where his life was chiefly spent in the pursuit of the blacksmith's craft com- bined with the cultivation of a farm. He married Susan Miller, daughter of Peter Miller, the latter having been for several terms a member of the State Legislature. Their children are Solomon, Wil- liam, Isaac, Jacob, Maria (Mrs. Reuben Fryer), Catherine (Mrs. William Sweinhart), Susan and Lucinda (Mrs. M. Y. Slonacker). The death of

territory adjacent to it for five years. On the 5th of May, 1853, he was married to Miss Lavina Romich, of Douglas township, Berks Co. Their children are Ida, Ann Mary, Newton Henry and Morris Jacob, all deceased.

In 1853, in connection with a partner, Mr. Fegely embarked in the coal business, his brother Jacob be- coming, in 1854, a member of the firm, lumber being added to the stock. In 1862, in connection with William D. Evans, he engaged in car-building. Having purchased the interest of his partner, he con-

Dexac tegels

Mr. Fegely occurred on the 23d of January, 1878. His son Isaac was born December 25, 1825, in Berks County, Pa., where he remained until eigh- teen years of age, meanwhile, until his fifteenth year, receiving at the country school a rudimentary educa- tion and later assisting in the varied employments of the farm. In 1843, desiring to acquire a trade, he removed to Pottstown and became an apprentice to that of a coach-maker, serving his allotted time, two and a half years. Circumstances soon after made him thoroughly familiar with the vocation of a mill- wright, which engaged his attention in the county and

trolled the business until 1867, when it was sold, and Mr. Fegely embarked in various profitable under- takings until 1874. During the latter year the Warwick Iron Company was organized, with the subject of this biography as president, which office he still fills, his time and ability being devoted to this company. Ile was also one of the projectors and is the president of the Pottstown Gas and Water Companies, president of the Pottstown Cemetery Company, director of the Pottstown Market Com- pany, of the Ellis Keystone Agricultural Company land of the Union Mutual Fire and Storm Insurance

Jor & Potts

605

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

Company of Norristown. Mr. Fegely is in politics a Democrat, but not interested as a politician in the public issues of the day. He is a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Pottstown, and largely identified with its growth and influence.

POTTSGROVE IRON-WORKS .-- The Pottsgrove Iron- Works, the rolling-mill of which is located on Water Street, between Charlotte and Penn Streets, were erected in 1846 by Henry Potts, of Pottstown, and Hon. David Potts, Jr., of Warwick, Chester Co. The works were enlarged in 1878. In 1862 the firm-name was changed from Potts & Baily to Potts Brothers, and is now Potts Brothers' Iron Company (Limited). The buildings front on Water Street four hundred and twenty feet, with a depth of five hundred and eighty- seven feet. The entire works cover an area of five aeres. One hundred and seventy-five hands are em- ployed, with a pay-roll of seven thousand five hun- dred dollars a month. The capacity is eight thousand tons of plate-iron and eight thousand tons of muck- bar per annum.

JOSEPH D. POTTS .- The man of whose active life we here give an outline, though for a number of years past a citizen of Philadelphia, and a native of Ches- ter County, is a member of the family whose name is the oldest and most prominent in the history of the mechanical industry of Montgomery County, and is himself identified with one of the largest of its manu- facturing establishments.

He is a descendant in the sixth generation of Thomas Potts, the pioneer iron-master of the region, and his great-great-grandfather, John Potts, was the founder of Pottstown, His grandfather, Joseph Potts, wasthe owner of Glasgow Forge and Valley Forge. His father, David Potts, was born at the family house, near the first-named ancient iron establishment, on August 11, 1799, and died November 15, 1870. His mother, Rebecca S. (Speakman) Potts, was born in Delaware County.

Joseph D. was born at Springton Forge, Chester County, December 4, 1829, and his early life was passed at Pottstown and at Isabella Furnace, Chester Co. He entered upon the profession of civil engineering in May, 1852, on the Sunbury and Erie Railroad, and was after- wards engaged on various roads in Western Pennsyl- vania, and was made vice-president of the Steubenville (Ohio) and Indiana Railroad, superintendent of the Western Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad and president of the Western Transportation Company. In May, 1861, Governor Curtin appointed him on his ac- tive staff as lieutenant-colonel and chief of the trans- portation and telegraph department of the State, which post he held until December, 1861, at which time the State transferred this labor to the national govern- ment.

In 1862, while serving with the militia called out in consequence of Lee's Antietam expedition, he was detailed by General Reynolds as military superintend- ent of the Franklin Railroad.

From 1862 to 1865 he was general manager of the Philadelphia and Erie Railroad for its lessee, the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. From 1865 to 1872 he was president of the Empire Transportation Com- pany, and also of the Erie and Western Transporta- tion Company, the latter being the owner of a large fleet of propellers upon the chain of great lakes. In 1877 the Empire Transportation Company sold its entire plant, equipment and good-will, and closed its existence. Mr. Potts continued its President until its final dissolution and the complete division of its large assets among its share-holders. He remained president of the Erie and Western Transportation Company until June 7, 1881, when he retired to ob- tain relief from the responsibility and eare involved, which, in addition to various other duties in relation to numerous enterprises, made a heavier burden than he chose to carry. The estimation in which he was held by the company is evinced by an extraet from the proceedings of the directors, showing the report of a special committee to whom was referred his letter of resignation. It reads as follows :

"Mr. Potts' proposed retirement will sever relations which have existed between him and this company since the beginning of its opera- tions. Under his fostering care the company has so grown that it is to- day prosperons, substantial, strong and healthy, financially and other- wise.

" So highly appreciated are his services that the committee feel they are speaking, not only for the board of directors, but for the whole body of stockholders, in saying that to him is due, in the largest measure, this excellent condition of affairs; that without his foresight, his unfailing powers of resorce and his untiring energy no such results could have been attained.

" It is with the most profound regret that his retirement is reluctantly assented to, and the fact that he has consented to remain in the board but in a measure modities this feeling.

" He will leave his official position accompanied by the warmest good wishes of the directors, officers and all others connected with the service of the company.

" W. THAW. " II. H. HOUSTON. "W. H. BARNES. "GEO. B. BONNELL."

The stockholders at their meeting passed resolu- tions of an import similar to the foregoing expression from the directors. Mr. Potts is still a member of the directory of the company.

Ile became managing director of the National Storage Company in 1874 and president of the Na- tional Docks Railroad Company in 1879. These are both New Jersey corporations, the first owning exten- sive wharves, warehouses, etc., in Jersey City, and the latter an important railway through the same eity. He resigned both of these positions in 1884, though still a director in each company. He became pre- sident of the Enterprise Transit Company in 1871, and still holds that position.

He purchased an interest, in 1879, in the Potts Brothers' Iron Company (Limited), of Pottstown, Pa., which owns the Chester Tube-Works, and has since been one of its managers. In 1880 he purchased the

606

HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY.

Isabella Furnace property, in Chester County, former- ly owned by his father and now managed by his sons. He was for some years and until January 1, 1885, presi- ' High Street, and were established in 1880. The frontage is seventy-five feet, depth three hundred feet, one story high. Fifty hands are employed, with a pay-roll of fifteen hundred dollars a month. The power is supplied by an eighty horse- power engine.

dent, and is still a director of the Girard Point Storage Company of Philadelphia, which is the owner of the ex- tensive elevators, wharves, warehouses, railroad, tanks, ete., near the mouth of the Schuylkill River. From its establishment he has been a largeownerand a director in the International Navigation Company (Red Star Line).

During the last few years Mr. Potts has, although strongly urged to the contrary, withdrawn, as far as

J. DUTTON STEELE & SONS' MANUFACTURING COMPANY, POTTSTOWN .- The works are located on

J. DUTTON STEELE is the eldest son of Jolin D. Steele, of Chester County, Pa., who migrated with his family from England in 1795, and first settled in Whitemarsh township, Montgomery Co., where

Les conficele

possible, from active business duties, and has refused / several very tempting offers of highly lucrative and honorable positions. The comparative ease and quiet which he has secured by partial retirement from business has been well earned by years of re- markable activity and the untiring exercise of great financial and organizing ability.

Mr. Potts, on Jnne 1, 1854, married Mary, daughter of Dr. William and Margaret (Pollock) MeCleery, at Milton, Northumberland Co., Pa. Their children are Arthur (who died in infancy), William M., and Francis Lanier.

he resided for seven years, after which he married Ann, daughter of Hugh Exton, of Hunterdon County, N. J., and purchased a tract of land in central Chester County, upon which he resided during the remainder of his life ; there J. Dutton Steele was born in 1810, and at the age of eighteen, after being edu- cated in the mathematical schools of Chester Co., he joined a corps of engineers engaged in the surveys for the internal improvements of Pennsylvania, and con- tinned in the service of the State for two years. In 1830 he entered the service of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, the construction of which work

607

MANUFACTURING INDUSTRIES.

was at that time being commenced, and continued in that service for ten years, having been connected chiefly with the construction department until their rails had reached Harper's Ferry, and had been extended to Baltimore, Md., and during an interval in that service he located the road between Troy and Ballston Springs, in the State of New York.

His last appointment with the Baltimore and Ohio Company was in connection with the location and con- struction of the Western Division of the road, extend- ing from Cumberland, Md., to the Ohio River,

In 1837 he was married to Elizabeth, daughter of Judge Thomas Capner, of Hunterdon County, N. J., and settled in Wheeling, Va., from which point he conducted an extensive system of surveys necessary for the location of the work in charge. The great financial break-down of that period, however, caused the railroad company to suspend the construction of their road west of Cumberland, and consequently his engagements with them terminated in 1840. He then purchased a farm near Downing- town, Pa., and followed the pursuits of agriculture for six years.

During this period, the financial condition of the country having recovered from its depression and the charter of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company through Southwestern Pennsylvania having lapsed, they applied to the Legislature for a renewal of their chartered privileges; but at the same time the Penn- sylvania Railroad Company were applying for a charter through the middle of the State; hence the memorable "rights of way contest," in which his familiarity with the topographical features of the regions to be traversed enabled him to take an active part, and in which the Baltimore and Ohio failed to obtain the renewal of their charter asked for, and were forced to occupy a circuitous route round the south- western corner of Pennsylvania. In 1846 he made a sur- vey of Pittsburgh and its environs for the purpose of indicating the practicable routes for entering that city with railway improvements, and entered the service of the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad Company on the 1st of January, 1847, in charge of the roadway department of that road, and continued in the service of that company, in the several capacities of chief assistant engineer, chief engineer and vice- president, until 1867,-a period of nearly twenty years. During this time the bridges on the road were nearly all replaced with permanent structures and the super- structure was renewed, an accurate survey was made of the Schuylkill coal-fields, the shipping facilities at Port Richmond were enlarged and im- proved, and the rails were extended into Mahanoy Valley and to Harrisburg. He introduced into railway practice the ribbed stone arches for skew bridges, and availing himself of the experiments made by a commission appointed by the Queen of England in 1847 to investigate the "applicability of iron to railway structures," the reportof which was published

in 1849, he introduced wrought-iron girders for bridges of short spans, and was the first to use elec- tricity as an auxiliary to rock-blasting to any consid- erable extent, with no light to guide him but some experiments which had been made in English stone- quarries, and without the aid of which the tunnels on the Reading Railroad could not have been widened, in the brief space of four months allotted for the com- pletion of the work, with safety to the passing trains.

In 1868 he was elected president of the Sterling Iron and Railway Company, and removed to Brooklyn, and assumed the duty of developing an extensive iron- ore property in Orange County N. Y., in which position he continued for three years. During this period he made explorations for railroad extensions in the States of Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota ; took an active part in organizing the American Society of Civil Engineers and contributed to their journal, and was appointed one of a commission of civil engineers to examine and approve the plans of John A. Roebling for the East River suspension bridge. It may not be out of place to refer here to some in- teresting geological features of the Sterling estate confirmatory of the glacial theory of Agassiz. Bowlders of fossil limestone were found on the tops of hills, two hundred feet above the level of the valleys, which had been carried hundreds of miles by the ice, and they had existed at an earlier day to such an extent as to furnish the necessary flux for a ehar- coal furnace, which had been upon the property for a period of half a century. A mountain in its ex- ternal appearance was one great mass of iron-ore; but on penetrating it, it proved to be only a vein of iron- ore, corresponding in pitch with the slope of the hill, which had been worn smooth by glacial action, and immediately below it, and under a superincumbent mass of eight feet of gravel, was found a deposit of shot ore, which had evidently been rasped off the vein by the rock-toothed glacier when the world was yet enveloped in ice.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, Part 139

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck Number of Pages: 1534

Author: Bean, Theodore Weber, 1833-1891, [from old catalog] ed; Buck, William J. (William Joseph), 1825-1901
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1534