History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania, Part 64

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co.
Number of Pages: 1438

USA > Pennsylvania > Monroe County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 64
USA > Pennsylvania > Pike County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 64
USA > Pennsylvania > Wayne County > History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania > Part 64

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).

BREWERIES .- Krantz's, or the " upper brew- ery" was started iu 1853 by George Burkhart. After passing through the hands of numerous

persons it became, in 1868, the property of August Hartung and Peter Krantz. Up to this time the brewery had been a small affair, but the new proprietors made extensive im- provements in 1869, 1872 and 1874. The part- nership was dissolved January 1, 1883, Mr. Hartung becoming sole proprietor.

A year later Peter Krantz bought the stock, and renting the buildings, operated the brewery on his own account. He produces about five thousand barrels of beer per annum and also brews ale in considerable quantity. The brew- ery is run by steam-power aud contains all of the best modern appliances and apparatus.

John Guckenberger's brewery, known as the " lower brewery," was bought by him in 1883. It was started in 1857 by John Heinicke and eight or ten years later sold to Jacob Lauer, who carried it on for many years and erected the present brick structure. Mr. Guckenberger has made many improvements since takiug pos- session of the property and now, with steam- power applied iu the most improved ways, the brewery has an output of five thousand barrels of beer and two thousand of ale per year.

DURLAND, TORREY & Co.'s BOOT AND SHOE FACTORY is one of the most extensive and prosperous manufacturing establishments of the borough. It was started in 1868 by Colonel Coe F. Durland and Robert N. Torrey, over the present stores of W. B. Holmes aud W. H. Krantz. In 1872 Andrew Thompson became a partner, and the firm moved into its present quarters, a building erected by Mr. Torrey, at the corner of Front and Tenth Streets. This building is three stories in height, and fifty by ninety feet. The specialties of manufacture are men's, boys' aud youths' kip and calf boots, aud women's, misses' and children's oil grain calf and kip shoes. The firm also carries a line of fine goods for the jobbing trade. About seventy-five hauds are employed, and the value of the manufacture is not far from three hun- dred thousand dollars per year. The goods fiud a market all the way from New York to Oregon.

GLASS-CUTTING .- An interesting industry is the manufacture of rich cut-glass, which has been carried on by T. B. Clarke, of Meriden,

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Conn., since March, 1884. He employs about forty men. The process is exactly like that in vogue at Dorflinger's White Mills Works, of which a full description appears in the chapter upon Texas township.

Glass decorating is carried on here also by N. A. Ray & Co., who established themselves in this business in 1885.

FURNITURE was first made in the borough in 1829 by Alanson Blood, an old-time " cabinet-

His successor was Lorenzo Grambs (of whom we give a sketch). Mr. Grambs, or Judge Grambs, as he is now commonly known, came to Honesdale in 1851, and worked a few months for Conger, and the latter then retiring, Grambs started in business for himself where Menner's store now is. He began in a small way, and gradually worked up to the management of a large and lucrative business. From 1860 to 1879 he manufactured and dealt heavily, em-

maker," of whom mention is made elsewhere. He continued at his trade until recent years. John Brown engaged in the business in 1850, and removed into the building now occupied by him, in 1869. John Loercher and Moore & Rittenhaus have also been engaged in this trade.

MANUFACTURE OF CIGARS AND TOBACCO .- The pioneer in this line of manufacture was John N. Conger, who began some time between 1835 and 1840.

ploying fifteen or twenty men in the former line. Quite recently he retired, placing his business in the hands of his sons.

His son George, in company with A. Eber- hardt, established the cigar manufactory now successfully carried on by the latter alone.

LORENZO GRAMES was born at Fischbach, Bavaria, January 28, 1825. His parents were John and Margaretta Grambs, who cmigrated to this country in 1839, with their three sons,- Frederick, who subsequently died in California ;

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Lorenzo, the subject of this sketch ; and George, who resides in Seranton, Pa. The father was by trade an architect, and soon after landing in this country located at Rondout, N. Y., where lie followed his vocation. In 1840 he resided in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., and later in Rochester and New York City. In 1848 he purchased a farm in Sullivan County, N. Y., which he tilled for a number of years, and finally removed to Honesdale, Wayne County Pa., where he lied in 1879.

Lorenzo Grambs was fourteen years of age at the time of the family emigration to this country. He had already received an excellent eommon- school education in his native land, and being in poor eircumstanees at the time of his arrival in America, he was obliged to enter upon the performance of the ordinary duties of life at once. His first month's work was in driving on the tow-path of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, between Rondout and Hones- dale. In 1840 he was apprenticed to learn the trade of a shoemaker, but not finding the oeeupa- tion eongenial, continued at it only one year. He then went to Rochester, where he labored at brick-laying and masonry, and then to New York City, where he learned the trade of a eigar-maker, and worked as a journeyman for three years. In 1846 he was married, and established business for himself in Delancey Street, New York. Here he remained until 1849, when, at the breaking out of the gold- fever that year, he sailed for California around Cape Horn. By an accident on ship-board his leg was broken, and he was confined two months in California, but later proceeded to the gold-mines, where he worked until 1851. Hav- ing aequired about two thousand dollars' worth of gold-dust, he located in Honesdale, Pa., on May 1, 1851, and for a year worked at his trade as a journeyman for John N. Conger, of that place. He then started in business for himself, and has sinee successfully engaged in the manufacture of cigars and the sale of tobacco and cigars at that place. The firm, as at present constituted, consists of Judge Grambs and his son Edward G., and is known as L. Grambs & Co.

During the period that Judge Grambs has

resided in Honesdale he has been closely iden- tified with the growth of the place, and held various positions of trust and responsibility. On August 5, 1859, he was commissioned, by the Governor, inspector of the Second Brigade, Tenth Division Uniformed Militia of Susque- hanna and Wayne Counties, with the rank of major. In 1862 he was elected treasurer of Wayne County, and filled that offiee for two years. He has also served as chief burgess of Honesdale, as a member of the Town Council and treasurer of the borough. He was elected in 1882 associate judge of Wayne County, and duly commissioned by Governor Hoyt on December 13th of that year, for five years from January, 1883. He also resigned, however, in June, 1884, and was succeeded by Judge Strong, of Starrueea. He was one of the organizers of the Wayne County Savings Bank in 1871, and has sinee served on the board of directors of that institution. He has also been prominently connected with the cause of Odd-Fellowship in Wayne County, and is a past-offieer of that order. In 1873 he visited the old country accompanied by Thomas J. Ham, of the Hones- dale Herald. He has always been interested in church-work, and for twenty years was eon- neeted with the German Lutheran denomina- tion of Christians, but is at present a regular attendant of the Presbyterian Chureh.

Judge Grambs was married, June 30, 1846, in New York City, to Kunigunda Reeh, daughter of Adam Reeh, a native of Unterlang- enstadt, Bavaria, and has had a family of eigh- teen children, of whom twelve are now living, viz. : Sophie D., Bertha M. (who married William H. Krantz, of Honesdale), George J. (who lives at Honey Brook, Pa.), Henry W. (who resides in Dakota), Tilly M., William J. (connected with the United States Geological Survey), Edward G. (of L. Grambs & Co.), Lorenzo O., Frank G., August B. (in his father's store), B. Louis and Albert A. Grambs.

BOAT BUILDING IN HONESDALE AND WAYNE COUNTY.1 -- Although the grass grows luxuriantly in most of the boat-yards on the line of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Com-

1 By William H. Ham.

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pany, the time was when they were the busiest spots in our county. Owing to the practice of the company latterly to build their own boats at Rondout, N. Y., the ship-caulkers' occupation hereabouts is nearly gone, and from being as at present, a lost industry, it will soon become a lost art. The building of the canal (1825 to 1828) called for a large number of laborers and mechanics, and its effect in stimulating all branches of business, directly and indirectly, extended far beyond the strip of canal from Honesdale to Pike County on the line of the Lackawaxen.

Its western terminus being located, a town necessarily grew up about it, which was ap- propriately named in honor of the president of the corporation to which it owed its existence, and we understand that a mutual admiration between Philip Hone and his namesake, Hones- dale, was ever kept up.

The canal was first opened in 1828, and was intended to hold four and one-half feet in depth of water; but, owing to the nature of the ground in many places and weakness of the banks in others, it was found impossible to realize these expectations, and consequently the few boats used that year in bringing up supplies of iron, engines and the like, and to carry back coal, were with great difficulty poled, pushed and pulled up and down with cargoes of from ten to twenty tons each. The one hundred and eight locks on the line of the canal were made at first seventy-five feet long and nine feet wide. As the canal was soon strengthened and deep- ened to five and a half feet, boats were built carrying fifty tons. During the years 1848 to 1853 the locks were enlarged to one hundred feet in length and fifteen feet in width and the depth of water made six feet, admitting boats of one hundred and fifty tons burden.

The number of boats required to do the trans- portation upon the canal grew rapidly as the mining facilities increased. In 1829 a dozen of the little tubs were sufficient to carry off the seven thousand tons of coal delivered at Hones- dale, but the next year six times the number were in use, and in 1833 three hundred boats worked hard to get away with one hundred and eleven thousand tons. In 1834, owing, per-

haps, to the business check given by the cholera in 1832 to all industries, the transportation dropped down to forty-three thousand tons, the same amount as in 1830. The lost ground was more than recovered, however, by 1837, when the financial panic sent the figures down to seventy-eight thousand tons in 1838. Since then the tonnage has mounted steadily upwards, the production of the Lackawanna coal being in 1840 one hundred and forty-eight thousand tons ; in 1845, two hundred and seventy-three thousand tons ; 1850, four hundred and thirty- two thousand tons; and 1855, five hundred and sixty-five thousand tons. From 1855 to 1860 was another depressed period, and the produc- tion remained about stationary, 1860 showing but five hundred thousand tons. In 1850 the Pennsylvania Coal Company began transporting their coal from the mines at Pittston to Haw- ley, where their own boats received it and carried it down the canal to tide-water, averaging year by year about the same number of tons as the Dela- ware and Hudson. Since 1860 the business has steadily grown until the gross tonnage often crowds closely upon two millions of tons.

The small or fifty-ton boats generally were built for from four hundred to five hundred dollars each. The one hundred and twenty-five ton scows, or " lemon squeezers," built in two parts and hinged in the middle, were worth about one thousand dollars, while the boats of the same capacity, which were decked over so as to go upon the Hudson River, brought from fourteen hundred up to eighteen hundred dollars, as the price of gold fluctuated up and down from 1862 to 1870.

The boat-builders of the early days had no easy life of it. They worked from sunrise to sunset up to 1848, when the ten-hour system was adopted, and often the emergencies of the business would require, during the repairing scason, the use of lanterns before day and after nightfall. Your boatman having two horses to feed, wages running on and his larder to supply, wants to keep his boat in motion every possible moment ; consequently, he is always in a hurry to have his repairs completed. In former times, and, indeed, down to within ten years past, the boat-builders were pretty sure of steady work

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at good wages, building new boats in the win- ter and repairing old ones in the summer, but of late, as stated, the new work being done at Rondout, the workmen have nothing to do win- ters and consequently drift off into other occu- pations, where they remain.

When the canal was young, saw-mills were few and far between and were generally such little, short-waisted concerns, that the builders preferred sending out into the woods hereabouts for long oak logs, which were brought into the boat-yards, raised by a windlass upon higli benches or " horses" and then sawn into the re- quired planks by two men with a whip-saw, one standing upon the log and the other upon the ground. The limbs of the oaks furnished the "knees" or "crooks" and the little saw- mills furnished the scantling.

The frame or skeleton was erccted on the keel and the planking spiked on; then came the bracing, knee-fitting, bolting, caulking, cabin and paint, and the vessel was launched upon sliding ways into the canal, thie occasion generally draw- ing a crowd of people to witness the event.

Good boat-yard sites are not common, as there must be a space fairly level upon which to build new boats. Near enough to the canal for launching, and connected with it, must be a place where a dry-dock can be built so as to be filled with water from the canal, allowing a boat to float into it when full and also permit- ting, when the gates are closed, the egress of the water under or away from the canal, leav- ing the boat high and dry upon the stocks, where the workmen can get at it for repairs. When the business was flourishing suchi sites were held at high prices ; now they are but a burden and a care.

A boat-yard " gang" was generally limited to about the number that could find steady work at repairing during the summer. In the winter months they built as many new boats as they could, or were able to contract for, which num- ber was generally from three to six.

Ship-building and boat-building requires the same kind of skill ; in fact, the sharper turns and bends upon the latter are more difficult to man- age than the long lines of the ship. Naturally, when the canal was first opened and boats were

required, the ship-carpenters from New York and other seaports sought opportunities upon it, and in general they became the first owners of the boat-yards. The first that came to Hones- dale was a man by the name of Rowland. He was followed in 1830 by a Mr. Silkworth, who built boats, and Mr. James Pinkney, who re- paired them, but who afterward purchased Mr. Silkworth's interest and continued the wliole business for many years. His dry-dock was located on the same spot now occupied by the Delaware and Hudson dry-dock, at the lower end of the basin. There being but little room for building at that point, the new boats were put up at the lower end of Main Street and were launched into the river. Mr. Pinkney also had a dry-dock at Leonardsville, a mile be- low Honesdale. The late Thomas Ham enter- ed Mr. Pinkney's employ in 1833, and the late William Turner a few years later. Mr. Pink- ney losing his health in 1841, his business was conducted by Mr. Ham in one of the yards and by Mr. Turner in the other. In 1842 Mr. Horace Traey took the " basin" dock, and Mr. Turner acted as his foreman until 1848, when the dock was leased to him until about 1870. Mr. Turner's foreman for many years was Mr. William Pragnell, whose father built some of the first boats used on the canal in Rondout, in 1828 or 1829. Mr. Pragnell leased the new dock opposite Fourth Street when that point was made the lower end of the basin, but when the lock and dock was changed to its present site it was leased to Hoyt & Bishop, after- ward to Bishop & Haley, and latterly to S. B. Haley. In 1843, Thomas Ham built a way- dock, or slides, in the Lackawaxen, near the Guard Lock, some of the old timbers being yet discernible, where he continued the business until 1862, when he sold the property to Wil- liam H. Ham, his son, who also became the purchaser of the flat adjoining and upon which he built the dry-dock opposite Kimble's mill. Up to 1863 all the work, such as getting planks to proper width and thickness, planing the edges to proper bevel, dressing knees, drilling iron and the like, had been done by hand. The high price and scarcity of labor, however, and the greatly increased demand for boats during

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the war, induced Mr. W. H. Ham to avail him- self of the water-power upon the premises.

He put up a mill alongside the grist-mill, twenty-four by one hundred and twenty feet, running a railroad from the yard through its centre, and, with the aid of heavy planers, saws, drills and the like, was enabled to turn out greatly inereased quantities of work, reaching in 1868-69 sixty-odd boats for the year, suf- fieient in number to nearly fill the present basin, and which, if placed in line, would extend more than a mile in lengthi. Sinee then the same, or a similar system has been adopted in the eom- pany's yard, at Rondout, where they now turn out about forty boats per year, being about equal to the present requirements of their busi- ness.

Mr. Andrew Coar now oeeupies the dry-doek, but the flat that onee was covered with boats in process of ereetion has been used for years as a base-ball ground.

Mr. Christopher C. Lam, who graduated from Mr. Turner's yard, purchased the doek at Leonardsville and for many years earried on a sueeessful business in building and repairing, but he, like the rest, has grown weary watch- ing his lonely doek, and has moved himself and family into more cheerful quarters in Honesdale.

The Pennsylvania Coal Company had the most of their boats built off from the line of the canal, mostly on the Susquehanna at Lewis- burgh and Northumberland, but they have gen- erally managed to keep Mr. Levi Barker pretty steadily employed for the past thirty years on their doeks at Hawley. Mr. Jno. Baisden, a couple of miles below Hawley, has also contrib- uted a fair share of the boats to the eanal.

It may well be believed that the building of three thousand boats in the past forty years at a eost of nearly five millions of dollars, the lumber for which was largely taken from Wayne and Pike Counties, added much to the prosperity of this section, as it necessitated quite an army of mechanics, woodsmen, sawyers, teamsters, blaeksmiths, wagon-makers, harness- makers, boarding-house-keepers, tailors, mer- chants and the like to do the work. The in- dustry may return to us some day, for the con-

ditions for building boats are, as ever, better here than elsewhere upon the line of the canal. The lumber, the mills, the doeks are still here, and the boats, when built, are close by the eargo they are to take away.

Thomas Ham, who was long and prominent- ly identified with this business, was born at Limsworthy, Kilkhampton parish, Cornwall, England, on the 25th day of December (Christ- mas day), 1805, and died at his farm residenee at Seelyville, near Honesdale, February 21, 1886. His parents, William and Ann Ham, were respectable farmers, the maiden-name of his mother being Ann Barrett. Other fami- lies with which he was closely allied by blood and marriage were Greenway, Rogers, Lyle, Yeo and others of local prominence, the record of whose long and honorable residence in Cornwall is written on hundreds of tombstones in Kilkhampton and Launeells.

At an early age the subject of this sketch was apprenticed to learn the business of carpenter and cooper with a relative, Mr. Philip Green- way, of Kilkhampton. He patiently served a term of seven years, at the end of which time, being a thoroughly competent workman, he purchased the business at Butsper, then earried on by the late Jolin Upright, who died some years sinee at Bethany, in this eounty. On the 5th of May, 1830, he was married to Miss Elizabeth Bellamy, daughter of Humphrey and Grace Bellamy, of Jacobstown parish. The ceremony was performed in the beautiful church in Kilkhampton, where he had been ehristened, and the baptism of the young pair's first child, the late Mrs. Jolin E. Dudley, born June 26, 1831, was solemnized at the font of Launeells Church, in the adjoining parish.

About this time an emigration fever broke out in Cornwall, and many of Mr. Ham's friends and acquaintances left their homes to seek their fortunes in America. Several of them located in and near Honesdale. In June, 1832, Mr. Ham joined the tide, sailing in a paeket . ship from Plymouth with his wife and child, and aecompanied by several members of his wife's family. Landing in New York in Au- gust, in the very height of the cholera epidemic of that year, they hastened into the country,

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reaching Honesdale via the Hudson River to Rondout and thence up the Delaware and Hud- son Canal. Soon after his arrival Mr. Ham was employed by Bentley, Humphreys & Ber- ger, building contractors, to erect a mill for Nathan Skinner, at Cochecton Falls, on the Delaware, a short distance below Milanville. He spent the winter of 1832-33 in that work, returning to Honesdale in the spring of 1833, where he first found employment in the turning factory of the late Amory Prescott, and soon afterward as a carpenter on the Delaware and Hudson Railroad, under the late Judge Phineas Arnold and his brother David. He remained in the company's employ for three years. In the mean time Messrs. Pinckney & Rowland had established boat-yards and dry-docks in Hones- dale, and in 1836, after having had a little ex- perience in the yards of Silkworth & Bloomer, he accepted a situation under Mr. James Pinck- ney, a thoroughly competent ship-carpenter. About 1842 Mr. Ham and the late William Turner commenced building boats for Mr. Pinckney by contract, which association was kept up until some time in 1843, when Mr. Ham rented what was known as the Leonards- ville Dock, now owned by C. C. Lane. Two years later he built a dock for himself on the bank of the Lackawaxen, directly opposite the foot of Main Street, and for many years carried on a large and fairly remunerative business, be- ing finally succeeded, in 1862, by his son, W. H. Ham. About 1855, in company with Mr. Turner, he bought the well-known Kinible Mill property, including all of the land lying between the plank-road and the river and canal, from the covered bridge to a point some distance below the mill. The mill was thoroughly over- hauled and fitted up with improved machinery, and under the charge of Hon. Thos. E. Grier, now of Pittston, did for some years a very profitable business. Mr. Ham and Mr. Turner were both individually largely engaged in boat- building and repairing during this time, and in 1856 they opened a wholesale and retail flour, provision and grocery-store on lower Main Street, which was a fairly successful venture. This branch of his business having been aban- doned in 1859, Mr. Ham devoted himself to,

and for the most part has lived on, his farm situate near Seelyville and purchased by him shortly after he arrived in this country. Up to 1864, however, with the exception of two or three years, his residence was continuously in Honesdale. In 1834, while working for the company, he purchased a lot on Fourth Street, and as indicative of his natural energy of char- acter and versatility in mechanical gifts, it may be recalled that he dug the cellar for his house with his own hands, hewed the timber for the frame, made the lath and shingles and built and plastered the dwelling from cellar to garret. In that house his sons William H. and Thomas J. were born. He subsequently sold the place to Thomas Kellow and bought himself a lot adjoin- ing that occupied by Mr. Pinckney, near the covered bridge, where he erected the cottage which was the home of the family for more than a quarter of a century, and where his younger sons,-Charles W. (who died in child- hood), Robert W. (of the firm of G. White & Co.) and Frank A .- were born, and where his wife died, universally beloved and mourned, on the 15th day of March, 1867.

In politics Mr. Ham was an active and un- compromising Democrat. He never had a desire for office, but took the keenest personal interest in the promotion of his friends. From time to time he filled some important local positions, such as member of the Town Council, burgess, etc., always discharging the duties faithfully and satisfactorily. He was repeatedly elected a dele- gate to county conventions, and in all ways open to him sought to advance the interests of the party to which he had allied himself.

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History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania, Part 64

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co. Number of Pages: 1438

Author: Mathews, Alfred, 1852-1904. 4n
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : R.T. Peck & Co.
Number of Pages: 1438