USA > Pennsylvania > Montgomery County > Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, a history, Volume II > Part 8
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He is a Republican in politics. Fraternally, he is affiliated with Norristown Lodge, No. 190, Free and Accepted Masons; Montgomery Lodge, No. 57, and Norristown Encampment, Independent Order of Odd Fellows; Norristown Lodge, No. 714, Benevolent and Protective
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Order of Elks; Norristown Lodge, No. 281, Loyal Order of Moose; Washington Encampment, No. 502, Patriotic Order Sons of America of Norristown; Shield of Honor; Sons of Veterans; and Tall Cedars of Lebanon. He is also a member of the Norristown Club, and in religion, of the Reformed Church of Ascension. He finds great delight in adding new specimens of birds and animals to his present collection of over five hundred.
Mr. Kogelschatz was twice married. He married (first), June 18, 1890, at Norristown, Pennsylvania, Jennie Tyson, daughter of Josiah R. and Mary Jane (Hess) Tyson, both of whom are deceased. The father was a mason in Norristown. He married (second), January 18, 1921, Nannie B. Kratz, widow of W. Harry Kratz, of Baltimore, Maryland, and daughter of Frisby Davis and Cornelia Ann (Butterworth) Boyer. Her father was a butcher in Martinsburg and Huntington, West Vir- ginia, until 1891, when he entered into retirement and resided at Hunt- ington, West Virginia, until his death in 1911. Her mother is still living, at Huntington, West Virginia. By the first marriage there are two children: Linnie, born January 1, 1892, wife of Harlow S. Simp- son of Norristown; and Warren T., born August 5, 1899, associated in business with his father. He was a student at Wenona, New Jersey, Military School during the World War, but did not see service as the tank corps was discontinued after the armistice was declared. There were no children born to the second marriage.
Mrs. Kogelschatz by her first marriage with W. Harry Kratz had two children : 1. Esther Louise, born September 1, 1893 and is now the wife of Charles Edward Wollman, of Baltimore, Maryland, and they are the parents of four children. 2. Henry Boyer, born July 9, 1896, now married and living in Philadelphia and engaged in the real estate business.
THE WOOD FAMILY-Among those who are the builders of a nation few are of greater importance "for weal or for woe," than are these captains of industry whose constructive ability brings into exist- ence the great business concerns which provide the means of livelihood to great numbers of men, and at the same time provide the masses of the people with the materials and the commodities which are the physical basis as well as the material expression of our civilization. As the coral islands and reefs are the physical remains of countless numbers of tiny insect lives, each generation building upon the deposits of the generation gone before, so, many of our big industrial concerns represent the life work of several generations of the families which own and control them.
(I) The Wood family which for several generations has been build- ing that immense concern known as the Alan Wood Iron and Steel Com- pany is now represented by members of the sixth generation of iron workers and iron masters, that is, the fifth generation from the James Wood who started the iron business. The immigrant ancestor of the family was James Wood, of the Society of Friends, born of English par- ents in the city of Dublin, in 1706, who came to America about 1725, and settled between Kloat and Blue Bell, in Whitpain township, Montgom-
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ery county, Pennsylvania. He died November 3, 1760, and was buried at Plymouth Meeting. In 1732 he married Dawes, and among their children was John.
(II) John Wood, seventh child of James and - - (Dawes) Wood, was born January 25, 1747, and died in 1836. He married, in 1769, Cath- erine Davis, and their eldest son was James, the first of his family to engage in iron-making in this country.
(III) James Wood, son of John and Catherine (Davis) Wood, was born October 23, 1771, upon a farm in Montgomery county, near Nar- cissa, or Five Points, situated on the road from Plymouth Meeting to Blue Bell. He was the first of his family in America to engage in the iron business. In 1792 he established a "smithy" near Hickorytown (then called Pigeontown), and was known as a "black and white smith," because in addition to the ordinary work of the country blacksmith, he also made kitchen or domestic wares. Later, but prior to 1805, he also worked a tilthammer forge at "Hammer Hollow," a ravine in the south- ern escarpment of the Chester valley, situated one miles north of the present station of Strafford, on the Pennsylvania railroad, the place deriving its name from the fact that hammers were the leading product of the forge. "Hammer Hollow" is now a part of the property owned by Major Stevens H. Heckscher. In 1808 Mr. Wood operated a forge on the Pennypack creek, and ten years later, in 1818, he joined John and Jacob Rogers, and Isaac Smedley, in a forge property at Valley Forge, where they manufactured sickles, scythes, shovels, and other agricultural implements, as well as files and cross-cut and circular saws. This forge had already been long in operation when it was taken over by Mr. Wood and his associates, the original forge having been built, according to the best obtainable evidence, in 1742, by Stephen Evans, Daniel Walker, and Joseph Williams, and purchased, in 1757, by John Potts, whose grand- son, Isaac Potts, lived in the stone residence near the mouth of the creek, which is now venerated as Washington's Headquarters. The original forge was located a half mile up-stream, and the iron was brought to it from Warwick furnace. During the time of the Revolution, it was owned by William Dewees, Jr., and was destroyed by the British troops. Some years later a new forge was built near the Dewees Mansion, and was operated until 1824. The site of the old forge is on the property owned by the late Senator Philander C. Knox. Mr. Wood and his asso- ciates repaired the old Dewees forge, and Mr. Wood was made manager of the concern. The company soon afterward began to turn out saws and shovels, etc., erecting for that purpose a crucible steel furnace. Writing of this enterprise, Swank says, in his "History of the Iron and Steel Industry": "Mr. Wood's son, John Wood, of Conshohocken, stated (about 1890) that the Valley Forge plant made some excellent steel, but the project was soon abandoned. This was the first important crucible steel enterprise in our history, brought to our notice." Writing of Val- ley Forge in the year 1858, William J. Buck, historian of Montgomery county, said: "There is now no forge or furnace in this vicinity, but iron ore is still dug in considerable quantities about a quarter of a mile
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from the village on the road to the King of Prussia." After the Valley Forge venture, James Wood returned to the Pennypack. A recently discovered patent of much interest as well as of historic value was issued to him on February 10, 1825, for improvements in making shovels and spades, the improvements being described as follows: "The blanks are entirely of iron or steel, the blade being attached to the handle by means of steel or iron straps fastened to the blade, and also to the handle by rivets on the front and back sides of the blade and handle, the said blades being each of a single piece of steel rolled to the proper dimen- sions and not hammered." The patent was signed by James Monroe, President ; John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State; and William Wirt, Attorney General.
In 1826 James Wood, still intent upon finding a favorable site for the establishment of an iron industry, turned his attention to the State of Delaware, records showing, however, that he held the Pennypack property until April 1, 1833, when he sold it to William Slater for $5,500. At this time, iron-making had been conducted in a small way in Delaware for about a century, deposits of bog ores being found in that State in deposits of sand and clay of the tertiary period, and another source of supply being the famous Iron Hill, in Cecil county, Maryland. The last-named deposit was known as early at 1661, and mentioned by Gabriel Thomas in 1695. Long before the Revolution, small "bloom- eries" were in operation along Red Clay creek, an affluent of Christiana creek, but after the War of 1812, when imported iron disappeared from the American market and prices soared, a new impetus was given to the industry which had, up to that time, been greatly handicapped. Upon Red Clay creek, at Wooddale, about five miles northwest of Wilming- ton, Delaware, stood a small water mill, which had probably been used previous to 1826, to turn out nail plates. This mill James Wood and his son, Alan, leased in 1826, for a period of five years, beginning March 25, 1827, though they took possession of the property at once. The neces- sity of securing protective legislation against British competition had resulted in the organization, in 1817, of the Delaware Society for Promot- ing Manufactures, but the balance of power at Washington was held by the farmers of the North and the cotton-growers of the South, who favored a free market in this country for the manufactured articles of Europe, and the efforts of the manufacturers were for a long time unavailing. It was only by securing very cheap and unskilled labor and by the closest economy, that manufacturing interests could be main- tained, and the prevailing rates of wages paid at the Delaware Iron Works were from fifty cents to one dollar a day, upon yearly agreements. Iron used at the Delaware Rolling Mill was bought in the form of bars, from American, English, and Swedish mills, and it was then the practice of James Wood & Son to buy and sell at six months' time, a discount of five per cent. being allowed for cash. From the beginning, as shown by their correspondence, the policy of the firm was to raise the quality of their product, insisting upon the best raw material and careful workmanship.
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The day book of the Delaware Iron Works was opened August 17, 1826, with the statement: "James Wood and his son Alan enter into the rolling and manufacturing business at the Delaware Iron Works and are to divide profit and loss equally." On a knoll overlooking the mill, is a stone house where the members of the family in charge of the mill, at various times, lived, and here for six years, from 1826 to 1832, Alan Wood lived, taking charge of the Delaware Iron Works, while his father, James Wood, managed the store at No. 161 North Second street, in Philadelphia. The day book shows that James Wood bought and forwarded most of the raw material, including coal, used in the Delaware Works, and that careful records were kept of all transactions between the store and the "works." They rolled considerable steel, this being brought in in the form of slabs or bars and rolled into shovel or saw steel. At that time soft steel bars cost $125 a ton, while American iron bars were $100 and Swedish $102.50 a ton. The Swedish iron plates were charged to James Wood, by the mill, at $140 a ton and steel shovel plates at $160. The Delaware Iron Works also manufactured some of its products into shovels, hoes, etc., and shipped them to the store in Philadelphia. The eight or ten men necessary to do the work were boarded at a cost of $2.00 a week to the mill, and were paid in addition, usually at the rate of $5 a week. The shearing and forming into shovels, however, was done by piece work at so much per dozen. It is interest- ing to note that by 1828 and 1829 the Delaware Iron Works was making sheets ranging in gauge from No. 27 (about three-fourths of a pound to the square foot) to No. 10 (over five pounds to the square foot) and sometimes rolled small cast steel ingots into circular saw plates.
In May, 1832, the business was removed to Conshohocken, not only the equipment of anvils, shears, and other tools being transferred, but the men themselves were transferred and the day book began anew at the water mill on the banks of the Schuylkill canal. No record of manu- facturing again at the Delaware Iron Works has been found, until 1840, when John Wood, a younger brother of Alan Wood, took charge there. From that time the Delaware Iron Works were again under the control of the Wood family until 1889, when it was abandoned, and a few years later the property was sold. In 1832 the mill for rolling iron was erected at Conshohocken "on the Plymouth Canal," and soon afterward the plant at Wooddale was abandoned until 1840. The Conshohocken mill began operations on May 5, 1832, rolling sheets, the rolls being eighteen inches in diameter and thirty-six inches in length. The water wheel had a length of twenty feet, and the balance of the equipment included one grate furnace. The sheet mill was coupled directly to the end of the water-wheel shaft, and the capacity of the rolls was fifty-four sheets in twelve hours. In 1835 the firm built a three-story shovel fac- tory at the west end of the water mill, but this was torn down in 1880. The trimming shear, which was of alligator type and had a stroke of twelve inches, was in the second story of this building and sheets were carried up to be trimmed. On January 1, 1840, James Wood sold his interest in the firm of J. Wood & Son to William W. Wood, who con-
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tinued the business in association with Alan Wood, under the title of A. Wood & Brother, for one year. At the end of that time, in 1841, the business was again conducted by James Wood and his son, Alan, under the original title of James Wood & Son, and now included once more the Wooddale mill, which had again been rented in 1840 and was oper- ated by John Wood, another brother of Alan Wood. Here they con- ducted a series of experiments in an effort to produce an imitation of Russian sheet iron. Business at this time was very dull, but the experi- ments were continued until 1842, when the persevering efforts of the firm were rewarded by a silver medal from the Franklin Institute. The resulting improvement in the products of the plant probably led to the series of readjustments of interests in the Wood family, which occurred in the following years. In April, 1843, Wood & Brothers, composed of Alan, John and William Wood, rented a store at No. 3 North Fifth street, removing there from the old Second street store. In 1843 Alan Wood purchased the old Delaware Iron Works, for $8,000, and soon afterward retired from the partnership with his brothers, and also that with his father. James Wood retired from business on February 23, 1848, after which the mills were conducted by his sons: John, William W., Thomas C., and David L. Wood, the title of the firm then becom- ing J. Wood & Bros. James Wood died June 29, 1851. He was twice married, (first), in 1796, to Tacy Thomas, of Gwynedd, who was of Welsh descent. She died July 11, 1811, and he married (second) Ann W. Warner. Among the children of the first marriage was Alan Wood. (IV) Alan Wood, third child of James and Tacy (Thomas) Wood, was born December 25, 1800, died November 24, 1881, and was his father's associate in business, as above related, from 1826 to the time of his purchase of the Delaware Iron Works in 1843, the connection with his father being severed January 1, 1844. His oldest son, W. Dewees, was at that time a lad of eighteen years, and had learned the rudiments of the business under the leadership of John Wood, while the latter was in charge of the Delaware Iron Works. W. Dewees Wood was put in charge of the mill under the direction of his father, who continued to live in Philadelphia, where he managed the business in the store, at No. 3 North Fifth street, and sold the iron rolled in Delaware. In 1851 W. Dewees left his father's business to go to Mckeesport, where in partnership with his father-in-law, Richard B. Gilpin, he built the Mckeesport Iron Works. The Delaware Iron Works were then left in charge of Alan Wood, Jr., a younger son of Alan Wood, and only sev- enteen years old at this time. For six years the Delaware Iron Works remained under the supervision of Alan, Jr., but at the end of that time, in 1857, the "panic of 1857" caused his brother, W. Dewees, temporarily to give up his venture in McKeesport and return to Delaware, where for four years he was again manager of the little water mill. In 1861 W. Dewees Wood decided that it would be wise to return to Mckeesport and resume his former business, which he did with great success. The Delaware Iron Works continued in operation under the general man- agement of Alan Wood and his sons, but from that time on was not in
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the immediate charge of any member of the family. Meantime, Alan Wood, in partnership with his brother-in-law, Lewis A. Lukens, had, in 1857, founded the firm of Alan Wood & Company, and started the present Schuylkill Iron Works at Conshohocken. Alan, Jr., who had had six years' experience at the Delaware mill, assisted his father in building the new mill and was put in active charge of it. The equipment consisted of one sheet mill with a grate furnace, and what afterwards became No. 2 Sheet Mill, but was then a two-high flue mill, and a five- inch bar mill with one heating furnace between them, used on the day turn to heat piles for the flue mill and on the night turn to heat piles for the five-inch bar mill, and two single puddling furnaces. The steam engine which ran the mills had no governor and the engineer sat on a high stool with a lever about three feet long which controlled the throttle valve. The only light in the mill at night were oil torches hanging over the roller and one over the catcher. The sheet mill force finished everything either two or three-high, nothing four-high, and the turn annealed all the product in the open grate furnace as they made it. In 1862, No. 3 Sheet Mill was built, and a Corliss engine installed. On this train were a pair of puddle-rolls and a coffee-mill squeezer. Two more puddling furnaces were also built at this time, and an "old English annealing furnace" in which the sheet iron was annealed standing on its edge, was built in the upper part of the building. In 1866 the West Mill was built, this being the first three-high mill for rolling light sheets and plates. The rolls were twenty-two inches in diameter by fifty-four inches long, and the little roll was eleven inches in diameter, but was soon exchanged for one of twelve-inch diameter. There were many discour- agements, and many difficulties to be overcome, but Alan Wood perse- vered until success was won. In the Pittsburgh district, this type of mill is still called a "Conshohocken mill." The mill was driven by a vertical thirty-six by forty-two engine, with a double crank, and on one side was the west flue mill, with a set of three-high finishing and a two- high breakdown mill, and beyond this a seven-inch bar mill; and on the other side of the engine No. 4 Sheet Mill, and later the little three-high mill beyond the No. 4 Sheet Mill. In 1866 the Corliss engine on No. 3 Sheet Mill was replaced by the vertical twenty-six by forty-two "strad- dle bug" engine, built by the Pusey & Jones Company, which is still in use. In 1870 the little three-high mill was built at the end of No. 4 Sheet Mill train, and in 1872-73 the East Mill was built, the three-high twenty-two by fifty-four equipment being changed in 1880 to twenty- four by seventy-two, and in 1896 to twenty-six by seventy-two. This mill had two heating furnaces and an open annealing furnace. Later, a twenty-inch bar mill was built, three-high, patented by Alan Wood, Jr., having three stands of rolls, one seven by one-quarter inch, one ten-inch, one five-inch, and an extra set of four-inch rolls. In 1891 the North Mill was built, in 1913-14 the West Flue Mill rebuilt, and No. 4 Sheet Mill changed into No. 5 Flue Mill with twenty-four by forty-eight rolls. In 1914-15 the East Flue Mill was rebuilt and equipped with thirty-six by fifty-four Newbold engine and a twenty-six by seventy-two United Engi-
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neering and Foundry Company train. In 1917 a new steel shipping building was erected on the east side of the North and East Flue Mills for trimming and shipping the products of these mills. This building has a crane for handling plates with a magnet. Up to 1913 no electric motor had been used in the mill, but since that time, the old steam engines and steam pumps have been replaced with electric motors, and since the high tension power line along the canal from Ivy Rock to the mill has been in service, July 1, 1918, the electric service in the mills has been greatly extended. A pulverized coal plant has also been built and all the furnaces in the mill have been changed from hand and stoker-fired into pulverized coal burning furnaces. Alan Wood, Jr., assisted in the build- ing of the mill in 1857 and managed it until 1876, when he was elected to Congress, at which time, Howard Wood, brother of Alan, Jr., took charge. By 1901 the Alan Wood Company had attained an annual pro- duction of 25,000 tons of sheets and light plates, of both iron and steel. The firm had its own puddle mill for producing iron, and had to buy the steel billets to meet the constantly increasing demand for steel plates. Billets were hard to secure when business was brisk, and in 1900 the company was obliged to import a considerable amount. The need of a steel mill became urgent, and to meet this need, Hon. Alan Wood, Jr., urged the incorporation of a new company. This was done November 21, 1901, under the name of the Alan Wood Iron and Steel Company, Rich- ard G. Wood, his son, Alan D. Wood, and his brothers, Alan W. and Thomas D. Wood, having, in the previous year, after the death of their father, disposed of the W. Dewees Wood Company, the Wellsville mill, and the Woodson property, with the machinery which had been pur- chased to build a steel mill thereon, to the American Sheet Steel Com- pany (afterward part of the United States Steel Corporation), now associated themselves with the Alan Wood Iron and Steel Company. The company purchased a tract of land, the old Carey farm, at Ivy Rock, about a mile north of Conshohocken, and built a plant of five fifty-five-ton open hearth furnaces and a thirty-five blooming mill, which produced its first steel on June 1, 1903. On July 1, 1903, the new company took over the Alan Wood Company, thus combining the Schuylkill Iron Works and the Steel Plant in one company. Three new O. H. furnaces were added to the steel works in 1905, and a fourth one completed February, 1907, making a total of nine furnaces, with a capacity of 250,000 tons of steel a year. The need of hot metal supply then began to be pressing, and in 1909 negotiations were entered into with Richard Heckscher & Sons Company, whose blast furnaces were situated on the other side of the Schuylkill river, directly opposite the steel works. Agreement was made for the consolidation of the two com- panies, which was legally consummated December 1, 1911. In the meantime, through the Upper Merion and Plymouth Railroad Company, a terminal railroad which had been organized in 1907 by the Alan Wood Iron and Steel Company, a railroad bridge was constructed across the Schuylkill river, thus connecting the two plants. A hot metal mixer was built on the north end of the open hearth building, and by 1910 the
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corporation had the advantage of hot metal produced in its own plant, which increased the steel making capacity about thirty per cent. Since the consolidation of the two companies Messrs. Ledyard Heckscher, Stevens Heckscher, and Gustave Heckscher have represented the Heckscher inter- ests in the directorate of the steel company. The blast furnace plant has been expanded, a third blast furnace being built in 1912 (known as No. 2 since the dismantling of the old No. 2 in 1917). In 1913 a new boiler plant was added, to utilize the waste gases from the furnace and fur- nish steam for an electric turbo-generator. In 1917, to meet the increased demands of war, the new No. 3 blast furnace and ore yard was started, being completed the following year, and was ready to go in blast when the armistice was signed. The demand for pig iron ceasing at once, the furnace was not lighted until January 8, 1920. The steel works also had been expanding. In 1913 an eighty-four-inch tandem plate mill was begun, and completed the following year, making its first plate on March 31, 1914. Two heating furnaces were built in 1916, and another in 1917, making a total of six. The mill is driven by alternating current motors supplied with electricity from the power plant at Swedeland. In the open hearth department during 1915, the capacity of the old furnaces was increased from fifty-five to sixty-eight tons, and three new eighty- ton furnaces were begun. These were completed by 1917, and were of great value in supplying the war demand for steel. Waste heat boilers were erected over the new furnaces, and so efficient has been the opera- tion of the mills that the plant has been copied by several of the firm's western competitors. At the blooming mill, a new soaking pit was com- pleted in 1917, and in 1918 a new five-story modern office building was completed.
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