USA > Vermont > Windham County > Rockingham > History of the town of Rockingham, Vermont, including the villages of Bellows Falls, Saxtons River, Rockingham, Cambridgeport and Bartonsville, 1753-1907, with family genealogies > Part 37
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CHAPTER XXIX.
EARLY PAPER-MAKING-PULP MANUFACTURE-OTHER PROMI- NENT INDUSTRIES
The manufacture of paper is to-day the leading industry of the town, and except for a short period near the middle of the last century it has been so since 1802.
The first paper-mill in New England was located in the town of Milton, Mass., on the banks of the Pumkatoag brook, just above its union with the Neponset river, and was built about 1783. It was erected by two brothers named Crane, whose names have been perpetuated in the best standard brands of writing paper for over a hundred years.
The first paper-mill in the vicinity of Bellows Falls was built in the year 1799 by Bill Blake. This mill was located at Alstead, N. H., which village took its early name, "Paper Mill village," from that fact. Alstead is five miles from Bellows Falls. Mr. Blake came to Bellows Falls in 1802, and, procuring a right to water-power from the "Company for Rendering Connecticut River Navigable by Bellows Falls," built the first paper-mill in the state of Vermont directly in the rear of where the stone grist-mill now stands, about where No. 8 machine of the International Paper company is located. It was a small, primitive affair, burned in IS12, and replaced at once by Mr. Blake with a mill one hun- dred and forty-four feet long and thirty-two feet wide, with a number of ells and storehouses. A portion of the mill was only two stories high, but the larger part was three stories. This mill was destroyed by fire July 12, 1846, from which date the site was unoccupied, and there was no paper-mill in Bellows Falls until 1870. In January of that year, William A. Russell of Lawrence, Mass., started the first modern paper machine under the hill, Albert C. Moore, now of the Moore & Thompson Paper company, being his first machine tender. This original machine is still running and known as
Earliest Paper-mills
. +13
"No. 7" or the "Mayflower." It enjoys the distinction of being the first machine on which paper was ever successfully made from wood pulp, an account of which is given in the history of the early days of the Fall Mountain Paper com- pany. A year later the machine now known as " No. 8" was brought here from Bartonsville and set to running. These machines have been rebuilt a number of times, but the main parts are the same and have been running almost continu- ously since those dates. They are known as "cylinder" machines.
The first "Foudrinier" machine was put in in the fall of 1872. During the year 1872, the first machine for making heavy cardboard was set up, under a contract with the Denni- son Manufacturing company of Boston and New York for making tag stock and "card middles." Since that time, in thirty-four years, there has not been a single month when large shipments have not been made of this stock from Bel- lows Falls to that company. There are now a large number of mills here and considerable amounts of capital are invested in the manufacture of paper and pulp.
When Bill Blake built his first mill here in 1802, the principles and methods of manufacture were widely different from those of to-day. There are here now a number of machines that run off a sheet of paper continuously from Monday morning until Saturday night at a rate of from four hundred to four hundred and fifty feet per minute, the sheet varying from thirty-one to one hundred and eight inches in width. A machine, said to be the largest in the world, is now running at Rumford Falls, Me., which makes a sheet one hundred and fifty inches wide, running four hundred and fifty feet per minute. The combined product of the mills of Bellows Falls at the present time averages about fifteen hundred tons of finished paper per week, which is shipped to all parts of the world, and about one thousand tons of wood pulp. Fifteen million feet of logs, largely spruce, are here converted into pulp annually.
It is interesting to contrast this with the methods employed
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History of Rockingham
at the time Mr. Blake's first mill was built here. The pro- duct of that mill at first was wholly writing and book paper. The stock used in making the paper was clean white rags, sorted at tables by girls, and cut fine on old scythes set into the tables. It was not necessary to bleach them, and the fine stock went directly to the beating engine for macerating, that process being then about the same as now. The "stuff" (as it is called in paper-mills), after being prepared, was run into tanks standing two or three feet high, and the paper from this point was made wholly by hand instead of by the com- plicated machinery of to-day. In a small frame, made to correspond with the size of the sheet of paper to be produced, was fixed a wire cloth or screen similar in grade to the wires now in use on the large machines. With this sieve in hand, the papermaker stood beside the vat, and dipping it into the the stuff, enough adhered to it to form the sheet when taken out. This sieve was then turned upside down on a felt of the same size, a paper board was laid on the sheet, and another felt was then put on the board, and the operation repeated until two hundred or three hundred sheets had been made.
The pile, then three or four feet high, was placed in a large press with an immense screw similar to that in a cider mill press, and by the aid of long levers in the head of the screw, the water was squeezed out of the pile. The sheets of paper were peeled off the felts and hung up singly, on poles, in a drying room with open sides like a corn crib, until thoroughly dried. They were then taken down and each sheet was scraped with a knife to remove all imperfections, in what was termed a "saul room."
A few years ago, a number of curiously worn stones were found in the vicinity of the eddy below the mill by the late Stephen R. Wales, who at once recognized them as being those used by the girls in sharpening their knives with which to scrape this paper many years ago, and they also used them to sharpen the pieces of scythes with which the rags were cut. Mr. Wales used to work in the mill as a boy. The process of putting on the finish was the same in
RESTA
BILL BLAKE, WESTMINSTER, VT
BILL BLAKE'S FIRST PAPER MILL at " THE FOREST," ERECTED IS24. From a Cut on a Paper wrapper.
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Advancement in Paper-making.
principle as to-day, by heavy calender rolls, from which the sheets went to the finishing room to be packed and shipped to market. The amount of product from this method of manu- facture was very small, and prices were of necessity extremely high as compared with those of to-day.
In 1820, an inventor came to Bellows Falls who had partially perfected a machine for taking the place of the hand work, and the hand sieve. It was the pioneer of the present cylinder and Foudrinier machines in general use. He arranged with Bill Blake to test his principle and one of his machines was built. While it was in process of building, feeling ran high against the inventor among the old employees of the mill here, because they forsaw the coming change, which would, as they thought, leave them out of work. At one time it was seriously discussed that the proper thing for them to do would be to "ride him out of town on a rail," but the machine was installed and made a revolution in methods of paper manufacture, without lasting detriment to labor.
In 1817, Mr. Blake having established a printing office, and owning the first newspaper here, added to his plant facilities for making news paper, the only difference being in the size of the sheet. The old files of this newspaper show this to be " deckel edge" or the peculiar, rough, saw-like edge always seen on oldest sheets of writing paper, and often seen on the edges of the oldest books published. This was the natural result of making the paper in a hand sieve in the above manner, and leaving the edges uncut.
It is an extremely fashionable edge for paper of to-day, but it has now to be made artificially after it has been cut from the large rolls in which it is finished, except in some instances when the edges of the roll are left "deckel." A number of families in this vicinity have old books for which the paper was made here, the printing and binding also being done here. The first edition of the Bible printed in Vermont, in quarto form, was published here on paper made at Mr. Blake's old-fashioned mill. For some years, Bellows Falls led all other places in the state in the number of books and
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History of Rockingham
papers published. The rags were gathered in this vicinity by pedlars' carts, and every process of manufacture to the finished book was performed here.
The paper-mill was often obliged to shut down for lack of operators, or because of its being impossible to procure raw material. There was no systematic method of collecting rags and much of the product of the different mills was carted about the country and exchanged for rags, and a little money. While the Colonies were under English rule, it was the policy of the mother country to repress Colonial manufac- tures. The few mills that grew up were forced to their full capacity during the Revolutionary war and threatened with extinction when peace permitted the importation of foreign goods, thus limiting by competition the sale of domestic manufacture. When Mr. Blake's mill was erected, white rags commanded a high price, and finished paper for either book or newspaper use sold for twenty-five cents per pound. During the the Civil war white rags were worth twelve cents and colored, eight cents per pound. To-day, because of the substitution of wood pulp in the manufacture of paper, the leading newspapers can procure their supply of paper on five and ten year contracts for from two to two and a half cents per pound. In early days, it is said that three months time was required from the reception of the rags into the mill before the finished paper from them could be placed upon the market. A year or two ago an experiment was made and successfully carried out in the taking of a tree standing one morning and putting it through the pulp and paper-mills so that the public was reading the news from its product the next morning. It is possible now to do this in from six to twelve hours.
For two years previous to 1824, the average freight rate to and from Boston on rags, paper, salt, and other heavy freight was $13.50 per ton, it being transported wholly by team, while the cost was about the same from Hartford, Conn., although it was largely transported there by boats. The obstacles to navigation of the river, tolls of canals, etc.,
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Fall Mountain Paper Company
added heavy charges to the cost. To-day freight is trans- ported from Boston at $2.80, and Hartford at $3 as a regular price, while special contracts for large amounts can be made much lower.
THIE FALL MOUNTAIN PAPER COMPANY
The industry having at this time the largest amount of taxable property in this town, and employing an important number of workmen, is the "Fall Mountain Mills" of the International Paper company. The latter-named corporation is the largest producer of paper and pulp in the world, hav- ing mills at thirty-one other places throughout the country, the total output of the combined mills being an average of 1,650 tons of finished paper per day. The business was established in Bellows Falls under the leadership of the late Hon. William A. Russell of Lawrence, Mass., who, in 1869, secured control of the valuable water-power owned by the Bellows Falls Canal company, and proceeded to develop it in a masterly and successful manner. He later was the leading spirit in the conception and organization of the gigantic combination known as the International Paper company, and was its first president.
Mr. Russell, when he first came to Bellows Falls, had two partners, named Alberto Pagenstecher and George B. Maynadier. They remained with him but a short time, and in later years his most efficient partner in all his varied enter- prises was A. N. Burbank, the present treasurer of the Inter- national Paper company located in New York. Until 1872, Mr. Russell's various enterprises here had different names, and in that year the companies were consolidated into one, and thereafter known as the Fall Mountain Paper company. These companies were the Bellows Falls Paper company, New England Pulp company, William Russell & Son and Willard Russell. From the time of Mr. Russell's coming to Bellows Falls, the growth of his industries here was so rapid that when the Fall Mountain Paper company was merged into the International Paper company in 1898 the capitaliza-
28
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History of Rockingham
tion of the plant at Bellows Falls was figured at $4,500,000, and the business and value of the plant has materially increased each year since then.
The first thought of Mr. Russell to come to Bellows Falls was caused by his observations in passing through here upon trains and noting the dilapidated and unused condition of the canal property. He was looking for power with which to develop the new industry of making pulp and paper from wood. This industry was then in its infancy, and was con- sidered by most good judges as a visionary idea. It has been said that Mr. Russell was the first man who successfully made paper from wood, but there are four other parties for whom the same claim is made. It is probable all are about equal in this regard, having been at work at about the same time upon different devices for the purpose. Voelteer, a German patentee, had interested Mr. Russell in the. enterprise, and in the dividing of the territory under his United States patents he gave to Mr. Russell all of the territory of New England to develop. Warner Miller, a noted capitalist of New York, also became interested in the project.
Mr. Russell had secured some water-power at Lawrence, Mass., and at Franklin, N. H., and had built small mills in both places during the year 1868, and purchased others. Paper had not been successfully made from wood, but his faith in the possibilities was so great that he continued branching out.
Mr. Russell's first visit to Bellows Falls was April 15, 1869, and on that date he closed a contract, the results of which have been the prosperity and growth of the village which has been so marked ever since. He often in after years told the story of this first visit and the peculiar action of the eccentric local character, Jabez Hills, that made his coming here to locate his industries possible.
Mr. Hills was the most peculiar character in the history of the town. He was miserly and had accumulated much real estate in different parts of the village. Part of this was
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William .1. Russell Locates at Bellows Falls
the mill site and rights to power of the paper-mill of Green & Fleming, which had been burned in 1846. It included just the territory now covered by machine rooms numbered six, seven, and eight of the International Paper company, with the connecting engine and bleach rooms. Where the old bleach room now stands was the location of the first office of the Fall Mountain Paper company, presided over by the late Lewis P. Moody.
On the date above mentioned, Mr. Russell visited Bellows Falls for the first time, not knowing a person in town. The mills then here were as follows: The grist-mill as it is to-day ; just north stood a frame machine shop of Clark & Chapman, where the John T. Moore & Son's paper-mill now is. A little farther north was a brick foundry connected with the shop, this business being the predecessor of the present extensive works of the Bellows Falls Machine company located on the island. The other frame shop stood where the Wyman Flint Sons, & Co. paper-mill now does. It was three stories high, the first occupied by the machine shop of Vermont Valley railroad, the only shop they had on their line, the second story by Albert Derby as a manufactory of doors, sash and blinds, and the third story as a cabinet shop by William Conant. North of this, between the present Robertson Paper company's mill and the International mill, stood a saw-mill with its old up-and-down saw, and a pond for storing logs, with a lumber yard near. These were the only mills here in 1869.
On the day mentioned, Mr. Hills signed the only contract he ever made which went upon the town record. Although he died owning many pieces of real estate, all of which were accumulated by foreclosures instead of purchase, there is no record of his ever selling a business piece of property in the forty years that he was a large factor in the business of the place. The nearest he ever came to it was upon the above date when he leased the power he owned under the hill to William A. Russell. This was the beginning of the interest of Mr. Russell in the village of Bellows Falls.
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History of Rockingham
Mr. Russell alighted from the noon train, finished his business, and went north the same evening. He first walked down around the canal and the old foundation. After a care- ful survey he inquired the owner of the site of the burned paper-mill and was told that it was Jabez Hills, and that he lived in the Pettes block. He went there without finding him, but was told later that he would find the old man down by the eddy catching flood-wood. He went there, found a man answering the description and asked if he would lease him the mill privilege. Mr. Hills looked him over sharply, asked a few questions and told him he would do so, and that he would meet him at lawyer J. D. Bridgman's office in an hour. He then returned to his vocation of pulling flood- wood from the river. Mr. Russell inquired his way to Mr. Bridgman's office, which was then in Mammoth block over the present location of Fenton's store. Mr. Bridgman, when told of the arrangement, laughed at Mr. Russell, saying Mr. Hills never had been known to make a contract and he never sold property, relating the many idiosyncrasies of the man. They waited, however, and in half an hour Mr. Hills was seen coming up the street, but as he went to the Pettes block Mr. Bridgman reminded Mr. Russell that he had probably seen the last of him. He returned, however, within the time, and in a few minutes the contract, or lease, was signed and delivered. The town clerk's records show that it was filed that day at 2 P. M., showing the quick decision of Mr. Russell, as well as the unheard-of action of Mr. Hills. It resulted in Mr. Russell's building up the local business of the Fall Mountain Paper company, and making of Bellows Falls a village that to-day is exceeded by but few places in the country in the amount of its annual production of paper. Through his influence many other industries and firms have been induced to locate here and to erect extensive mills.
The terms of this contract were exceptionally advan- tageous to Mr. Russell, the lease being for ten years of the water privilege of the old paper-mill, and all its rights, at a rental of only $200 per year, payable quarterly, with the
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First Pulp-mill Built
option of purchase at any time within the ten years at a price of only $3,000. Mr. Hills dying in 1871, Mr. Russell at once bought the property of his estate. The possibilities of the power, not then developed or in condition to use, in this way becoming known to Mr. Russell, he soon after bought of ex-Gov. S. W. Hale and E. F. Lane of Keene a con- trolling interest in the Bellows Falls Canal company that owned the canal and water privileges. Within a few years he spent large amounts in dredging and enlarging the canal, raising the dam, and giving much more power. This he utilized to great advantage to himself and to the town, which has grown rapidly and steadily ever since that date. Had Mr. Hills not done differently that day from what he did at any other time in his life, and had Mr. Russell sought his location elsewhere for the use of his energy and the building up of his industries, what would have been the probable present status of Bellows Falls as a manufacturing centre ?
Within a week from the date of the signing of this con- tract between Mr. Hills and Mr. Russell, the foundations of the first pulp-mill were commenced, and it was started in October of the same year under the name of the " New Eng- land Pulp Co." It was located where the present engine room No. 4 of the International company is to-day, about fifty feet east of the Adams grist-mill. The building was a small one and the devices for pressing the wood against the grindstones were primitive when compared with the power- ful machines of to-day for the same purpose.
Mr. Russell died early in January, 1899, and the many stories told by A. N. Burbank of the various defeats and suc- cesses they encountered are interesting. Mr. Russell's unvary- ing. optimism and courage, during the experiments which covered a number of years before it could be said without question that it was possible to make paper from wood, would make an important chapter in the history of the development of this great industry.
A story often told by the late A. H. Fisher of Mr. Russell's aggressive persistence illustrates that phase of his
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History of Rockingham
character. Mr. Fisher was employed by him in a mill that had been making but one ton of pulp per day, which he was soon able to increase to two. The next time Mr. Russell came to see the mill he said, "Fisher, can't you make three tons?" Mr. Fisher worked hard and the next time Mr. Russell came he was making three tons, but when he asked him, "Fisher, can't you make five tons?" the reply came quickly, "Perhaps I can make it, but by G -- I can't make twenty."
In 1872, the Fall Mountain Paper company was incor- porated by William Russell, William A. Russell, James H. Williams, George W. Russell and A. N. Burbank. The first paper to be made in Bellows Falls for the use of the daily press was made in the month of July, 1873, for the Boston Herald and Baltimore American, with which great papers the company made standing contracts. With the Herald the contract was for the furnishing of ten tons of finished paper of a certain grade each day for ten years, and it was carried out in every detail, a special mill being erected for the purpose.
To a small beginning different mills have been added until now the average daily output by the local Fall Mountain Mills is one hundred tons of finished paper used largely by the great dailies of the world.
THE VERMONT FARM MACHINE COMPANY
In July, 1868, the Vermont Farm Machine company, which is now one of the most important manufacturing indus- tries of the town, was started in Bellows Falls under the name "Hartford Sorghum Machine company." It was located in the second story of the old Town's livery building which stood on the north side of Bridge street, west of the canal. The building was taken down in 1905 and replaced by the present larger livery stable. The company occupied a room in the second story of the ell which had been previously used for a billiard room and bar. Its first officers were James B. Williams of Glastonbury, Conn., president, and F. G. Butler of Bellows Falls, secretary.
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Vt. Farm Machine Co. Incorporated
The company was organized for the purpose of manu- facturing the Cook sugar evaporator, first made with wooden sides and later improved by J. B. Williams by adding iron sides. This evaporator was fully covered by patents and soon attained world-wide reputation. As late as 1893 its product was selected at the World's Fair in Chicago as the standard by which the other exhibits of maple sugar and syrup were judged. Only four or five men were employed at first. The sale of the device was remarkably successful and soon the manufacture of horse-rakes was added, and, as a branch of the business, mowing-machines, harrows, and cultivators were sold.
The name was changed to the Vermont Farm Machine company when incorporated, Februay 15, 1873. The manu- facture of the celebrated " Cooley Creamer " was taken up in February, 1877, and proved a phenomenal success. The demand for these and other dairy implements was so great that the company discontinued manufacturing rakes and has since confined itself largely to dairy implements. In 1889 the Davis swing churn was an important branch of manu- facture, and at the present time the U. S. cream separator is sent from.here to all countries of the world.
The one primitive room over the stable early became inadequate, and the company moved into a small building erected for it near the west end of the Rutland railroad bridge across the canal, on Canal street. This, in turn, was out- grown, and the Bellows Falls Canal company erected for its use the five-story brick building "under the hill," the most southerly of the present mills. This building was first built with four stories only, and the expansion of the business readily occupied the whole building except the basement. In this building the company suffered a serious loss in the destruction of their plant by fire March 8, 1883, but the building was quickly replaced and occupied, with an added story. In 1889 the large buildings at present occupied on the island were erected, and have been enlarged at various times as the business has increased. The manufactory and
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