THE ORIGINS OF THE IRON WORKS

Notes for Chapter 1

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(1) The early factories located on Head Race consisted of a scale factory, a reaper factory, a sawmill, a woolen mill, a flax mill, and a flouring mill. The location of these factories can be seen on an unidentified map dated 1850, located in the Bartlett Historical Museum, Beloit, Wisconsin.

(2) Beloit Journal, November 16, 1859. According to this article plus what was implied by transactions involving the land, the likely names of this factory were: Barker and Love Iron Works, The Beloit Iron Works, Love and Otis Iron Works, D. S. Warner and Company, and The Beloit Manufacturing Company.

(3) Sereno T. Merrill, Narrative of Experiences in the Life of Sereno T. Merrill (Beloit: By the Author),1900, p. 17.

(4) Oscar T. Thompson, Home Town, Some Chapters in Reminiscence (Beloit: Beloit Historical Society, 1 42) , pp. 6,16.

(5) Beloit Journal, November 16, 1859.

(6) The first advertisement was printed in the Beloit Journal. December 28, 1858.

(7) Frederick Merk, Economic History of Wisconsin During the Civil War Decade (Madison: Publications of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1916), p. 31.

(8) Beloit Journal, December 28, 1858.

(9) Beloit Journal, November 16, 1859. The article also gives the following statistics for J. B. and 0. E. Merrill Machine  Shop for the year 1859:

Capital invested---------------------- $7,000
Value of Manufacture------------------ $6,000
Annual expense------------------------ $3,500
Number of men employed-----------------6
Number of tons of iron and steel used -30

(10) Beloit Journal, February 22, 1860

(11} Meetings began some time in February of 1860. For references see: Beloit Journal, February 15, 1860, and March 14, 1860.

(12) Beloit Journal, February 22, 1860. This article entitled
"Croaking" emphasized the pessimism that had taken hold of many Beloit citizens "The West has gone up. Beloit has gone up. The whole country is bankrupt. The railroads have ruined us. The bonds have ruined us. It remains for us but to sit down and croak. We submit whether this (is) not the spirit which many man manifest." The article went on to become a pep—talk that attempted to boost the town's morale.

(13) Janesville, Wisconsin, County Court House, Deeds, Vol. 48, page 432.

(14) This is the approximate location of the Beloit Corporation's assembly building. There is some confusion concerning the original location of 0. E. Merrill and Company. The Beloit City Directory of 1862 states that the machine shop was on the west side of Second Street between Third Street and the dam (the approximate location of the old Yates American building). Much evidence points to the conclusion that this was not the original location of 0. E. Merrill and Company. It is likely that the author of the Director mistook a structure on Tail Race for a dam. original location of the shop was actually southeast of the old Yates American building.

(15) The Straw Board Company became the Beloit Straw Board Company and is now the Beloit Box Board Company.

(16) Lockwood's Directory of the Paper Trade (New York: Howard Lockwood Publisher, 1873), pp. 109-111. In 1873 it was likely that Beloit produced more paper than the entire Fox River Valley, which possessed four mills at that time with a combined capacity of more than 19,500 pounds a day. The Directory does not list the capacity for Kimberly-Clark that year, however it was probably not that great, because the company had just started the previous year.

(17) Ibid., p. 24. Beloit and Rockton had a combined capacity of about 45,000 pounds of paper a day. The capacity of Middleton, Ohio, was about the same.

(18) Beloit Journal, December 4, 1862.

(19) Parts of this legend can be found in the following sources:

a. H. F. Tower, Pioneers Paper Making Machines (Beloit:Beloit Iron Works, 1955) p. 8. Here there is a reference to steam dryers.

b. The Book of Beloit (Beloit:. Beloit Daily News Publish ing Co., 1936), pp. 211—212. The entire story told on these pages with the exception of the reference to steam dryers.

c. A History of the Wisconsin Paper Industry (Chicago: Howard Publishing Company, 1943), p. 55. Here there is reference to additional orders for paper machinery from other midwestern paper mills.

Pioneers Paper Machines dates the conversion to building complete papermaking machines in 1862. If this was the case, it went unnoticed by the Beloit Journal, which was in the habit of monitoring city industry. The first news paper article concerning the production of complete paper— making machines by 0. E. Merrill and Company did not appear in the Beloit Journal until April 19, 1866.

(20) One such article ran in the Beloit Journal, October 25, 1866. This article was a reprint from the Chicago Republican.

(21) Beloit Journal, April 19, 1866.

(22) David Smith, History of Papermaking in the United States, 16 91-1969 (New York: Lockwood Publishing Company, 1970),

(23) Lyman Horace Weeks, History of Paper Manufacture in the United States (Lockwood Trade Journal Company, New York, 1916), pp. 260—270. Weeks weighs the pros and cons of paper profitability during the Civil War, but comes to no exact conclusion. It is sufficient to say that the increase in the number of paper mills during that time is evidence that paper mills were making good profits.

(24) Beloit Journal, August 24, 1865.

(25) A Hi story of the Wisconsin Paper Industry, p. 7. The Neenah Paper Mill was later taken over by Kimberly-Clark and Company in 1868 or 1869.

(26) Maurice Branch, "The Paper Industry in the Lake States Region, 1834-1947", (Unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Wisconsin, 1954,p. 26. Branch also writes that paper production in Wisconsin and Michigan increased 22 times during that period.

(27) Merk, pp. 187—203.

(28) Ibid, p. 203.

(29) Beloit Journal, July 30, 1863.

(30) Beloit Journal, October 25, 1866.

(31) George Houston Testimony, Second National Bank of Beloit vs The Merrill and Houston Iron Works, Janesville, Wisconsin County Court House. Hereafter, references to this case which lasted from 1883 to 1892 will be noted by naming the individual testifying.

(32) According to George Houston, the water wheel was tested three times between 1869 and 1872. Each time the Houston Water Wheel gave superior readings compared to the leading advertised wheels at that time.

(33)  Cited in the Beloit Free Press, May 13, 1871. 

(34) Beloit Free Press, September 30, 1871.

(35)Beloit Free Press, November 3, 1872.

(36) Houston Testimony.

(37) Beloit Free Press, September 30, 1871, and Beloit Free Press, November 30, 1872.

(38) $1300, 1870; $22,000, 1871; $32,000, 1872. Houston Testimony.

(39) Beloit Free Press, March 16, 1872.

(40) Beloit Free Press, July 27, 1872.

(41) During this time, most midwestern communities were jealous of the industrialized east coast. The following excerpt from the Beloit Free Press, November 3, 1872, shows how Beloit citizens gloated about the success of 0. E. Merrill and Company:

"It is a singular fact that nearly one quarter of the Houston Wheels manufactured so far have been sent to the New England States..., where also have been manufactured the heretofore favorite wheels of the country, which now find it not only impossible to prove themselves superior to this Western production, but as difficult to demonstrate an equality in the matters of power and price."

(42) Houston Testimony, Sereno T. Merrill Testimony. 

(43) Sereno T. Merrill, Narrative in the Life of Sereno T. Merrill, p. 8.

(44) Ibid., pp. 17—18.

(45) bid., pp. 19—20.

(46) Ibid.

(47)Sereno listed many of his accomplishments in his memoirs. Ibid., p. 46.

End Notes