In The Cradle of Industry and Liberty

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@ Above: David Rittenhouse, in a 1796 painting by Charles Willson Peale. Rittenhouse was a brilliant scientist, inventor, astronomer, and builder of scientific instruments. In 1792 he became the first director of the U.S. Mint, one of Philadelphia’s early federal manufacturing operations. PAINTING IN NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. Below: Detail from 1767 Philadelphia County Commissioners tax list, showing the taxable assets of sailmaker John Malcome, which included “5 Negros.” KISLAK CENTER FOR SPECIAL COLLECTIONS, RARE BOOKS AND MANUSCRIPTS, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA. MID- CENTURY PROSPERITY By the mid-eighteenth century Philadelphia had become the largest and most prosperous city in America. As the city grew in this period, so did its manufacturing sector. Every manner of craftsmen could be found in Philadelphia in the 1750s and 1760s, from occupations such as shipwrights, brick makers, and brewers that had been part of the city since its founding, to makers of fine furniture and sophisticated tools and instruments. David Rittenhouse, born in 1732 into the family that had founded America’s first paper mill, set up a shop as a young man on the family farm outside the city, where he made and sold clocks and surveying instruments. A brilliant self-taught astronomer and inventor, by the time he moved into Philadelphia in 1770 he was one of America’s most renowned scientists and a highly regarded maker of telescopes and advanced scientific devices. Other high-end craftsmen made fine products for Philadelphia’s emerging upper class in the mid-eighteenth century. Irish immigrant Philip Syng was a well-known silversmith whose work graced the homes of many of Philadelphia’s leading colonial families. An inkstand he made in 1752, now on display at Independence Hall, was used for signing both the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution. The firm of Bonnin & Morris operated America’s first commercial porcelain factory, the American China Manufactory, in Southwark for a few years in the early 1770s. They made exquisite bowls and dishes before going out of business, due in part to England’s Wedgewood company flooding the Philadelphia market with similar wares and drastically undercutting Bonnin & Morris’ prices. “ THE LOWER SORT” At the other end of the economic scale, among “the lower sort” as they were then called, were those who did the grunt work in the city’s industries: the apprentices, indentured servants, day laborers, and slaves. The indentured service system was particularly important in the industrial development of early Pennsylvania. A young man would be bound to work for a craftsman for a period of time, usually four to seven years, in the course of which, in exchange for his labor, he would be taught a trade and given room and board by his master. Poor young Europeans who sought a better life in America would pay for their passage by indenturing themselves, the men as tradesmen and the women usually as house servants. Many of Philadelphia’s colonial craftsmen learned their trades through this system. Slaves were another important source of labor for city industries. The 1767 Philadelphia tax list shows 748 enslaved African Americans working in dozens of industries in the city. Manufacturers who depended on slave labor at this time included brick maker John Coats, who had six slaves; sailmaker John Malcolme, with five; baker William Hodge, with six; and the city’s largest slave owner, John Phillips, who had thirteen enslaved workers at his ropewalk in Southwark. Many of the city’s free blacks (Philadelphia had the largest population of free African Americans of any city in the colonial era) also labored in its manufacturing establishments. BREWERIES The city’s breweries continued to produce beer throughout the colonial period. The earliest breweries, dating from 1685, were mostly concentrated in the Dock Creek area, but over time breweries came to be located in other parts of the city and in the outlying districts. Some thirty breweries were started in Philadelphia at various times in the colonial era, at least six of which were still active on the eve of the Revolutionary War. In addition to making beer for local consumption, Philadelphia brewers were major exporters to both American and overseas markets. The Boston Evening Post noted on October 31, 1774 that a shipment of Philadelphia porter had just arrived in Boston and that it was “little if any inferior” to that in London. John Adams, in Philadelphia in 1775 representing Massachusetts in the Continental Congress, wrote to his wife back home that “I drink no cider, but feast on Philadelphia beer.” IN THE CRADLE OF INDUSTRY AND LIBERTY 28
INDUSTRY INVENTORS Manufacturers in this period were often inventors as well. Toolmaker Job T. Pugh and his father-in-law formed a company in 1774 to make augers. Pugh later invented the double twist auger, which proved much more efficient in boring through materials than the flat auger generally in use at that time. The new tool proved highly popular and the Job T. Pugh Company went on to make augers in Philadelphia into the 1920s. New machines to speed the spinning of cotton and wool, known as “jennies,” were of particular interest in late colonial America. The April 1775 issue of The Pennsylvania Magazine included a detailed drawing of a “Machine for spinning twenty-four threads of cotton or wool at one time,” with a note that it was constructed in Philadelphia by Christopher Tully “who first made and introduced this machine in this country.” Tully’s jenny was among several American efforts to replicate the new textile manufacturing devices then in use in England, efforts that would intensify in the 1780s and 1790s. The same month that Christopher Tully’s cotton jenny appeared in The Philadelphia Magazine, musical instrument maker John Behrent, a German immigrant, advertised in the Pennsylvania Packet that he had “just finished for sale, [an] extraordinary fine instrument, by the name of Piano Forte.” This was the first piano manufactured in America. Eight years later the same newspaper carried a notice that: “James Julian, lately arrived in this city…informs the public, that he makes the great North-American Forte-Pianos, the mechanical part of which is entirely of his own invention.” These newspaper notices signaled the birth of yet another industry in which Philadelphia would play a significant role in later years: piano making. IMPORTATION AND CONFRONTATION Despite these innovations and the overall growth in manufacturing activity in Philadelphia in the late colonial period, most finished goods continued to be imported rather than made locally. Cloth, tools, instruments, and other finished products were either not made in sufficient quantity or quality to meet local demand, or could be made much more cheaply abroad. Such goods were usually obtained from the mother country, England. John Penn, grandson of William Penn, described in a 1767 letter a manufacturing operation that had been set up in Philadelphia three years earlier “for making of sail-cloth, ticking [tightly woven cloth], and linens.” Penn noted that the business was soon discontinued because “the high price of labour will not allow any of the articles to be made at so cheap a rate as those of the same quality and goodness made in England are sold for by the retailers here.” One particularly important item that was made in England and imported to Philadelphia was, fittingly, remade in the city. In 1751 the Pennsylvania Assembly ordered from a London foundry a bell for the new tower then being built on the State House. Upon its arrival in August 1752, the bell cracked and had to be melted down and recast by two Philadelphia iron founders, John Pass and John Stow. Now known as the “Liberty Bell,” it is one of America’s most important symbols and Philadelphia’s most popular tourist attraction. @ Above: The April 1775 issue of Pennsylvania Magazine included a drawing of “A New invented Machine for Spinning of Wool or Cotton.” The drawing was “Engraved for the Pennsylvania Magazine by Christopher Tully [of Philadelphia], who first Made and Introduced this Machine in the Country.” JOHN CARTER BROWN LIBRARY AT BROWN UNIVERSITY. Below: Advertisement by John Behrent in the March 13, 1775 Pennsylvania Packet that he “Has just finished for sale an extraordinary fine instrument, by the name of PianoForte.” This was the first piano manufactured in America. NEWSPAPER COLLECTION, HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF PENNSYLVANIA. CHAPTER TWO 29
Page 1 and 2: IN THE CRADLE OF INDUSTRY AND LIBER
Page 3 and 4: IN THE CRADLE OF INDUSTRY AND LIBER
Page 5 and 6: CONTENTS 4 FOREWORD 6 ACKNOWLEDGEME
Page 7 and 8: @ Michael A. Nutter, Former Mayor,
Page 9 and 10: For the historical images that enli
Page 11 and 12: This is a history of manufacturing
Page 13 and 14: While other manufacturing centers w
Page 15 and 16: @ Above: Workers at Midvale Steel p
Page 17 and 18: aircraft that dates to the earliest
Page 19 and 20: would hold into the early nineteent
Page 21 and 22: technology, transportation, and com
Page 23 and 24: age had joined the Religious Societ
Page 25 and 26: Philadelphians lived in the city’
Page 27 and 28: “and many boats, which are useful
Page 29: Quaker merchant Thomas Masters purc
Page 33 and 34: Quaker upbringing. Known as the “
Page 35 and 36: MAKING A CASE FOR AMERICAN MANUFACT
Page 37 and 38: up cotton manufacturing operations
Page 39 and 40: After receiving a patent for the en
Page 41 and 42: The Globe Mill on the Cohocksink Cr
Page 43 and 44: @ Opposite: Detail from 1849 map sh
Page 45 and 46: of the town’s total population. S
Page 47 and 48: On a positive note, a group of Fran
Page 49 and 50: factories with a powerful energy so
Page 51 and 52: and flagship for Commodore Matthew
Page 53 and 54: @ Left: Penn Steam Engine & Boiler
Page 55 and 56: Garrett & Eastwick Locomotive Works
Page 57 and 58: seen. The episode brought Hagner co
Page 59 and 60: United States, the nation’s de-fa
Page 61 and 62: The turn of the twentieth century p
Page 63 and 64: in various categories at the Centen
Page 65 and 66: makers, 20 stove manufacturers, 12
Page 67 and 68: and lace, in which Kensington manuf
Page 69 and 70: through exploitation of their worke
Page 71 and 72: @ Left: Yard locomotives at Midvale
Page 73 and 74: among the largest in the world at t
Page 75 and 76: factory nearby. This became the lar
Page 77 and 78: she writes of the sad circumstances
Page 79 and 80: @ Clockwise, starting from the top:
Page 81 and 82:
BEER AND TOBACCO Beer making contin
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MILK AND ICE CREAM Like any major c
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the Philadelphia Phillies. Located
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and a half later from a city of man
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After major cutbacks in the auto in
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into countless lunchboxes throughou
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hangar space in 1980 at Northeast P
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is the nation’s largest manufactu
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fuel for local industries, current
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centralize operations in the buildi
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BOOKS AND ARTICLES Bridenbaugh, Car
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Sutcliffe, Andrea J. Steam: The Unt
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Penrose, Bartholomew & Thomas shipy
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PARTNERS IN BUILDING PHILADELPHIA H
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@ Left: An early Kingsbury advertis
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PARTNERS IN BUILDING PHILADELPHIA 1
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Aerodynamics. The name DeVal was a
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packaging and shipping; and nondest
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Another step in product advancement
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PHILLY CASE From the basement of a
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Under Yost’s direction, The Rowla
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The story of Tioga Pipe is a classi
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neighborhood. The increased product
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Humphrys is one of the oldest manuf
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The Doherty brothers realized, to s
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Centrally located off the Pennsylva
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Jersey and Delaware. Outgrowing the
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Philadelphia is famous for its appr
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injection molded plastic to enter t
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had expanded from smaller pieces fo
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for many years and they know the fi
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furnace as well as a custom flame h
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and Salmon Streets. The company wou
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The company capitalized on the stra
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discharges. The supercapacitors are
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products that are custom designed t
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Today manufacturing matters, now mo
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LEADERSHIP SPONSORS Historical Publ
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