Industry

The Watkins Woolen Mill is among the best preserved examples of a Midwest woolen mill in nineteenth-century United States. Its machinery for preparing, spinning, and weaving wool reflects the existence of well-established textile industry in the country. It was designed and built by Waltus L. Watkins (1806-1884), a machinist and master weaver from Frankfort, Kentucky, who began operating his mill in 1861 in Clay County.

Wool was cleaned and dyed before being sent to the carding room where carding machines typical of pioneer mills prepared the fibers for spinning. Large revolving cylinders shaped the wool into a flat web of brushed fleece similar to cotton batting. Rollers then divided it into yarn-like ropes, which were wound onto large spools. The spools were mounted on machines that extended and twisted the ropes into finished yarn. Yarns were then arranged on a reel and rewound onto loom beams. After weaving, the cloth was treated in a fulling mill. Dry cloth from the fulling mill was napped, sheared, or pressed, often by machine.

Demand for woolen cloth had doubled during the Civil War, and Watkins prospered, adding a flour mill, general mill, and employee housing as part of the complex. As cloth sales declined in the 1880s, yarn sales became a major source of income. Watkins' sons continued to operate the business until the turn of the century. The family and later owners attempted to preserve the machinery, the mill, and the home until it was restored from 1964 to 1966. The mill is also a National Historic Landmark, and many of Watkins' records are in the archives of the Jackson County Historical Society in Independence.

Newell Shredder

Anonymous — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 07:39:50 +0000

Newell Shredder

(not verified) Wed, 07/25/2012 - 03:39

Society

Main Category

Sub Category

Era

Date Created

Address1

Newell Industries

Address2

530 Steves Ave

City

San Antonio

State

Country

USA

Website

http://www.asme.org/about-asme/history/landmarks/topics-m-z/solid-waste/-179-ne…

https://www.asme.org/getmedia/2c664309-172d-48d9-a822-5327e310a107/179-Newell-S…

Creator

Newell, Alton

This machine, designed by Alton S. Newell, efficiently reduced automobile bodies into scrap metal for recycling. A body was fed into the shredder at a controlled rate, and rotating hammers, driven by a 500-hp motor, shredded it into small pieces that were easily shipped. The process took about 10 minutes a car and used less energy than other shredding and crushing machines.

A one-time junkyard manager, Newell learned how to scrap cars by hand (10 hours a car). By the late 1950s, he was operating scrap processing plants across the southeast United States. Remembering metal-can shredders and grain crushers for silo storage, he began to design the automobile shredder. The quality of the resulting material allowed him to market it to steel mills for reuse.

The system that he developed by 1965 avoided pollution caused by previous methods that burned nonmetallic parts to remove them from processing. It allowed the system to reject unshreadable scrap, had a smaller affordable motor, and discharged scrap in a way that eliminated the need for large, expensive foundations. His patent was granted in 1969. The second Newell shredder, called a 36104 top-discharge shredder, is the landmark now on display at the company's plant in San Antonio.

Joshua Hendy Iron Works

Anonymous — Wed, 25 Jul 2012 07:39:34 +0000

Joshua Hendy Iron Works

(not verified) Wed, 07/25/2012 - 03:39

Society

Main Category

Sub Category

Era

Date Created

Location Country

Coordinates

37.376923, -122.024087

Address1

401 E Hendy Ave

City

Sunnyvale

State

Country

USA

Zip

94086

Website

http://www.asme.org/about-asme/history/landmarks/topics-m-z/manufacturing---1/-…

https://www.asme.org/getmedia/4c99ebb6-8005-461a-a215-0af2f8eaf17c/34-Joshua-He…

Creator

Hendy, Joshua

This ironworks exemplified the adaptability required for industrial survival in a dynamic technical environment. It was a major western producer of mechanical equipment used in mining (especially large hydraulic machines), ship propulsion, irrigation, power generation, optical telescope mounts, and nuclear research.

Joshua Hendy started California's first redwood lumber mill shortly after sailing around Cape Horn to San Francisco Bay in 1849. In 1856 he founded the Iron Works to supply Gold Rush miners with equipment and soon became a leader in the industry. The original works was destroyed by the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. After rebuilding in Sunnyvale, the plant produced mine cars, buckets, stamp mills, ore crushers, and the hydraulic "giants" used to dig the Panama Canal. During World War I, marine steam engines were produced for cargo ships. During the Depression, it survived by producing gates and valves for major dams such as Boulder, Hoover, and Grand Coulee as well as crawler tractors and freight-car wheel pullers. In 1940 the works expanded to build defense products, including a third of all engines built in the United States for Liberty Ships.

Hendy was acquired in 1946 by Westinghouse to make equipment for electrical utilities and was soon producing steam turbines, transformers, switchgear, and motors, as well as continuing production of large hydraulic equipment.