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History of papermaking in Massachusetts

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This article addresses the history of papermaking in Massachusetts.

Crane and Company Old Stone Mill Rag Room (built c. 1844), Dalton, Massachusetts

1620–1800

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Early paper in Massachusetts was, as was common in Europe, made from cotton and linen rags.[1] As the 18th century progressed, the demand for printed books was increasingly met by local printers, so the demand for paper increased and rags became scarce.[1] One paper manufacturer in Massachusetts even issued paper with a "Save Rags' watermark.[1] The shortage was so extreme during the American Revolution, that the Committees of Safety in Massachusetts were required to appoint a rag collector in each jurisdiction.[2]

Early mills

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In 1801, Zenas Crane began making paper in Dalton, Massachusetts, which later became Crane & Company.[3] In 1857 Crane & Company began making the paper for banknotes,[4] and it was confirmed as the paper of choice for U.S. currency beginning in 1862. As of 2012, Crane & Company continues to manufacture the paper for U.S. currency.[5] By 1840 Lee was the largest paper producer, and by Zenas Crane's death in 1845, Berkshire was the largest paper producing county in the United States.[6]

The "Turkey" mill in Tyringham was built by Milton Ingersol in 1833 to produce paper from rags. In 1835 it became the firm of Platner and Smith, which in 1850 purchased the Union and Enterprise mills on the Housatonic River in Lee, Massachusetts, and another mill on the Laurel Lake outlet. These three mills were called the Castle and Laurel paper mills.[7] Platner and Smith became the largest paper manufacture in the United States.[7] Subsequently, the firm was incorporated as the Smith Paper Company.[7]

 
Municipalities and villages with paper mills in Massachusetts by the year 1938

In 1849, the Holyoke Dam was completed across the Connecticut River which started an expansion of mills, and especially paper mills throughout Massachusetts. The first of these mills, met with some resistance by the dam's investors at that time, was the Parsons Paper Company. In the subsequent decades the growth of the paper industry across Massachusetts was described as thus-[8]

For a time it seemed that paper mills sprung up like mushrooms, all up and down the streams in Lee, Tyringham, Stockbridge, Housatonic, Great Barrington, and there were times when men, seemingly bemused by the lure of this industry, erected little "one family" mills on their farms and went headlong into the business, knowing little or nothing about it and prospering little or none.

Wood pulp

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Making matchboard at the American Writing Paper Company, Mt. Holyoke, MA (c. 1940)

In 1857, the firm of Platner and Smith made paper from wood pulp, but their endeavor failed to be commercially viable because of the lengthy process used to reduce the wood to pulp and the high cost. The paper they produced was quite coarse and did not take print well.[9]

In 1866, Albrecht Pagenstecher, a German immigrant living in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, together with his brother Rudolf, bought two German-made Keller-Voelter grinders. On March 5, 1867, in nearby Curtisville, Pagenstecher was the first in the United States to manufacture commercially viable wood pulp. He sold the pulp to the Smith Paper Company which immediately produced commercial newsprint.[9] However, Pagenstecher initially made his pulp out of aspen or "popple"; however, he soon exhausted his supply of this tree and was forced to substitute with less friable softwoods, with the result that the New York World cancelled its contract for newsprint.[10]

Many of the Holyoke mills quickly converted to wood pulp, and Holyoke with twelve major paper mills became the world's largest center for papermaking.[11] Additionally the city was home to D. H. & A. B. Tower, who specialized in mills operating using the sulfite process; at one time their firm was reportedly the largest in the United States.[12] Because of its prominence in industrial papermaking, Holyoke's machinery and labor practices would be the subject of extensive study by officials and industrialists of Japan and China alike, who sought to modernize their production methods.[13][14][15][16]

Decline

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As local labor costs rose and wood became scarcer in Massachusetts, papermaking declined due in no small part to competition first from mills in well-forested Wisconsin and then from Canada.[11] Starting after World War I, paper mills in Massachusetts began to close. The industry survived by focusing on the manufacture of specialty papers, such as writing bond, which prospered until the 1970s.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c Hunter, Dard (1947) Papermaking: The History and Technique of an Ancient Craft (2nd edition) Knopf, New York, page 309, OCLC 383666 (republished in 1978 in facsimile by Dover, New York)
  2. ^ Hunter (1947) page 310
  3. ^ "The Crane Museum of Papermaking" Exploring Western Massachusetts
  4. ^ Hunter (1947) page 507
  5. ^ "The Production Process: How Money Is Made Today" Archived 2015-01-03 at the Wayback Machine United States Bureau of Printing and Engraving
  6. ^ Repurposing Old Mill Buildings: The Mass MoCA Success Story. WGBY; New England Public Media. 3 May 2019 – via Youtube.
  7. ^ a b c (February 1914) "Augustus R. Smith, of Lee, Mass., is Dead" Paper: Devoted to the manufacture, sale and use of pulp and paper 13(23): p. 25
  8. ^ Jones, Dwight E. (1966) The Jones Story Jones Division, Beloit Corp., Pittsfield, Massachusetts, OCLC 20260906
  9. ^ a b Hunter (1947) page 378
  10. ^ Recknagel, A.B.(Forestry Consultant, St. Regis Paper Company), (May 1960) "The Pulp and Paper Industry in Northern and Central New York", The Northeastern Logger 8(11): pp. 16–17, 62
  11. ^ a b Rosenberg, Chaim M. (2007) Goods for Sale: Products And Advertising in the Massachusetts Industrial Age University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, Massachusetts, page 169, ISBN 978-1-55849-580-7
  12. ^ "Emory Alexander Ellsworth". Journal of the Boston Society of Civil Engineers. III (8): 480. October 1916. In 1879 Mr. Ellsworth left the firm of Davis & Ellsworth to become principal assistant and head draftsman for D. H. & A. B. Tower, of Holyoke, who were the largest firm of paper mill architects in the country at that time, and who designed no less than twenty paper mills in the city of Holyoke alone
  13. ^ "A Japanese Paper Maker on Cheap Labor". Scientific American. Vol. LIX. September 22, 1888. p. 184.
  14. ^ "Mitsu-Bishi Paper Mills, Tokio, Japan". The World's Paper Trade Review. Vol. L, no. 4. London. July 24, 1908. p. 16. Mr. Fugino [Fujino], who spent some months in the district of Holyoke, stated that the machines supplied to the mill were of American construction
  15. ^ "Holyoke Notes". New England Stationer and Printer. Vol. XIV. March 1900. p. 50. Michiaki Kurokawa, vice-superintendent of the Fuji Paper Company, Tokio, Japan, has recently visited some of the paper mills in Western Massachusetts in company of Mr. Miller of the Cheney Bigelow Wire Works, whose new factory he had also the pleasure of inspecting. Mr. Kurokawa is having some paper mill machinery built in this country for his mill in Japan, whose product is book and news.
  16. ^ "Visiting Holyoke Mills; Chintao Chen, Representative of the Chinese Government, Making a Special Study of the Paper Industry of Holyoke". Springfield Republican. Springfield, Mass. May 24, 1906. p. 13.
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External videos
  Manufacture of Writing Paper at an unknown Holyoke mill of the American Writing Paper Company, Fox Movietone News (1919)
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