Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1873-10-30
Nail Making by Machinery

1t was about 1790 that machines for
making nails Legun to be devised on
both sides of the Atlantic England
had begun just fifty years before this TO
smelt iron by means of pit coal, and
had Developed in TIE half century .he
iron business in general, and the nail
business in particular, to such proper
tions as stimulated the desire for inn
proved processes; while in the United
States the universal practice of build
ing wooden houses, to say nothing of
ships and other structures, made it q
matter of great consequence to obtain
nails, if possible, by cheaper process
than the traditional one y forge and
anvil. An Engliahnian by the name
of Clifford, Il Bristol man, obtained a
patent in1740 for All ingeniens-eontriv-
ance of two steel rollers i'm which were
sunk i'm preston or forms Of the nails,
half of the form being in each roller, so
arranged that bar of iron passed be-
tween the rollers would como out
string of nails, the head of each being
slightly attached to the point OF the
next, to be then separated hy nippeTs.
This process, whether simple or with
several rows of indentations i'll the
rollers, was found to be too expensive
to become real Improvement.
Just about the same time several
persons in the United States began to
work out tile idea of cutting nails from
strips or rolled hoops of iron. 1t Is
sometimes said that Benjamin CGch-
ran, who WAS Il shopnlate of Eli Whit
ney (more fortunate as the inventor of
the cotton-gin,) made the first machine
of the kind, in 1890. At any rate, be-
tween 1874, when the first patent for 4
nail.cutting machine was issued to one
Pearson, of New York, and 1917, more
than 100 patents We're issued in this
country fo; nail-cutting machines and
improvements. in the first machine
the nails were cut of from Il slip or
hoop, and headed afterward by Il ham
mer; but as early rs lIS6, two patents
were issued for cutting and heading
machines combined-one to Garretson,
of Pennsylvania, and one TO Chandler,
of Maryland. The machine afterward
patented by Jesse Reed, of Massachu
sets, with some later Improvements.
is essentially the machine most gener-
ally used at present. Many of these
early inventors spent large sums of
money upon their several machines,
and It was estimated in 1910, when
patents we're taken out in England on
the machines invented in Massachu
sets, that 81 200, 900 had been spent by
inventors up to that time, when good
machine made about 100 nails 4
minute. yf
The English have not been slow to
avail themselves of the results of YAM
kee invention. Nails are now made
by machinery in many towns and vii
lages throughout Great Britain; but the
| principal seats of the trade are at
! Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Bills
ton, Dudley, and small district in
Derbyshire. The British consumption
of these products is immense; and in
1867, they were exported from Great
! Britain of nails, screws and rivets,
Is, I II tons, Of the value of 81 ,64S, 800. q
| We have not yet the returns ofthe
late census in regard TO this industry,
but there are probably not far from
5000 nail machines in actual working
in the United States, and the annaal
product cannot be less, but is probably
more than 100, ,C0Otons. This is pecu-
| liariy an American industry, born on
the soil, and has every opportunity OF
development. The business is extern
siyely carried on in the Schuylkill iron
region of Pennsylvania, where the
pigs go direct from the furnace to the
bloomary, thence to the rolling mill,
and thence through the Sitting and
nail-cutting machines, so that all the
operations from ore to nails are carried
on in single locality.
Minneapolis claims more and better
! | 80 ;,,h, ss