The Cheyenne daily leader. [volume] (Cheyenne, Wyo.) 1870-1884, 1882-08-16
The Manufacture of Brass.

A significant fact is, that wherca certain
/ of manufacturing enterprise takes
firm and m~onoplizing root in the early
settlement and building up OF u town or
village, and continue under good man
agement to improve and develop in a steady
ratio for q number of years, it at last be-
comes the great and overshndowing indus
try n the business features OF the place
in which it is located. A most striking
example of this kind is furnished by the
brass industry in Waterbury, Conn, which,
from a very small beginning, has gradually
grown year after year until IL now COM
prises great and fully fitted out establish
ments, whose numerous and nice opera
tons are carried on by a large number of
workmen thoroughly cohversant with their
trade
The early settlers of Waterbury, as is
usually the case among the inhabitants of
q new and s~cantily populated region, gave
their attention almost exclusively to agri-
culture but very soon they began to engage
in a crude, uninstructed manner, in the
manufacture of brass, and ere long they
gained quite q reputation for making brass
buttons, etc. 1t would seem as If some of
their number had been mechanics in Euro
pean countries, where the workmen seldom
found opportunities to acquire more than
one particular branch of any mechanical
pursuit, and hence lacked scope and com
prehensive knowledge, being expert each
only in his little narrow speciality for
most of these primitive brass workers could
not individually perform more h n
particular portion of the necessary labor,
and only by bringing into cooperation
what each knew could they manufacture
any article in its entirety from brass. A
few, however, seem to have mastered the
business in every detail. But the majority
did not long remain in the encramping
roots. English mechanics, encouraged by
Americans to come to this country and
give our forefathers the benefit of their
trained knowledge and discipline, at last
began to emigrate to America, and their
skill combined with the native ingenuity
of the Yankee, gave IN important impetus
TO the manufacture of brass in the United
States, and particularly at Waterbury and
Turing later years, so great has been the
advancement made, that, with but few ex-
oeptions, the machines now used in brass
establishments are of home manufacture.
In Waterbury, at the present time, are
manufactured brass articles of every nize,
kind and description, from patent brass
kettles, to trimmings for %tassels, gloves,
parasols and umbrellas. Five hundred
different styles of eyelets, finished in Ger
man silver, brass or bronze, and the best
percussion caps made in the United States,
are among the principal brass manufac-
lures of the same town.
The history Of brass making in Water
bury furnishes only one of the many instan-
ces in which some industry, started with
the settlement of a place, has chung to It
and in time wonderfully developed in size
md importance. We may conclude, then,
that in choosing n location for the establish
ment of n manufactury, it may not be the
worst policy to 20 into a new settlement,
W ere no particular impulse or settled
purpose has yet been given to any branch
of business that can be widely developed,
and there make a start with the purpose,
as the phrase has it, of growing up with
the conetry.i-Ine Metal Worker.