New Britain herald. [microfilm reel] (New Britain, Conn.) 1890-1976, 1918-11-11
Berlin News
{ Continued from Fifth Page.)

as was the grandfather of Jedidial,
Simeon's father and lived at the north
end of the village of Berlin, where
Simeon was born in 1865. Here he
grew up q farmers boy and the first
thing we have q record Of his doing is
old he shouldered his gun and walked
all the way to Saybrook to enlist in
the Continental Army. Upon his az
rival, rumors had preceded him that
CORVALLIS had surrendered and tho
officer in charge refused to enlist
him. He returned to Berlin to the
farm, soon had 4 farm OF bis own Of
about so acres and in 1895 purchased
land adjoining his farm on Spruce
Brook or which there was an ole
fashioned saW-mill. Soon after the
purchase, besides continuing to saw
lumb he began making scythes,
building all addition to the mill Of
two stories above the basement and
using the latter for Il forging room.
'"rhere is nothing on record to tell
us when he first began to make
pistols nor have we any information
IS to where he learned the trade, but
We do know that one Elias Beckley
had small gun shop about a mile
from his home and it is proba BILE that
he had worked there at some time
and developed what he must have had
to q marked degree, a natural apti-
tude for mechanics.
He had progressed far enough in
the art of pistol making in his own
shop to get a contract from the gov
eminent on March 9, 1893, for 500
horseman's pistols and on Feb. 6,
1900, he entered into a second con-
tract for 1900 similar pistols to be
delivered within two years. He con-
tinued the manufacture of arms under
government contracts to the end OF
his life; these contracts extending
over an unbroken period of fifty
three years, covering sixteen admin
STATIONS, from that of John Adams
to Willard Fillmore's, representing
both political parties, and character
lied throughout by the utmost har-
mony and satisfactory service on his
part. In fact, through all this long
period of business relations between
Colonel North and the government, he
never had an arm rejected nor it's
material or workmanship questioned.
'He manufactured pistols in the
Berlin shop until 1914 and continued
to run it for the making of forgings
for his firearms under the superin-
tendency of his son until 1843. The
sons health failing, the shop was1
closed at that time, the buildings
were swept away by a food in 1857,
and nothing remains there today to
indicate that less than a century ago
it was the sight of one of the busiest
factories in this region. At one time
over one hundred men were employed
there, a large force for those days
TN 1908 Colonel North suggested to
the governm ent that if he could make
his parts interchangeable and stand
artize them, he could make them bet
ter and cheaper. This is the first doc
umentary evidence, SO far as we know,
of the thought of the principle of
standardization of parts in an Aneri-
can factory,-a, principle so common
and necessary in present day manu- !
facture that no shop could run with |
out its application.
I'm 1913 Colonel North went to |
Washington and there showed the |
Ordnance Department the advantage |
of using this method and received at |
once a contract for twenty thousand !
pistols, the largest contract the gov |
eminent had ever given for this small |
arm. In this contract he specifically |
agreed to make every part so that it |
would be interchangeable with every |
other like part on any one of the |
twenty thousand.
The capacity of the Berlin shop be- !
in Inadequate to fill SO large an order
prom pity, Colonel North Immediately
purchased fifty acres of land at Stad-
a in 1pto a
new factory, equipping it complete
with new machinery of his own inven-
ton and making it up to date in every
respect. This at a cost to himself Of
over a hundred thousand dollars. To
the parts he had to invent
and make his own jigs and the first
milling machine was made and used
in his Berlin factory.
Pistol making was a difficult and
intricate art, and the government re-
qulrem entS were rigid as a reading OF
any of their contracts will show. Prior
to his time firearms had been made in
small shops, the parts slowly ham
nered out by hand, mostly in local !
shops where some artisans
specialized as gunsmiths.
The Middletown factory was used
for pistol making until 1928 and then
Colonel North changed to the manu-
facture Of rifles and carbines. In 1919
he received another order for twenty
thousand pistols, similar to those pre-
viously made and after that made
few thousand naval pistols. In all he
made about fifty thousand pistols for
the government receiving for them
under the various contracts about
four hundred thousand dollars. These
pistols were generally sold and used
N pairs so that a horseman in COM
BAT or q seaman in boarding opera
lions could have a shot in reserve in
case the first failed to hit the mark
The average price for which they
were sold was from $500 to $500