South Bend news-times. (South Bend, Ind.) 1913-1938, 1921-01-30

1t is a long jump from the time
OF Archimedes to the late eighties.
but to thoroughly understand the
genesis and development of the
Dodge Manufacturing Company,
sGch a jump is necessary.
Industry in the late eighties was
not efficient as gagged by present
day standards and this statement
is especially true OF power trans
mission units.
Visualize a factory or machine
shop i'm those days: Solid wooden
pulleys were the rule on all line
shafts. Now consider what hap
pened when a new installation be
came necessary; belts must be re-
moved from all the old machines,
hangers. flange couplings, shaft
inCs. and then "a dozen or more
pulleys driven off the shaft with
heavy sledges and the new pulley
driven in place and the entire pro-
cess reversed.
Putting a new lathe or machine
in operation in those days required
time-too much time
The old gray boards in the shops
smile now when they think Of the
holidays and Sundays spent in the
back breaking labor. Then, too,
there was another side TO the mat
ter You see. there were (and are)
some forty different standard sizes
Of commercial shafting and a range
of some 200 different sizes in
faces and diameters of what pay
be termed the common pulley.
Every one of The 2.7OO pulleys were
60 a
ings. a dealer in mill supplies
would have TO carry 10000 pull
lcys TO carry a complete line Of
pulIeys one of each size. Needless
To say no such dealer ever lived.
All this is preliminary to the
real interest Of this story The use
lessneSS OF machines apart from
their sources of power and the
useleSsness of engines apart from
he mechanical agents which make
them do things, the absolute and
dire necessity of finding a way out
of a problem are the actuating
principles behind the development
Of the Dodge Manufacturing Com
pany-
Wallace II. Dodge celebrated his
birthday-July 10th. 1851 by
watching his entire fortune GO up
in blaze. He had owned and OPP
Grated a saw mill and machine
shop at Mishawaka for some time.
but a stroke of lightning had fired
his property and il burned TO the
ground. Dodge was a thinker and
a doer of things-this was clearly
shown by the fact that he utilized
the smallest pieces OF wood in his
mill in the making of file handles
and wooden mallets.
While his loss did disconcert him,
il did not utterly discourage him.
for before the ashes were cold he
and his superintendent. George
Phillion. began 10 make plans for
the rebuilding OF the saw mill and
machine shop.
With his usual characteristic en-
ergy the work forged ahead up TO
"A certain point and on this point
that ancient and inefficient solid
wood pulley-hinges the whole
story.
Phillion and Dodge needed new
pulleys and history has IL that
their funds were mighty low at
this time so they turned 20 the
ruins and began 10 90 over the
pile of salvaged pulleys but. true
TO type. the salvaEed pulleys would
fit only one size of shafting and.
OF course. this was not the size Of
the shafting already installed.
Eve have the lumber Let's
make our own pulleys,' they de-
cided.
AIomentous decisiOni They de-
Cided not only 10 make their own
pulleys but TO split them in two so
that they could be fastened on the
Hne shaft easily The only hitch
was how 10 hitch the two parts
together again,
However hard the problem. they
believed they had worked out
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