The University of Massachusetts Amherst
Robert S. Cox Special Collections & University Archives Research Center
CredoResearch digital collections in Credo

Collecting area: Manufacturing

Ricci, James B.

James Ricci Machine Tool Companies Printed Materials Collection

1885-2005 Bulk: 1940-1989
17 boxes 25.5 linear feet
Call no.: MS 1214

For more than fifty years, Jim Ricci collected both machine tools and the books,  catalogs, and manuals that relate to the machinery and the industry as a whole. A graduate of UMass Amherst (’71) and the son of a faculty member, Ricci is an historian of reel lawn mowers who has written extensively on the subject, publishing the book Hand, Horse, and Motor: The Development of the Lawn Mower Industry in the United States in 2016.

The collection represents more than 750 companies and includes brochures, catalogs, manuals, and parts lists from machine tool manufacturers. The majority of the companies represented are located in the United States; international companies are located in Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, England, France, Germany, East Germany, West Germany, Hungary, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Poland, Scotland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan and Turkey.

Machine tools are machines that make parts and pieces for end products or other machine tools. These tools range from lathes, range from lathes, milling machines, grinders, manual and hydraulic presses, drill presses and saws to drills, mills, grinding wheels and cutting tools as well as measuring tools, jigs and fixtures. The machine tool industry evolved dramatically throughout the 20th century with the introduction of multi-function workstations. Multi-axis machines with attached tools changers are driven by sophisticated computer-controlled programs. The evolution of the industry is reflected, in part, in this historical collection of printed materials.

Gift of James B. Ricci, 2023.

Subjects

Bearings (Machinery)Cutting machinesGrinding machinesMachine-tool industryMachinery--Parts
Rodney Hunt Machine Company

Rodney Hunt Machine Company Records

ca.1850-1987 Bulk: 1862-1943
316 boxes, 150 vols. 158 linear feet
Call no.: MS 105

The Rodney Hunt Company Records document the operation of one of the region’s major producers of textile machinery, water wheels, turbines, and other specialty industrial products. Founded in Orange, Massachusetts, in 1840, the company was incorporated in 1873. Still an active concern, it continues to sell its products in international markets.

Due to a fire in 1882, and several floods, relatively few early records of the Rodney Hunt Company survive, but from the time of its incorporation in 1873, documentation improves, with nearly complete coverage from the period 1883–1914. The collection provides an excellent introduction to the history of technology and industry in 19th- and 20th-century Massachusetts. Of particular note is the incoming correspondence from 1876 to 1903, which is nearly complete. Other materials include company histories, correspondence, board minutes, blueprints, installation drawings, sketchbook drawings, patents, payroll ledgers, account books, price lists, sales books, brochures, catalogs, newsletters, subject files and photographs.

Subjects

Orange (Mass.)--Economic conditionsTextile industry--MassachusettsTurbines--Design and constructionWaterwheels

Types of material

Account books
Sagendorph Woolen Co.

Sagendorph Woolen Company Daybook

1885-1887
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 430

The Sagendorph Woolen Company of East Brookfield, located about sixty miles southwest of Boston in Worcester County, Massachusetts, maintained sixteen looms and specialized in the carding of shoddy and the manufacture of cashmeres, repellents, and suitings. There is some evidence that Sagendorph also spun raw materials for other companies and sold some textile goods on commission.

This daybook records the daily transactions between the Sagendorph Woolen Company and other businesses, local residents, and the company’s labor force. These detailed entries present a dynamic picture of the company’s manufacturing operations ranging from the purchase of raw materials to the sales of finished products.

Subjects

Carding (textiles)East Brookfield (Mass.)--HistoryTextile construction processes and techniquesTextile industry--Massachusetts--HistoryTextile manufacturers--MassachusettsTextile materialsYarn-making processes and techniques

Contributors

Sagendorph Woolen Company

Types of material

Daybooks
Smith and Wesson Company

Smith & Wesson Records

1920-1973
30 boxes 15 linear feet
Call no.: MS 267

World famous handgun and handcuff-manufacturing company founded in Springfield, Massachusetts in the 1850s.

The Smith and Wesson records are comprised of incoming sales and service correspondence with some outgoing correspondence and administrative and financial/legal subject files, including categories such as ads and advertising, American Railway Express, audits, counselors at law, debtors, insurance, legal actions, newsletters, patents and trademarks, personnel, photos, sample parts, sideline ventures, stocks and bonds awards, and Western Union Telegrams. Includes correspondence with the National Rifle Association, Small Arms Industry Advisory Committee, and the United States Revolver Association.

Subjects

Pistols--Design and construction

Contributors

National Rifle AssociationSmall Arms Industry Advisory CommitteeSmith and WessonUnited States Revolver Association
Stocking, George, 1784-1864

George Stocking Account Book

1815-1850
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 486 bd

The shoemaker George Stocking was born on May 23, 1784, on his family’s farm in Ashfield, Mass., the second son of Abraham and Abigail (Nabby) Stocking. At 25, George married Ann Toby (1790-1835) from nearby Conway, with whom he had nine children, followed by two more children with his second wife, the widow Mary Jackson Shippey, whom he married on Dec. 16, 1840. George succeeded Amos Stocking, his uncle, in the tanning and shoemaking business at Pittsfield, Mass., where he died on Christmas day 1864.

George Stocking’s double column account book documents almost 35 years of the economic activity of a shoemaker in antebellum Ashfield, Massachusetts. Although the entries are typically very brief, recording making, mending, tapping, capping, or heeling shoes and boots, among other things, they provide a dense and fairly continuous record of his work. They also reveal the degree to which Stocking occasionally engaged in other activities to earn a living, including mending harnesses and other leatherwork to performing agricultural labor. The book includes accounts with Charles Knowlton, the local physician was was famous as a freethinker and atheist and author of Fruits of Philosophy, his book on contraception that earned him conviction on charges of obscenity and a sentence of three months at hard labor.

Subjects

Ashfield (Mass.)--Economic conditions--19th centuryKnowlton, Charles, 1800-1850Shoemakers--Massachusetts--Ashfield

Contributors

Stocking, George, 1784-1864

Types of material

Account books
Thayer Family Industries

Thayer Family Industries Ledger

1847-1855
1 vol. 0.2 linear feet
Call no.: MS 238 bd

The Thayer family operated a small manufacturing complex on the Deerfield River in Charlemont, Massachusetts. Businesses included a sawmill, a foundry, a shop for the manufacture of axes and edged tools, and a tannery. Ledger documents their businesses and reflects the exchange economy of rural Massachusetts.

Subjects

Axe industry--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centuryBarter--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centuryCharlemont (Mass.)--Economic conditions--19th centuryCharlemont (Mass.)--Rural conditions--19th centuryFoundries--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centuryKingsley, EdmondManufacturing industries--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centurySawmills--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centuryTanneries--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th centuryThayer familyThayer, Alonzo, 1817-Thayer, Ruel, 1785-Thayer, Ruel, 1824-Tinsmiths--Massachusetts--Charlemont--History--19th century

Types of material

Account books
Topol, Sidney

Sidney Topol Papers

1944-1997
52 boxes 78 linear feet
Call no.: MS 374
Depiction of Sidney Topol
Sidney Topol

Temporarily stored offsite; contact SCUA to request materials from this collection.

An innovator and entrepreneur, Sidney Topol was a contributor to several key developments in the telecommunications industries in the latter half of the twentieth century. A graduate of the University of Massachusetts (1947) and an engineer and executive at Raytheon and later Scientific-Atlanta, Topol’s expertise in microwave systems led to the development of the first effective portable television relay links, allowing broadcasts from even remote areas, and his foray into satellite technologies in the 1960s provided the foundation for building the emerging cable television industry, permitting the transmission of transoceanic television broadcasts. Since retiring in the early 1990s, Topol has been engaged in philanthropic work, contributing to the educational and cultural life in Boston and Atlanta.

The product of a pioneer in the telecommunications and satellite industries and philanthropist, this collection contains a rich body of correspondence and speeches, engineering notebooks, reports, product brochures, and photographs documenting Sidney Topol’s forty year career as an engineer and executive. The collection offers a valuable record of Topol’s role in the growth of both corporations, augmented by a suite of materials stemming from Topol’s tenure as Chair of the Electronic Industries Association Advanced Television Committee (ATV) in the 1980s and his service as Co-Chair of a major conference on Competitiveness held by the Carter Center in 1988.

Subjects

Boston (Mass.)--Social conditions--20th centuryCable televisionElectronic Industries AssociationRaytheon CompanyScientific-Atlanta

Contributors

Topol, Sidney