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

Collecting area: Manufacturing

Akin, Benjamin

Benjamin Akin Daybook and Ledger

1737-1764
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 204 bd

A tanner, currier, and shoemaker, Benjamin Akin was born into a prominent Bristol County family in Dartmouth, Massachusetts, on May 18, 1715. With a prolific and well-connected family and successful in his own business endeavors, Akin attained some stature in Dartmouth. First appointed town clerk in 1745, he filled that office from 1754-1770 and again from 1776-1780, adding the title “Esq.” to his name by the 1760s. During the Revolutionary years, he served on the town’s public safety committee. He died on April 10, 1802.

The Akin ledger offers insight into the fortunes of an 18th-century artisan during the most productive years of his life, as well as into the structure of a local community in southeastern Massachusetts. The ledger includes accounts of with customers for tanning and currying of calf and sheepskin, day-book entries, and accounts with the Town of Dartmouth for services performed at Town Clerk.

Acquired from Charles Apfelbaum, 1987

Subjects

Artisans--MassachusettsDartmouth (Mass.)--History--18th centuryEarthquakes--MassachusettsShoemaking--MassachusettsTanning--Massachusetts

Contributors

Akin, Benjamin, 1715-1802Akin, Eunice Taber, 1711-1762

Types of material

Account booksDaybooks
Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. New England Joint Board

ACWA New England Joint Board Records

1939-1976
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 193

Organized in Chicago in 1914, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America was formed after a split in the United Garment Workers, and quickly became the dominant force for union in the men’s clothing industry. Within a decade of its founding, ACWA had more than 100,000 members across the U.S. and Canada.

Records of the New England Joint Board of ACWA consist of general correspondence, membership lists, press releases, and collective bargaining files for companies such as Arlan’s Department Stores, Bedford Shirtmakers Corporation, Ethan Ames Company, Holyoke Shirt Company, Lawrence Clothing Company, and Whitney Shirt Company.

Subjects

Clothing trade--Labor unions--MassachusettsLabor unions--MassachusettsTextile industry--MassachusettsTextile workers--Labor unions--New England

Contributors

Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. New England Joint Board
American Writing Paper Company

American Writing Paper Company Records

1851-1960
19 boxes 9.5 linear feet
Call no.: MS 062

Paper company based in Holyoke, Massachusetts that at one time controlled 75% of the total United States fine paper output. Records include board of directors’ minutes, by-laws, blueprints, land transactions, merger agreements, and publications. Labor files (1936-1960) comprise the bulk of the collection and include contracts, correspondence, grievances, and negotiations.

Gift of Bill Casamo, Oct. 1985 (1985-094)

Subjects

Collective bargaining--Paper industry--Massachusetts--HolyokeHolyoke (Mass.)--Economic conditions--19th centuryHolyoke (Mass.)--Economic conditions--20th centuryLabor unions--Massachusetts--HolyokePaper industry workers--Labor unions--MassachusettsPaper industry--Massachusetts--HolyokeStrikes and lockouts--Paper industry--Massachusetts--Holyoke

Contributors

American Writing Paper Company

Types of material

BlueprintsPhotographs
Bush, Carroll H.

Carroll H. Bush Papers

1929-1938
1 box 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 1055

A knitter in a Northampton silk factory during the years of the Great Depression, Carroll Bush was a Socialist and officer with the American Federation of Hosiery Workers.

The Bush papers offer a small but fascinating glimpse into political radicalism and union organizing among Northampton silk workers during the Great Depression. An active Socialist and union member in the Textile Workers Union of America, Bush corresponded with other textile workers and union organizers in Massachusetts and entertained an interest in union agitation more generally. The collection consists entirely of letters received by Bush.

Gift of Bruce Rubenstein via Eugene Povirk, Oct. 2018

Subjects

Communists--Massachusetts--NorthamptonHosiery workers--Labor unions--Massachusetts--NorthamptonNorthampton (Mass.)--History--20th centurySilk industry--Massachusetts--NorthamptonStrikes and lockouts--Massachusetts--EasthamptonTextile workers--Labor unions--Massachusetts--NorthamptonTremont Silk Company

Contributors

American Federation of Hosiery WorkersUnited Elastic CorporationUnited Textile Workers of America

Types of material

Fliers
Butler, Mills, Smith & Barker

Butler, Mills, Smith, and Barker Daybook

1837-1845
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 183 bd

Daybook listing financial transactions of Butler, Mills, Smith and Barker Woolen Mill, a small woolen manufactory in Williamstown, Massachusetts owned by Henry Mills, Silas Butler, Asa Barker and Ebenezer Smith.

Accounts provide detailed information regarding costs of commodities, labor, and boarding in the town and document the impact of a small factory on the local economy where residents sold soap, oil, and wool to the mill, boarded its workers, took in weaving and hauled freight for the business. Includes mixed personal and business expenses, information about employees and production in the two woolen mills in town, and information concerning the cost of commodities, labor, and boarding workers in the town.

Subjects

Woolen and worsted manufacture--Massachusetts--Williamstown

Contributors

Barker, AsaButler, Mills, Smith, and BarkerButler, Silas, d. 1841Mills, Henry, b. 1810Smith, Ebenezer

Types of material

Daybooks
Clement Company (Northampton, Mass.)

Clement Company Records

1881-1934
61 boxes, 103 ledgers 43 linear feet
Call no.: MS 099

In mid-nineteenth century, the Connecticut River Valley in Massachusetts emerged as a center of cutlery manufacture in the United States. In 1866, a group of manufacturers in Northampton including William Clement, previously a foreman at Lamson and Goodnow, founded Clement, Hawke, and Co. in Florence to produce both hardware and cutlery, and after several reorganizations, the firm spawned both the Northampton Cutlery Co. (1871) and the Clement Manufacturing Co. (1882, formerly International Screw). Clement produced high quality table cutlery and was an early adopter of stainless steel. The company ceased operations in about 1970.

The Clement Company’s records include extensive correspondence files (1881-1934), along with journals and ledgers, payroll accounts, employee information, and other records. The records provide excellent documentation of wages, working conditions, the labor forces, and technological change in the industry, as well as the efforts of local workers to unionize.

Subjects

Cutlery trade--Massachusetts

Contributors

Clement Company (Northampton, Mass.)
Colman, William, 1768-1820

William Colman Account Book

1802-1822
1 vol. 0.2 linear feet
Call no.: MS 212 bd

Merchant and shoemaker from the Byfield Parish of Newbury, Massachusetts and Boscawen, New Hampshire.

Includes accounts of the prices paid for shoemaking and agricultural labor, accounts of the men and women who worked for his father’s shoe store and factory, notes of who lived in the younger Colman’s home, a page mentioning his move to New Hampshire, and accounts of agricultural produce sales and exchange of farm labor.

Subjects

Agricultural wages--New Hampshire--History--19th centuryBoscawen (N.H.)--Economic conditions--19th centuryBoscawen (N.H.)--Rural conditions--19th centuryHouseholds--Massachusetts--Newbury--History--19th centuryMerchants--Massachusetts--Newbury--History--19th centuryNewbury (Mass.)--Economic conditions--19th centuryShoemakers--Massachusetts--Newbury--History--19th centuryShoes--Prices--Massachusetts--History--19th century

Contributors

Colman, William, 1768-1820

Types of material

Account books
Comstock, Perry G.

Perry G. Comstock Account Book

1862-1880
1 vol. 0.25 linear feet
Call no.: MS 480 bd

After witnessing the woolen mill he had built in West Stockbridge go up in flames, Peregrine Green Comstock (1808-1892) rebuilt his operation on the Williams River as a paper mill. For decades thereafter, he prospered as a paper manufacturer, raising a large family with his wife Elizabeth. Comstock died of gastroenteritis on Aug. 6, 1892 at the age of 84.

Comstock’s account book, 197pp., includes records of transactions of a Berkshire County paper manufacturer in the third quarter of the nineteenth century. Among Comstocks’s clients are Monument Mills, M.S. Hovey and Co., Smith Paper Co., Berkshire Woolen Co., Owen Paper Co., and Kniffin and Bro., and the book includes records of labor, rents, cash, board, and the exchange of goods, along with entries for calendar rolls, paper, wrap, weaving yards, sacks, dyestuffs, and lumber.

Subjects

Great Barrington (Mass.)--History--19th centuryPaper industry--Massachusetts--Great Barrington

Types of material

Account books
Esleeck Manufacturing Company

Esleeck Manufacturing Company Records

1898-1987
3 boxes 4.5 linear feet
Call no.: MS 505

A manufacturing firm specializing in the production of onion skin paper, the Esleeck Manufacturing Company was established in 1898 as the Monadnock Paper Co. The principal owners, Augustine W. Esleeck and Alfred T. Judd, had worked together with the Valley Paper Mills of Holyoke, Mass., but when striking out on their own, moved to Turners Falls, believing the town to be the ideal location for a mil. Changing their name to Esleeck Manufacturing Co. in 1901, the firm sought to be a good neighbor, using local labor and products from local firms in their manufacturing. After more than 100 years of continuous operation, the company was purchased by Southworth Co. in 2006.

The collection consists chiefly of financial records, but also includes three minute books from 1898-1961 that capture the the company’s early history, as well as a memorial history of the company written by a long-term employee in 1954.

Subjects

Paper industry--MassachusettsTurners Falls (Mass.)--History

Contributors

Esleeck Manufacturing Company
Florence Manufacturing Company

Florence Manufacturing Company Histories

1916, 1974
1 folder 0.15 linear feet
Call no.: MS 380

Photocopies of two typescript company histories for the Florence Manufacturing Company: “50 Years of Brush Making (1866-1916)” and “50 More Years of Brush Making, 1916-1974.”

Subjects

Broom and brush industry--Massachusetts--HistoryFlorence Manufacturing Company