Some three hundred major companies have made woodworldng machinery since the 1830s. Unfortunately the loss of primary research material over the years has doomed many of these businesses to remain only as mysterious names cast in iron. Vintage woodworking machinery trade catalogs have proved invaluable in uncovering the history of some of these companies. Catalogs, historians now realize, offer a fresh approach to studying man's past-his culture, industry, business, and technology.

Woodworking machinery catalogs are valuable not only from a purely technical point of view, revealing a company's complete line of machinery, but usually the catalog's introductory pages also give the location of the main works and office, the company officers, agencies and sales rooms, the date of the company's founding, and information about quality control and guarantees. If a researcher is lucky, the catalog may also include photographs of the works-inside and out-and a capsule history of the firm. A study of the text and illustrations tells much about machine construction-the type of frames, materials, and bearings-patent dates, important features exclusive to the company, methods of construction, the story behind the machine's design, the largest and smallest machines made, as well as other bits of information.

In comparison, company ledgers actually yield very little information unless there is a long consecutive run. A single small catalog with illustrations of a company's machines is often worth more to a researcher than a mountain of day books, ledgers, and old invoices.

Woodworking machinery catalogs are not only "cross-collectible" items appealing to those who collect ephemera (sometimes referred to as "dirty paper" or "old paper"), local history items, or the machines themselves, but are valuable reference tools for historians and industrial archaeologists. More than any other document, catalogs are the very best record of a company's manufacturing and product history. It is also fascinating to see which machines fellow woodworkers were using so many years ago and how designs (especially safety devices!) have changed, from Babbitt bearings to ball and tapered roller bearings, flat belts to V-belts, and square cutter heads to round.

Dana Batory is a geologist-turned-cabinetmaker who operates a small one-man shop in Crestline, Ohio, with several antique machines. Several years ago, he began work on an ambitious project-a definitive history on American manufacturers of woodworking machinery from 1830 to the present in a series of volumes, each consisting of four or five detailed histories of selected companies. Volume 1, Vintage Woodworking Machinery, appeared in spring 1997 and volume 2 in autumn 2004. (Available from Astragal Press: P.O. Box 239, Mendham, NJ 07945, astragalpress.com; $25.95 and $33 postpaid. Autographed copies are available from the author for $SO and $35, postpaid, 4O2 E. Bucyrus St., Crestline, OH 44827. A third volume is a work-inprogress.

Copyright Early American Industries Association Sep 2005
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