| The Davistown Museum |
| The Ancient Dominions of Maine: An Archaeology of Tools |
| The Industrial Revolution (1865f.): Classic Period of American Machinist's Tools |
| Hegemony of the New England Tool Makers |
| The period between 1840 and 1865 was a time of rapid industrial change that culminated in the Civil War. By |
| the end of the Civil War the world of the toolmaker and the tool user had changed radically and would never be |
| the same. The key event in the florescence of the Industrial Revolution was the direct process production of |
| steel by the Bessemer method, soon supplanted by the more flexible modern Siemens-Martin open hearth |
| method, which allowed quality control production of countless alloy steel variations. There was a vast increase in |
| the variety of tools in the tool kits of the machinists and woodworkers who worked after the Civil War. The |
| mass production of steel permitted the continued rapid growth of both railroads (iron rails soon become steel |
| rails) and the factory system that supplanted and gradually made obsolete the small workshops of the mill towns |
| of rural America including Liberty and Montville. The final display area of the Archaeology of Tools is devoted |
| to illustrating some of the tools typical of the new tool kits that began supplanting the implements produced by |
| the blacksmiths and small forges in the earlier maritime culture of Maine and New England. The transitional and |
| patented planes and the classic machinists tools in the Museum exhibits are important historical artifacts |
| illustrating cultural change as well as esthetically interesting sculpture objects. |
| Despite the full onslaught of the Industrial Revolution, shipbuilding continued in Maine, especially in the larger |
| parts of Penobscot Bay, Waldoboro, Damariscotta and Bath. A golden age of exquisitly designed and constructed |
| schooners and downeasters supported a florishing industry of Maine edge tool and agricultural equipment |
| manufacturers, but the most important developments in manufacturing technology, including edge tool and hand |
| plane production occured in southern New England, where the classic period of the Industrial Revolution |
| overlapped with Maine's lingering maritime culture. |
| The sojorn of America's first machinist in Maine, Darling & Schwartz, was brief, the florescence of the classic |
| machinist tools was in southern New England. The maritime culture of Maine was in decline. The final sections |
| of the exhibition of The Davistown Museum's Archaeology of Tools illustrates the rapid emergence of new types |
| of meticulously designed and constructed tools. |
| Martin Donnelly in his introduction to the classic period of American Machinist Tools, provides this summary of |
| machine tool production in the early years of the Industrial Revolution; a final footnote to the hegemony of |
| New England's maritime culture.. |
| | "...the Classic Period of American machinist tools... [is] that period of time from shortly before the |
| | American Civil War to the beginning of the First World War when, in response to tremendous economic |
| | growth and technological advancement, there was an incredibly rapid increase in the number of |
| | manufacturers and marketers of machinist tools. A great number of companies and individuals, producing all |
| | manner of products, grew and prospered, marketing elaborately conceived and artistically machined hand |
| | tools for those skilled workers who manned the engines of industry. As the end of this Classic Period |
| | approached, the vicissitudes of the emerging economy, which brought periodic recessions or 'panics', |
| | together with the need to compete on a national, rather than regional, scale, had served to eliminate nearly |
| | all of those many companies. Certain industry leaders, particularly the L.S. Starrett Company of Athol, |
| | Mass., and the Brown & Sharpe Mfg. Company of Providence, R.I., were the principal survivors, in many |
| | cases (particularly that of Starrett) buying out the other companies as the businesses of those companies |
| | foundered. As this Classic Period came to an end, standardization of design and minimization of |
| | embellishment became the rule, largely as a result of the demands of mass production. In many cases, tools |
| | included in the Starrett product line at the end of this period continue to be produced in essentially the same |
| | form today. |
| | During the Classic Period, however, as new companies competed for a share of the business in a dynamic |
| | market, a tremendous number of well-made precision tools, many of them protected by patents and |
| | decorated with artistic knurling, were marketed by a competing group of firms and a substantial number of |
| | individual entrepreneurs. Many of these tools and their makers failed to survive in an increasingly |
| | competitive environment, and, as companies reduced the number of products offered in the face of |
| | inadequate business success, certain elaborately embellished and mechanically ingenious tools of a very high |
| | quality... were cut from the product lines." |
| Principal Machinist Tool Manufacturers of the Classic Period | Status | Location |
| Edge Tools - American Made Cast Steel |
| | Page 1 of 8 |
