Appleton Manufacturing Company
Jackson Street
Incorporated 1828
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Research Report:
Founding and Initial Development:
Millyard Development: 1833-1843
Turbine Experiments: 1844
Millyard Development: 1845-1872
Millyard Development: 1873-1904
Millyard Development: 1905-1918
Corporate History
after 1918
Archeological Comment
Figures (1-23 )
Footnotes
Bibliography
Inventory Forms:
Mill No. 1
Mill No. 2
Dye House
Mill No. 3
Mill No. 4
Office Building
No. 1 Cotton House
"New Mill"--Mill No. 5
No. 5 Extension
Mill No. 6
Building No. 7
Stable
Site of Coal Pocket
Turbine Building and Boiler House
1828-1832
1
5
5
6
8
10
13
14
15
±i
Research Report
Appleton Manufacturing Company
Jackson Street
Incorporated 1828
Founding and Initial Development:
1828-1832
The Appleton Manufacturing Company, also called the Appleton
Company, was incorporated on February 4, 1828 by Thomas H.
Perkins, Ebenezer Francis and Samuel Appleton "for the purpose of manufacturing cotton and woollen goods, in the town
of Lowell." It had a capital of $500,000 which was increased
in 1839 to $600,000.
In a sketch of the life of Patrick T.
Jackson, John A. Lowell explains why the Appleton Company
was started:
Mr. Moody had recently introduced some important
improvements in machinery, and was satisfied
that great saving might be made, and a higher
rate of speed advantageously adopted. Mr. Jackson
proposed to establish a company at Lowell, to be
called the Appleton Company and adopt the new
machinery ( 1) .
Interlocking directorships characterized the manufacturing
companies founded on the Merrimack Manufacturing Company's
model during the early years of Lowell and included the
Locks and Canals Company, whose directors were essentially
those of the Merrimack Company.
The Appleton was no exception.
In 1828, for instance, three of the five Locks and
Canals Company directors were also directors of the new
company: P. T. Jackson, J. Thorndike, Jr., and Nathan
Appleton. By 1832, Henry Cabot, P. T. Jackson and George
Lyman again held positions on both.
The practice
continued for many years.
Several of the Appleton's
directors were involved in the management of the other
companies as well.
Likewise the manufacturing companies
had many of the same shareholders.
The "parcel of land", which the new company purchased from
the Proprietors of the Locks and Canals on Merrimack River
in 1828,.. lay on the island between the new Hamilton Canal
and the Pawtucket Canal and abutted the Hamilton Manufacturing
Company, ~o the east, which was incorporated in 1825 (2).
With the mill sites, the Appleton also acquired two mill
privileges "of the power described in the annexed proposals'~
(3).
Of interest is the fact that the first indenture
'
.
Appleton Manufacturi.ng Co.
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(of March 15, 1828) between the Proprietors and Appleton
reserved "to the grantors and their assigns a right to
attach to said Wall of the Main--ie.
Pawtucket--Canal
a towing path for the canal~ giving us a good idea of the
motive power by which barges carrying goods were propelled
to and from the mills.
By the end of 1828, the Appleton Company had . ,_ commenced
operations in No. 1 and No. 2 Mills, making heavy sheetings
which became "such a popular article for use at home and
for exportation'' (4).
Power was supplied by raceways
which carried water from the Hamilton Canal to the Appleton's
breast wheels.
The water, after it had passed through the
wheelpits, was discharged thirteen feet below into the lower
level of the Pawtucket Canal,which ran along the back of the
Appleton
millyard. According to Joshua Merrill, a wellknown Lowell teacher and books.e'd.J.er,
the Appleton Mills
were erected by one . Cap~ John Bassett, "a distinguished
master-builder" (5).
Bassett was not listed in the Lowell
Directory when it commenced publication in 1832, but he had
apparently been a prominent builder in the Chelmsford.;.Lowell
area.
Unfortunately Bassett has proven a very elusive
figure to track down.
One indirect reference to him states:
"On the 27th of August, 1824, young Peabody [later Mayor
Josiah G. Peabody] came to Lowell for the purpose of learning the trade of house-carpenter and builder, and engaged
himself to Capt. John Bassett--a man for many years
universally known in this region"
(6).
Bassett may have carried out the construction of the Appleton
Mills, under contract to the Proprietors of Locks and Canals.
Generally,the Locks and Canals Company, which included the
Lowell Machine Shop, built the mills, machinery, furniture,
houses, etc. for each newly incorporated company (7).
The
Machine Shop evidently did build the Appleton's machinery,
but the construction of the mills themselves seems, as was
sometimes the case, to have been contracted out to another
party. This is not surprising in that the time of Appleton's
incorporation was an extremely busy period f6r the Lowell
Machine Shop, the "Shop that Built a City," as Gibb calls it.
In 1828 one of the original Merrimack Manufacturing Company
mills burned, necessitating its reconstruction and the building of new machinery. Meanwhile,the Hamilton Manufacturing
Company was also waiting for mills and machinery.
Thus the
contract · to build the Appleton Mills must have been awarded
to Bassett, with Kirk Boott, the Locks and Canals agent,
perhaps overseeing the work as it went forward and offering
advice or men as needed.
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
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The Appleton mill buildings and the millyard layout were of
the type developed by the Boston Associates in Waltham and
standardized to a great degree in their Lowell plan. To
this early construction period belonged not only the first
two Appleton mills, each with two separate picker houses,
but also two secondary buildings on the Hamilton Canal
(Fig. 1), both of them to the left of the entrance to the
yard (8). By 1834 or 1835 a third building had been added
on the canal and to the right of the entrance (9).
Presumably the functions of cotton house and storehouse, counting
house, and repair shop were distributed among the three.
These, at any rate, were the functions assigfied them on an
1878 insurance plan. Moreover, this is the distribution of
buildings and functions seen in the majority of the other
millyards developed in Lowell on the Merrimack model during
the 1820s and 1830s. The counting house and repair shop
very often occupied positions on either side of the yard
entrance.
Three long, brick boarding house blocks ranging between
Jackson and Middlesex Streets also dated to the earliest
building period of the Appleton Company. Merrill, then
teacher at the Hamilton Corporation School, reminisced about
the Appleton many years later:
During the su~er of 1828, the Appleton Mills were
put in operation, and their boarding houses filled
with tenants, and a few houses were built on
Appleton Street; consequently my school was very
much larger than it was the previous winters-numbering in 1828, 169 scholars (10).
The first two Appleton mills were about 156 feet long by
45 feet wide (11).
They were four stories in height with
clerestory monitor roofs.
Richark Arkwright's use of the
clerestory monitor in his Lower Mill at Cromford, England
was apparently unique in eighteenth century English
industrial buildings but it became a frequently used form
in early American mills (lla). Finished granite lintels
and sills ornamented the mill windows,which were set quite
close to the wall thus maintaining the flat continuity of
the wall plane.
In proportions, materials, and detailing
the Appleton mills continued to show the sympathetic adaptation of the Federal style to utilitarian structures which
had characterized the Boston Associates' mills at Waltham.
This style of mill building was prevalent in Lowell from
the 1820s through the 1840s,with only occasional reference
to the Greek Revival style which became popular in other
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
types of buildings
most- likely in the
two Appleton mills
roofs put on them
-4-
after about 1820. At some later date,
1860s, and certainly by 1880, the first
were raised one story and shallow-pitched
(12) .
Attached to the center of each mill, on hhe long side facing
the millyard, was an outside stair tower of brick which rose
to the level of ,: the clerestory windows. Among the earliest
appearances of this feature in America was that on the
Boston Manufacturing Company's second mill at Waltham.
It
was to become a standard in n i neteenth century American
mill construction and often the tower housed a loading
platform and toilets on each floor, in addition to stairs.
The Appleton boarding house blocks, like the mills, were
primarily Federal in stylistic origin, though simple post
and lintel doorways and some molding details seem to show
an awareness of the Greek Revival. Three stories in height,
plus a raised basement, they had gabled roofs with twin,
parapet-linked chimneys at each end of the building and
dividing the separate boarding house units.
By 1832, the Appleton Company was equipped with 9,500 spindles and 350 looms .. About 1,500,000 pounds of cotton were
used per week to manufacture nearly 4,000,000 yards of cloth
a year. About 475 women and 60 men were employed (13).
In
September of 1832, Appleton purchased two additional mill
powers from the Proprietors of Locks and Canals (14).
By
1836 the number of spindles had increased to 11,500 and the
looms to 380, still in two mills, and the number of female
operatives had risen to 575. The cloth produced annually
likewise increased to 5,200,000 yards (15).
As the efficiency of the machinery increased,the number of
women employed decreased.
In 1842, for instance, only 470
females were employed although the Appleton had 11,776
spindles and 400 looms by that date.
The number of men
employed had increased slightly to 65. The yardage produced at first remained the same (as the work force
lessened initially) and then made steady gains with
improvements in technology.
In 1842 the Appleton continued
to make sheetings and shirtings of No. 14 yarn (16).
In
June of the following year, the company purchased another
mill power, followed by an additional one-half mill power
in November, for a total of five and one-half (17).
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
Millyard Development:
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1833-1843
Beard and Hoar's 1841 "Map of Lowell" shows two additional
buildings constructed in the Appleton yard since 1832.
One, discussed above, was on the Hamilton Canal, making a
total of three structures ranged along the front of the
yard. The second building shown in 1841, but not in 1832,
was on the Pawtucket Canal behind Mill No. 2, and occupied
the site of a later Boiler House and an even later Dye House.
It was most probably a Picker House on the edge of the
water and in the rear of the millyard, isolated to guard
against the possible spread of fire.
The cotton picking
process was a highly flammable one and the extreme concern
with fire caused a number of the "second phase" of picker
houses to be placed in a similar isolated, waterside location in other Lowell millyards.
This second Appleton
Picker House would have been the successor to the four
earlier picker buildings. These were small, two-story,
fireproofed buildings (two to each mill usually) set off
a few feet from the front mill wall, probably with a blank
wall toward the adjacent mill. Finally, in 1843 or 1844
Appleton built what was evidently a "third phase" Picker
House. Constructed of brick, as its predecessors had been,
it was located at ~ight angles to Appleton's Mill
No. 2, near its west end.
This building is shown on
the ca. 1845 view of the Appleton yard (Fig. 2) in the left
foreground.
It appears to be in what Hill calls the "old
style of mill architecture" when referring to the
Massachusetts Cotton Mills' picker building.
It seems, in
other words, more Federal Style in its detailing in comparison to the infill building of almost the same date
between Mills No. l and No. 2.
The latter with its
emphatic pediment is more Greek Revival in tone.
Turbine Experiments:
1844
The first experiments with the turbines developed by Uriah
A. Boyden were conducted at the Appleton Manufacturing
Company. · A Bostonian, Boyden had been a surveyor for the
Locks and Canals Company until 1834 and had continued his
studies of water power technology after going on to other
jobs. He was also, for instance, a surveyor for the Boston
and Lowell Railroad during the 1830s.
In 1844, after careful study of the theory of the Fourneyron
turbine, Boyden applied to the Appleton agent, George Motley,
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
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to permit him to construct a turbine wheel for the company's
new Picker House. This was the first turbine put in operation in Lowell. When it was completed, James B. Francis
assisted at its test and observed the increase in ~ower it
afforded while occupying less space than a breast wheel.
Boyden's patents were thus purchased by the Proprietors of
Locks and Canals and it was on Boyden's turbines that
Francis conducted his famous experiments over the following
decades. The experiments at Tremont Mills in 1855 are
perhaps the best known. Under pressure from the Locks and
Canals Company, the Lowell manufacturing companies steadily
replaced breast wheels in all their Lowell mills following
the successful experiments at Appleton. There were five in
that company alone by 1856 (18). Francis, in the preface
to the 1868 edition of his Lowell Hydraulic Experiments,
wrote:
"The author takes this opportunity of acknowledging
his obligations to Mr. Uriah A. Boyden of Boston, for useful
suggestions during the last twenty-five years, on almost
every subject discussed in this volume" (19).
Millyard Development:
1845-1872
In about 1845-1846 the Appleton Company constructed a third
mill building in the seventy-five foot space between their
Mills No. 1 and No. 2, as did many of the other manufacturing
companies during the mid-1840s.
The need to expand existing
facilities and a greater confidence in the ability to prevent
fire from spreading were evidently the motives behind this
development.
By the early 1840s, wrought-iron, high-speed
shafting was in use, as was the heavy, slow-burning method
of interior wooden framing developed during the late 1830s.
The appearance of this infill building is recorded in a view
that purports to represent the yard in 1845 (Fig. 2) and in
one of the vignettes which framed Sidney & Neff's 1850 Plan
Lowell (Fig. 3). It functioned visually as an emphatic,
projecting pavilion between the two older mills. Its broad,
heavy pediment is rather Greek Revival in proportion though
the cornice does not extend all the way across the gable end.
An 1880 view of the third mill gives a good idea of its mass
in relation to the two buildings which it now joined (Fig. 4).
Perhaps late eighteenth century mills in England or Scotland
served as "stylistic prototypes for the American builders
when it carne time to join two earlier mills by a connecting
unit. Arkwright's mills at New Lanark, Scotland (ca. 1785),
for instance, were extended rectangles accentuated at the
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
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center of both long sides by a projecting pavilion . [Fig. 2a].
For some reason neither the Lowell Directory nor the
"statistics of Lowell Manufacturing," published yearly by
the local newspaper, record the Appleton Company as having
three mills until 1853. Frank Hill, however, writes that a
third mill was added in 1846 (20), and the building in
question was referred to in later years as Mill No. 3. Moreover, the mid-184~saw the second major construction phase
in Lowell mill building during which many companies built
just such infill structures between pairs of their earlier
mills.
The Tremont and the Suffolk Companies are examples.
The new Appleton building may well have functioned as a mill
from the beginning without being designated by a number until
1853. A similar situation in which a mill was in operation
long before it was "published" existed at other companies,
such as the Boott. Finally, neither the directory nor the
newspaper information is of course wholly reliable. Other
statistical evidence, besides the number of mills, does
appear to support the contention that a third mill was in
operation well before 1853. The number of spindles in use
by the Appleton increased from 11,776 in 1844 to 17,920
in 1849 (figures far 1847 are not available), strongly
suggesting the presence of a third mill by 1849. Also, the
additional one-and-one-half mill powers were purchased in
1843.
[See Above.]
The number of looms rose from 499 in
1844 to 600 in 1849, then to 700 by 1853. Four hundred
women and 120 men were employed in 1849 and 1853, .whereas
there had been 340 women and 65 men in the Appleton work
force in 1844. The company continued to make sheetings and
shirtings
(No. 14), at a rate of 150,000 ¥ards per week in
185 3.
Accordingto Frank Hill, the Appleton Company next constructed
a mill in 1861. Perhaps this was the building shown as the
easterly "L" off Mill No. 1 on the 1878 insurance plan.
This
building is shown on the 1868 map of Lowell but not on the
1850 map.
In this case, none of the statistics available
seem to support the existence of an additional mill in
1861. Not until 1872 does the number of spindles (27,568)
and looms (788) show a really noticeable increase (cf. 19,872
spindles and 707 looms during the 1861-1866 period) .
Perhaps the Appleton, like many of the other companies during
the Civil War period, took the opportunity afforded by reduced
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-8-
activity to update their mills.
This might account for
Hill's information. However, the Appleton suffered less
during this period than many of the others and in fact
produced the same amount of cloth every week (160,000 yards)
from 1860 through 1865, with a drop coming only in 1866
(to 130,000 yards), followed by recovery in 1868. In that
year drillings were added to the sheetings and shirtings
already in production.
Millyard Development:
1873-1904
Production did not increase noticeably until about 1875 when
the Appleton New Mill, built in 1873, was in full operation.
A spinning and weaving mill, it was entirely powered by steam.
The Appleton Company, unlike several of the other cotton
manufacturing companies in Lowell, did not alter its machinery in order to produce woolen cloth during the war period
and, therefore, suffered less disruption and financial loss
both during and after the war. By 1876 the Appleton was
operating with 41,088 spindles and 1,202 looms and producing
200,000 yards a week of sheetings, drilling9, and shirtings.
The number of employees was up to 450 women and 250 men.
Both duck and colo ~ed hosiery yarns had been added to the
manufactures by 1884, at which time 45,064 ·, spindles and
1,224 looms were in operation, producing 280,000 yards of
cloth per week.
The Appleton New Mill is a five-story, brick structure,
basically Italianate in style, with three towers ranged
symmetrically along its front (Jackson Street) facade (Fig.5).
The central tower is five stories, the other two are six.
The building rests on a granite water table which is stepped
slightly to accommodate the slight westerly rise of the site.
Sills of rock ~ faced granite and simple segmental arches
accent the windows, except on the fifth floor.
There, the
windows have projecting Italianate arched caps which, being
joined by smaller arches between each window, sustain a continuous rhythmic progression J - broken only by the three towers.
Directly above is the corbelled brick cornice. The lack of
arched window caps over the windows on the first four stories
is quite unusual as early as 1873. It seems to look forward
to a later nineteenth and early twentieth centu ~i t t pe 'Of
window treatment such as that used on the 191 5. addition to
the New Mill at the corner of Jackson and Revere Streets.
The Hamilton Manufacturing Company Storehouses toward the
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-9-
opposite end of Jackson Street exemplifies the sort of
window treatment which was usual in the 1870s and into
the 1880s. There, windows in each floor have the projecting Italianate caps.
As is usually the case, the decorative elements on the
stairtowers are more concentrated than on the remainder of
the building, with a granite stringcourse between the first
and second and the third and fourth stories, and paired
windows set within recessed brick panels. These panels
are framed by brick piers which are carried up into a
rather elaborate cornice.
Instead of sixth floor windows, the
center tower has granite plaques set into the space between
a secondary cornice, at the level of the actual building
roof, and the tower cornice. The plaques on the east and
west sides of the tower read "Appleton." The one · across
the front reads "1828-1873."
An imposing walkway bridges Jackson Street, linking the
third story of the center tower and Mill No. 4 in the millyard across the street. The bridge is of frame construction,
with Italianate detailing and board and batten sheathing.
Its paired, Italianate windows echo the style of the New
Mill. No doubt tha walkway was constructed at the same
time as the New Mill and was retained during the early
twentieth century reconstruction of the Appleton millyard.
Behind the New Mill are both a one-story brick boiler
house complex and a turbine house, likewise brick and onestory. Both are early twentieth century additions to the
structure.
In 1888 the Appleton Company was listed in the Lowell
Directory as having five mills in operation, rather than
four as previously, with 50,280 spindles and 1,480 looms
rather than the 45,064 spindles and 1,224 looms listed in
1887. The manufactures continued to be sheetings, drillings,
shirtings, and duck. Four hundred and sixty women and 260
men were employed in 1888. As there is no documentary
evidence of new construction at that time, the fifth mill
must have been a new use of a pre-existing building.
The Appleton Company, responding to an increasing demand
for business blocks on Middlesex Street, in 1889 disposed
of the sontherly half of the company-owned block between
Robeson and Hamilton Streets,on which stood its three boarding houses (21). Before doing so, however, they cut a
narrow street from east to west halfWay between Jackson and
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-10 -
Middlesex Streets, thus physically dividing the block in
half. The southerly segments of two of the houses were
demolished and the property sold to several individuals
who constructed business and residential buildings along
Middlesex Street. The Marston Block, for instance, rose
at the corner of Middlesex and Hamilton (later Marston)
Streets. The southern half of the boarding house nearest
Robeson Street was sold intact, while its northern segment,
still Appleton property, was razed. On this site at the
corner of Robeson and Jackson Streets was erected a large,
six-story brick mill and storehouse (Appleton Mill No. 6).
Elements of the southern segment of the boarding house at
the corner of Robeson and Middlesex appear to remain within
the fabric of the building presently at 207 Middlesex
Street.
[See Inventory Form on 207 Middlesex Street.]
The northern halves of the other two boarding houses (Nos.
204-206 and 286-288 Jackson Street) remained intact and
Appleton owned. By 1906, howev~,they too had been
demolished and the entire northern half of the block
between Robeson and Hamilton Streets was occupied by the
enormous (97 by 306 foot) Appleton Company Mill No. 6,
constructed of brick. The later segment, like the earlier,
is six stories tall. Both segments have tall windows on
the first two flooLs, and much shorter windows above.
On
the earlier portion of Mill No. 6, these upper windows
are widely spaced, suggesting the upper floors were
designed as storage space. The 1920 Insurance Survey bears
out this difference, showing manufacturing activities on
the lower floors and storage on the upper levels.
Between 1896 and 1906 Appleton had also built a narrow row
of shops on Middlesex Street, running the entire length of
the block between Revere and Robeson Streets.
A few changes had also taken place in the millyard by this
date. The Picker House west of old Mill No. 2 had been
extended out to the very edge of the canal by 1896, and a
Dye House built along the canal north of No. 2. Presumabl~
the regulation in the 1828 indenture between the Appleton
Company and the Locks and Canals Company which prohibited
building within ten feet of the Pawtucket Canal was no longer
in force by this date.
Millyard Development:
1905-1918
Only the five-story Appleton New Mill (1873) remains of all
the nineteenth-century buildings erected by the company, with
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-11-
the possible exception of the first two stories of Cotton
House No. 1. The entire nineteenth century Appleton millyard was demolished and reconstructed between 1905 and 1918
under the direction of Alexander G. Cumnock, who became
treasurer of the company on February 17, 1898 after thirty
years as the Boott Mills agent. According to Coburn, the
company "was in a bankrupt condition, with worn out machinery
and old buildings, some of them dating back to 1828" when
Cumnock took over.
"The principal product of the mills was
sheetings which could not be successfully manufactured in
competition with southern mills" (22). Apparently Appleton
had been in trouble for a nurober of years, prompting Hurd
to write in 1890:
"The average of its annual dividends ...
for the last twelve years have been less than 4 ~ 1/2 % " (23).
Appleton in fact stopped advertising (though it was still
listed) in the ~owell Dire~tory in 1891 and resumed only
after the reorganization and reconstruction were well underway. Under Cumnock, the Appleton product was changed from
sheetings to colored nap goods and, according to Coburn, the
company's "trademark was copyrighted in thirty-two foreign
countries with a constantly increasing busines~ (24).
The extensive building activity carried out in the Appleton
yard between .1904 and 1920 is recorded in the City of Lowell
BuildingsDepartment.
The following is a list of the dates,
purposes, and costs recorded on building permits for which
the company applied:
Dec. 1904, "for manufacturing and storehouse" ( $30,000) ;.
June 1905, "for manufacturing"($35,000);
April 1907, "Brick Mill" ($10, 000);
April 1909, "Pawtucket Canal. Add Dye House" ($12,000);
Nov. 1909, "Add--Boiler House" ($3,800);
Dec. 1910, Jackson corner King Street.
"Build twostory brick stable" ($7,500);
April 1912, "Build 5 story mill" ($80,000);
June 1915, Jackson, corner Revere Street, "Build
·' Storehouse" ($75,000);
Jan. 1916, "Build Brick Mill" ($10 ,000);
March 1916, "Build add. to Dyehouse" ' ($11,000);
June 1918, Jackson, corner Revere Street, "Build
Manufacturing Building" ($32,000);
Jan. 1920, "Raising Building 2 stories" ($40, 000).
The estimated cost noted with each building entry gives some
idea of the relative size of each project.
The Appleton millyard as it now stands is, in short, a composite of earlytwentieth century utilitarian brick mill structures, the
majority of them five to six stories in height.
The exception
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-12-
is a ten-story reinforced concrete storehouse with brick and
glass hung walls of a style popularized by the architect
Albert Kahn throughout the United States during the early
twentieth century. This must be the$75,000 storehouse
constructed inl91S. Known as Storehouse No. 7, it stands
at the corner of Jackson and Revere Streets, west of the
five-story brick and granite trim addition to the Appleton
New Mill built in 1918. Also belonging to the early-twentieth century building period is the t\om-story brick stable
built by Appleton in 1910 on King Stree~ near the corner of
Jackson Street. This still stands, in somewhat altered
condition.
The entire Appleton complex is clearly shown on
an Insurance Survey of November 17, 1920 (Figs. 11 ·, , 12).
The following buildings now stand in the Appleton millyard
proper. Mill No. 1, on the Hamilton Canal, is a six-story
brick structure, 100 by 207 feet, with a very slightly
pitched roof.
Large, plain wooden brackets support the roof
overhang above a corbelled cornice. Segmentally arched
windows have quarry-faced granite sills. Across the yard
entrance from No. 1, and also running along the Hamilton
Canal, is the ell of Mill No. 4, also called the office
building.
The main segment of No. 4, 88 by 120 feet, then
runs back (north) ~rom the canal until it connects with Mill
No. 3. Together No. 3 and No. 4 form the \•!estern boundary
of the Appleton yard.
The ell of No. 4 housed the mill office
on the second floo~ adjacent to the yard entrance.
Stylistically, No. 4 is very similar to No. 1, with one interesting
exception. Windows on the third floor of the west side of
Mill No. 4 have flush granite lintels rather than segmental
arches. This notably conservative and traditional element
may have resulted from Cumnock ordering the reuse of materials
from an earlier Appleton building, or this may be a
fragment remaining from an earlier wall of an Appleton
building which was similar in style to the Lowell Machine
Shop structure adjoining it (Fig. lOa). This limited use
of granite lintels on a building otherwise having seqmental
arches over the windows is curious.
From the exterior
the portion of wall into which these windows are set does not
appear to be earlier than the remainder of the west wall of
No. 4 Mill.
I
On the interior of the yard, built into the angle formed by
the offioe building and No. 4 Mill, is the six-story brick
Cotton House No. 1, 78 by 165 feet.
On the first four
stories, this has the very small, arched windows characteristic of the nineteenth-century storehouses built by many
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
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of the Lowell manufacturing companies. This lower portion
of the building was constructed sometime between 1896 and
1906 (it appears for the first time on the 1906 Lowell
Atlas), while a January, 1920 permit to raise a building two
stories probably refers to this storehouse.
The style of
the two added floors is that seen in the remainder of the
yard proper.
The 75 by 423foot Appleton Mill No. 2 extends the entire
length of the inner millyard. Built of brick six stories
high, it is of the same style as the others.
Its windows
have granite sills and are capped by segmental arches.
No. 2 ell is a 42 by 57 foot, five-story building betweenHills
No. 1 and No. 2, on the boundary line between Appleton and
Hamilton.
The 52 by 430 foot, two-story, brick Dye House
running along the Pawtucket Canal behind Mill No. 2 also
still stands.
Corporate History
After 1918
The Appleton Company continued to be listed in the Lowell
Directory through 1933. Four years earlier, however, The
American Wool and Gatton Reporter described the "great
Appleton Company " as '\.vholly out of business in Massachusetts.
They have 1,500,000 square feet of floor space in the
Appleton Company mills and only 115,000 square feet has it
been possible to rent" (25). The company leased space to
various concerns, and from 1934 until 1950 the directory
listing for the Appleton Company at 217 Jackson Street
reads "industrial real estate."
Meanwhile in 1944, Jackson Properties, Inc., also at 217
Jackson Street, purchased from the Appleton Company the
entire real estate, buildings, equipment, and operating
supplies of their Lowell plant.
In May of 1975, Jackson
Properties sold the former Appleton Company complex to
James T. Lichoulas, a trustee of the Appleton Trust (26).
Today the plant is used for warehousing, light manufacturing
and other commercial enterprises. Much of it is vacant.
Of interestis the fact that Lichoulas, and Jackson Properties
before him, have continued to pay rent to the Proprietors
of Locks and Canals on Merrimack River for all of the
original Appleton Company mill powers. Mill privileges
distributed by the Proprietors during the nineteenth century
to the Lowell textile companies have reverted to the Locks
and Canals Company in every other case but one, that of
the Lawrence Manufacturing Company. The Lawrence plant
APpleton Manufacturing Co.
-14-
retains8& 20/30ths of its original mill powers, while
Lichoulas continues to lease all ofthe .11 & 25/30ths
mill powers which the Appleton Company obtained during
the nineteenth century.
In 1978 ten Appleton turbines
were still in place.
They presumably still are.
According
to Molloy, the two oldest are McCormack horizontal turbines
of 1901 and the two latest are horizontally mounted Hunt
wheels (28).
Archeological Comment
This millyard remains largely intact.
Successive razing
and rebuilding likely has obliterated most remains of
previous periods. Although it i£ possible that elements
of early structures are incorporated into present structures,
this property has a low potential for yielding significant
archeological remains.
. i_ ..... .. ...... 1 .
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APPLETON MILLS.
Figure 2
View of Appleton Mills,
March 1884.
j,
F IG UHE
184~
'
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1845.
from the Bay State Monthly, v. 1, No. III,
AI\·IER IC AN BU ILDINGS AND T IIEIR AR C III TF. CT S
l
g . David Dale and Richard Af'kwright.
M ills. New Larw rk, Scotland , 1785.
Figure 2a
David Dale and Richard Arkwright's Mills in New Lanark, Scotland, 1785.
From William H. Pierson, Jr., American Buildings and Their Architects:
Technology and the Picturesque, The Corporate and the Early Gothic Styles,
1978, p. 34.
Figure 3
Appleton Mills.
Vignette from border of Sidney & Neff's
"Plan of Lowell,"
1850.
Figure 4
Appleton Yard, 1880.
Hill, Lowell Illustrated, 1884, p. 74.
.
. '
~
I
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~
Figure 5
Appleton New Mill, built l873.
1902, facing p. 88.
City of Lowell, Board of Trade Publication,
Figure 6
View on Middlesex Street showing Appleton Company boarding houses standing among
bter commercial buildings (right side of street). City of Lowell, Board of Trade
Publication, 1902, facing p. 32.
THE APPLETON l\1ILLS 7 FROM THE TOP OF
No. 6
Ph oto by Will R oun<ls
l\iiLL OF THE HA:IlfiLTON 00:Il1P AJ\'Y
Figure 7
The Appleton Mills, from the top of No. 6 Mill of the Hamilton Company.
Manual of the Lowell Board of Trade, Report •.. for the year ending
January 1, 1905, p. 102.
Figure 8
The Appleton Mills--Looking up Jackson Street.
of Trade, ... 1905, p. 92.
Manual of the Lowell Board
APPL ETON ~!ANUFACTURING COMPANY
70,0(\0 ::ipindlcs
2,500 Empluycc•
Figure 9
Appleton Manufacturing Company from roof of Appleton Storehouse on Jackson
Street. Lowell Board of Trade Year Book, 1911-1912, p. 84.
[
'I ,
-·
-(
:
Figure 10
View of the Appleton mills from the southwest. Above the partially demolished
Machine Shop building on the left foreground, the flat granite lintels on the
west wall, third floor of Appleton Mill No. 4 are visible.
U. of Lowell Library, Special Collections, Locks and Canals photo #2664
(March 2, 1932).
.l
Figure 11
Appleton Company, Lowell, Mass. Insurance Survey, November 17, 1920.
U. of Lowell Library, Special Collections, Proprietors of Locks and
Canals Photo file #1760-H.
CONFIDomAL
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Figure 12
Appleton Company, Lowell, Mass. Insurance Survey, November 17, 1920. U. of Lowell
Library, Special Collections, Proprietors of Locks and Canals Photo file #1760-F.
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Atlas of Lowell, 1924, plate 3A.
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Figure 16
Atlas of Lowell, 1936, plate 4.
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Figure 16a
Atlas of Lowell, 1936, plate 5.
AD V E R .T I SIN G
A}lpl~)riri
·.-,.<
,..
325
D E P A R T MEN).
tQJli·Pany,
.
;._:~:''" ~ ~ 5 .....
JA..CKSON STREET.
-·
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INCORPORATED, 182B.
CAPITAL ·
$600,000•
.-
GEORGE lUOTLEY, Agent. ·
ARTH1JR L. DEVENS~ 1.'reasurer,
22 FRANKLIN BT.RF,:ET, BOSTON.
A. D. ROBINSON·; · Pay1nader.
Spindles . . ·.• _ •.• .• • • • . • .. •.• ; : •• ·. • . .• . .. . . ·. . 19,872
l
Looms
.. .
. ...
•• , . : . . • • • . . . • • , . . . . • • • . . . . • . . . . . . • 717
Females ·employed . ·• • . · . . . : • . . . . . . . . • . . . . . . 400
Males employed • . • . . . . . • . • . . . • . . • . • . • . . . . · . . :·120
Yards m.ade per w-eek . . . • . • • . • . • . • . . • . • .130,000
Cotton oons-..m.ed per w-eek, lbs. • . . • . . - . . - . 50,000
Kind of" Goods made •. Sheetings &
Shirtings;:J..4· to 20
.NUMBER OF l\ULLS R.UN BY ·THIS COMPANY ARE THREE.
J>ay-Day, -week at'ter laat Saturday In each montli,
Figure 17
Lowell
Director~
1866, p. 325.
447 -
MANUFACTURING COliPANIES.
APPLETON_. : CO~PANY,
JACKSON. STREET.
: INOORPORATED, 1828. .
'
.
•
•
•
'
I
~
'.
CAPITAL,
. ... • •
..
• -•
. . . ..
• •
$600,000 .
· G~ORGE MOTLEY,· _Treasurer,
rO·
5 Pe~berton<Squa~~· Boston: .
J. H. SAWYER, Superintendent. .
,
" , '.'I·
.· 1.': A. -H; ROBINSO~,
Paymaster.
Spindies. ~ . ; .•.. ; .... ~ ·••••• ; •••• ~ ·•.••. ; . . . • . •
2'1,568
· -'188
Looms . ~- ..... ·. ..... ~ : . :•.. ~ ·• ~- .••..••• : . ...•• ; .. ·
Females ·employed .. ,. ...••..••..•....• : . . . . . . .
400 '
.
120 '
Males. employed.·.·..•.. : ~ .. .. ................... ,
160,000 :
Yards m~de per week...................... . ...
Cotton consumed ·per week, lbs .. : ., . .':. . . . . . . . .
'1'0,000
Manufacture Sheetings, Drillings, and-Shirtings, ... ·. . -No. 14
Nu'£!lberof.: Mills ·run ·by this Company are Four; ·
·" PAY•DAY1 WEEK
Al~rEB
LAST SATURDAY IN EACH l!ONTII.
Figure 18
The "New Mill" is reflected in the four mills reported in this advertisement,
but the number of looms and number of employees does not increase substantially until a few years later, reflecting a delay in bringing that mill into
full operation. Lowell Directory, 1874, p.447.
·INCORPORATED 1828.
I
- ·· o ·
i
Capital, - , ·- ·· - · $600,000.
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-~u_ PE.E_ : . ~reasurer,
·
19 Exchange Place; · Boston.
l .~· H. SA~YER:·.super~ten~~~nt:s ., :·. ·.
I
.. • . . ·- -
· A. H. ROBINSON, Paymaster.
. - o -·.
·sp1'n dies.· ·, ·...••
· · · · ,.· ·...
· •...
· · ·...
· · ·, ·. ·.....
· · · ·. ·........ . . .
I
Looms ·. ~ ~ . ·; ·. ·. , . >~
•
·
•
. 41,088
1,202
.., .. ·.-, ·.: .. ·..:::: .. ~., .....
employed: ..;:::. :.: ::: •., ............ 450
em.ployed::--: .·.. ~. ::·:·.;.. :~ , .' ............'. 250
Yards made'per week.:::: : .. ~; : ............. .. 200,000
Cotton consn.med per week, i!,o~nds,. . . . . . ... . . . . . 96,000
Females
Mal es
• ~ 1! ~
•
l •
,".
1
t
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..
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lmnufmcturo Sheet~n~s, ~rillin~s, mnd Shirtings~
I1
. .N~b~r of!~11~ ~- by this Company 8J'& _Fo~.
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.•
Figure 19
The 1876 Appleton statistics reflect the increases associated with the full
operation of Mill No. 4, the "New Mill" of 1873. Lowell Directory, 1876.
749
JACKSCN STREET.
INCORPORATED 1828.
/
·CAPITAL,
a
a
$SOO,OOO.
JAMES A. DUPEE, Treasurer.
No. 95 Milk Street, Boston.
UPHAM, TUCKER, & CO., SELLING AGENTS,.
BOSTON AND NEW YORK.
DANIEL ·WRIGHT, Superintendent.
J. F. SCHOLFIELD, Asst. Supt.
D. E. STIMPSOr~, Paymaster.
Spindles ................ . ..........• ·• . . . . . . . . . . 45,064
Looms............... . .........................
1,224
Females employed... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . • .
600
Males employed.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . .
27 5
Yards made. per week ............ ·.............. 280,000
Cotton consumed per week, pounds .............. 107,000
Manufacture Sheetings, Drillings~ Shirtings,
Duck, and Colored Hosiery Yarns.
NUMBER OF MILLS RUN BY TillS COMPANY ARE FOUR.
Figure 20
Lowell Directory, 1886, p. 749.
I
907
MAN UFACTUI:trNG COi\IPANIES.
l
JACKSON STREET.
lX CHJCt•ott.'\.T E H
CAPIT
L, -
-
J.S2.S
$600,000
Lours ilo<BESON, 'I'<RE~SU11E11,
78 CHAUNCY . STREET, BOSTON .
~
~
DANA, TUCKER, & CO., Selling Agents,
B.OSTON, NEW YORK and PHILADELPHIA.
CHARLES H. RICHARDSON, AGENT.
D. E. STIMPSON. PAYMASTER.
Spindles. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
50,280
Looms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1,639
F emales employed. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
500
Males employed ..... ... . . ..... , . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
275
Yards made · per week. . ..... .. ............ .... ......... . . . . . . . . .
~~35 , 000
Cotton consumed per week, pounds. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
120,000
:Iv.I:ANUFACTU::RE
SHEETINGS, DRilliNGS AND SHIRTINGS .
.j·
Nmu lm· of Jrilt• ll•m by tl•b Cmnpnny, F'Lv • .
j _,
Figure 21
Lowell Directory, 1891, p. 907.
l
·---~!
;"
APPLETON COMPANY:-
·c
JACKSON
STREET - .
'l
.
•. - ·
1·· ·
·,.
.
. ':· __INCORPORATED
1828
..
CAPITAL ·
.A. G. CUMNOC:Kt Treas.:
. F. .A~ BOWEN, Superintendent ~
1 W. M. SHERWELL, Paymaster: ::
.
CATLIN
.
'
-i-·
~~;:_;{
.- CO.~ s.,;;_!ling A g e n t s
&
Ne-w
~
.
York
a n .d
Boston
.. ~ .lt.\NUFACTURERS OF .. ..
.
Fancy . Goods 1n Great Variety
~
- -4.0::::~ .
Figure 22
Lowell Direc tory, 1908 , p. 896.
[
··;
·l"
. r
·.;.
Figure 23
Top: Regulations for Occupants of Appleton Company boa rding houses.
Bottom: Rent receipt from a boarding house keeper for the Appleton Company, 1869.
U. of Lowell Library, Special Collections.
l
-15-
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
Footnotes
1)
John A. Lowell, "Patrick T. Jackson," Contributions/Old
Residents', v. I, p. 202.
2)
North Middlesex Registry, Record Book 7, p. 243.
15, 1828).
3)
Ibid., Record Book 7, p. 231.
4)
"Letters of Samuel Batchelder," Contributions/Old
Residents', v. 1, p. 16.
5)
Joshua Merrill, "School District No. 5."
Old Residents', v. 1, pp. 27-28.
6)
"The Mayors of Lowell,"
v. 1, p. 172.
7)
Gibb, The Saco-Lowell Shops, pp. 72-73.
8)
Benjamin Mather, "Plan of Lowell,"l832.
9)
U. A. Boyden · and Philander Anderson, "Plan of Lowell
Village," 1834-35.
(March
Contributions/
Contributions/Old Residents',
10) Joshua Merrill, "School District No. 5·," Contributions/
Old Residents', v. 1, p. 30.
11) Insurance Plan: Mill Yard of the Appleton Company,
Lowell, Mass., 18 7 8. Special Collections, U. of Lowell.
llA) Pierson, American Buildings and Their Architects.
Technology and the Picturesque, p. 33.
12) Hill, Lowell Illustrated, p. 74.
13) Lowell Directory, 1832, p. 6.
14) North Middlesex Registry, Record Book 17, p. 318.
15) Lowell Directory, 1836, p. 8.
16) Lowell Directory, 1842, p. 21.
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-16-
17)
North Middlesex Registry, Record Book 38, p. 249 and
Record Book 44, p. 44.
18)
Statistics of Lowell Manufactures.
U. of Lowell.
19)
James B. Francis, Lowell Hydraulic Experiments. New York:
D. Van Nostrand, 1868. n.p.
20)
Hill, Lowell Illustrated, p. 75.
21)
Souvenir, p. 87.
22)
Coburn, History of Lowell, v. III, p. 420.
23)
Hurd, History of Middlesex County, v. II, p. 75.
24)
Coburn, History of Lowell, v. III, p. 420
25)
Quoted in King Cotton is Sick, Claudius T. Murchison,
Chapel Hill ~ U. of North Carolina Press, 1930.
26)
North Middlesex Registry, Record Book 2147, p. 513.
27)
Molloy, Lower Merrimack River Valley, p. 49.
Special Collections,
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
-17-
Bibliography
Charters,Additional Acts, and other Documents Relating to
the Proprietors of the Locks and Cahals on Merrimack River ...
and the Manufacturing Companies at Lowell .... Cambridge:
Allen and Farnham, Printers, 1857.
City of Lowell Atlases:
1879, 1896, 1906, 1924, 1936.
City of Lowell Buildings Department Records.
City of Lowell Directories:
1832 to present.
City of Lowell, Mass., Its Commercial and Financial Resources;
Souvenir of the Lowell Morning Mail, Lowell, 1890.
Coburn, Frederick ~. History of Lowell and Its People.
York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1920.
New
Cowley, Charles. A Handbook of Business in Lowell, with a
History of the City. Lowell: E. D. Green, 1856.
Cowley, Charles. · A History of Lowell. Lowell: B. C. Sargent
and J. Merrill & Son, 1868.
Eno, Arthur L., Jr., Ed. Cotton was King. A History of Lowell,
Massachusetts. Manchester, N. H.
New Hampshire Publishing
Company, 1976.
Gibb, George Sweet. The Saco-Lowell Shops, 1813-1949.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1950.
Handbook for the Visiter [sic] to Lowell.
Hill, Frank P. Lowell Illustrated.
Lowell:
1884.
Hurd, D. Hamilton. History of Middlesex County , Massachusetts.
Philadelphia: J. W. Lewis & Co., 1890.
Illustrated History of Lowell and Vicinity, Massachusetts,
done by divers hands. Lowell: Courier-Citizen Company,
1897.
Kenngott, George F. The Record of a City.
MacMillan Company, 1912.
New York:
The
Appleton Manufacturing Co.
- 18-
"Letters of Samuel Batchelder," Contributions of the Old
Residents' Historical Associatiott, y. I (1879), pp. 10-17.
Lowell, John.
"Patrick T. Jackson," Contributions of the
Old Residents' Historical Association, v. I (1879), pp. 189211.
Lowell of Today.
Lowell Daily Citizen, 1893.
Lowell Year Book, Nos. 1-10.
(1882-1893).
Morning Mail Company, 1882-93.
Lowell:
The
Merrill, Jdshua. "School District No. 5," Contributions of
the Old Residents' Historical Association, v. I, pp. 25-41.
Miles, Henry A. Lowell As It Was, And As It Is (1845).
Reprint--New York: Arno Press, 1972.
Molloy, Peter M. The Lower Merrimack River Valley. North
Andover, Mass.: Merrimack Valley Textile Museum, 1978.
Murchison, Claud mus T. King Cotton is Sick.
University of North Carolina Press, 1930.
Chapel Hi ll:
Pierson, William H., Jr. American Buildings and Their Architects.
Technology and the Picturesque. The Corporate and the Early
Gothic Styles. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Co., Inc.,
1978.
Selections, Historical and General, Mostly Concerning Lowell
and Vicinity. Largely from the Lowell Newspapers of the past
thirty years. Lowell: 1894.
[Scrapbook in three volumes
Special Collections, U. of Lowell.]
Special Collections, U. of Lowell. Maps, Insurance Plans,
picture file, document file.
Statistics of Lowell Manufactures.
[Pamphlets and document
file, Special Collections, U. of Lowell.]