© Harold E. Spaulding,
Workshop of the
World (Oliver Evans Press, 1990).
The Germantown neighborhood
as it exists today began as German Township in 1683, when
Francis Daniel Pastorius secured a 5,700 acre tract six
miles northwest of Philadelphia from William Penn.
Pastorius was a wealthy aristocrat and lawyer and
represented a group of German investors that called
themselves the "German Society"; their interests were
mostly commercial. Along with Pastorius came thirteen
Quaker families from Krefeld, Germany who were interested
in participating in Penn's "holy experiment". Together
the two groups established the Germantown community along
both sides of the Indian trail that would later become
known as Germantown Avenue.
Most of the settlers who came to Germantown were linen
weavers and experienced in cloth production. Within a
year of their initial settlement, they were producing
linen and selling it at a store in Philadelphia that was
owned and operated by Pastorius. By 1689, the Germantown
community contained 44 families. 1
The cascading waters of the Wissahickon Creek near
Germantown provided a source of water power for milling
activities by Pastorius and the early settlers. In 1690,
William Rittenhouse erected a paper mill on what is now
Paper Mill Run. It was the first paper mill to be erected
and operated in America. 2
By 1746, a dozen
water-powered sites were situated on the creek.
3
Elsewhere in the
township, farmers grew grains such as flax, which was
used in the manufacture of cloth. By 1760, just less than
80 years after its founding, the descendants of the
German settlers were enjoying success and prosperity. The
Reverend Andrew Barnaby, in 1760
wrote:
The Germantown thread stockings are in high estimation
and the year before last I have been credibly informed
there were manufactured in that town alone above 60,000
dozen pairs, their common retail price a dollar per
pair." 4
Germantown became Anglicized in the middle of the
eighteenth century when wealthy Philadelphians fled the
congestion associated with the city to build country
estates there. After the American Revolution, Germantown
also became the home to people fleeing the yellow fever
epidemics in Philadelphia. 5
Industry of non-German origin came to Germantown when
William Logan Fisher built and operated a textile mill on
Wingohocking Creek in 1809; several years later, Fisher
established a calico print mill nearby. By 1830, the
Anglicization of the township was virtually completed
with the introduction of the first English language
newspaper and the impending connection to the city by the
Philadelphia, Germantown, and Norristown Railroad.
6
During the 1830s-40s, Germantown's textile industry
boomed, with immigrants skilled in mill operations and
textile production arriving in large numbers from
England, Scotland, and Germany. In 1830, John Button
arrived from Leicester, England with two hosiery knitting
machines; he built a large, complex production facility
on Walnut Lane, east of Germantown Avenue called the
Germantown Hosiery Mills and became the first producer
using machinery rather than hand-operated frames. William
and Andrew McCallum came from Scotland in 1831 and bought
an old water driven mill on Paper Mill Run. There they
expanded and built the Glen Echo Mills complex. In 1843,
Charles Spencer arrived from Leicester, England and
established the Leicester Mills. Like the Glen Echo and
Germantown Hosiery Mills, Spencer spun his own yarn; he
also combined power looms with hand operated machines.
While entrepreneurs such as Spencer and Button operated
large, integrated "factories" throughout Germantown,
there were also many individual knitting frame and hand
loom operators, producing goods out of their homes and
carriage houses under contract. These people would
purchase yarn on their own or else would have it supplied
by the mills under whom they were contracted.
The 1850 Census of Manufactures reported ninety-seven
industrial establishments in Germantown; fifty were on
the west side of Germantown Avenue, forthy-seven on the
east. After that, new industries began to locate east of
Germantown Avenue, leaving the area west for residential
development. By 1860, 136 industrial sites were listed in
the Census of Manufactures (this included nine quarries,
opened presumably in response to the demands of the
building boom). At that time, development in the area
south and east of Bringhurst Streets also took on a
curious nature. Lots were subdivided in a narrow, deep
configuration—usually 50 feet wide by 200 feet
deep; on them, a dwelling would be constructed next to
the street and a small two or three story factory at the
rear of the lot. The textiles they produced were usually
finished, ready-for-sale items such as fancy knits and
woolen hosiery. Power to operate their machines was
supplied by small, steam powered machines, usually 15
h.p. or less. There were also a lot of hand looms in
operation in these small factories; however, they rarely
produced their own yarn. Instead, they purchased yarn in
smaller, more manageable amounts from the larger plants
and avoided the high costs of carding machines and
spinning frames.
In 1881, the Reading Railroad opened a station at Wayne
Junction, along the southern end of Germantown. Here they
developed a major freight handling center for the
Philadelphia area and it was here that Germantown's
biggest concentration of industry occurred.
7
Here, McCallum
and McCallum, owners of the Glen Echo Mills, purchased
4-1/2 acres and built the New Glen Echo
Mills. Shortly thereafter,
numerous diverse manufacturing plants began to be
built adjacent to the railroad; these included brass
foundries, coal yards, wood shops, machine shops, a
carpet mill, an electric company, the Leeds &
Northrup Scientific Instrument Company, and the
Atwater Kent
Company.
The Wayne Junction area continued to develop and by the
turn of the twentieth century had influenced a broad
shift in the industrial makeup of Germantown.
Diversification of industry replaced the sole dependence
on textiles as companies such as the Arguto Oilless
Bearing Company, the Blaisdell Paper Pencil Company,
Carbutt's Keystone Dry Plates Company, the
Max Levy Autograph
Company, and the Atwater Kent
Company's radio production plant emerged near Wayne
Junction.
Urban congestion, overcrowding, and poor housing
conditions contributed to a decline in Germantown's
infrastructure by the late 1930s. After 1945, industries
began to relocate out of the area, seeking safer, more
open, and less expensive environments. This caused a
decline in the area and in spite of the relocation of a
remanufacturing plant in an old mill by the Cunningham
Piano Company, little could be done to stop the departure
of industry.
In recent years, the Asher Candy Company has confirmed
its commitment to the area by expanding its production
facility on Germantown Avenue. Slowly, other companies,
mostly small in size, are following Asher's lead, taking
advantage of well-constructed, attractive buildings and
low prices. However, Germantown, for the most part,
stands as a visible reminder of the city's industrial
past, full of a now-gone greatness that was sold, one
company at a time, over the past 50 years.
1 Mark Frazier
Lloyd, "Germantown
1683-1983," Antiques, August 1983.
Also, "An
Explanation of the Original Location and General Plan or
Draught of the Lands and Lots of Germantown and Creesam
Townships, Copied from Matthias Zimmerman's Original of
June 26th A.D. 1746, Recopied by Christian Lehman, July
28, 1766, Recopied by Joseph Lehman, January 1,
1824," transcript by Robeson Lea
Perot, 1907, on file at the Germantown Historical
Society.
2 "Germantown
and its Industries—The Old and the
New," The Germantown Guide, Feb. 3,
1917, p. 3.
3 "Philadelphia
Atlas, 1746," pp. 58-59, on file at the
Germantown Historical Society.
4 Charles F. Jenkins, of
the Site and Relic Society (now the Germantown Historical
Society), "Guide
Book to Historic Germantown" (1904), p. 14, found at the
Krauth Memorial Library, Lutheran Theological Seminary,
Germantown.
5 Lloyd, p. 255.
6 Lloyd, p. 255.
7 Lloyd, p. 256.
Also see Workshop of the
World—Nicetown. Nicetown borders the
other side of Wayne Junction.
Acknowledgements:
Thanks to John
R. Bowie, who assisted in the writing of this chapter.
Thanks also to Sandra MacKenzie Lloyd, who provided
research assistance and insights into the general
history of Germantown. Special thanks to Edgar B.
Coale, who shared valuable notes and information on
Max Levy Autograph, Incorporated. Special thanks also
Jack Asher, who provided information on the history of
the C.A. Asher Candy Company. Thanks to the staff,
Pastore Library, Philadelphia College of Textiles and
Science. Very special thanks to Lisabeth M. Holloway,
Archivist, Germantown Historical Society Library.
Special thanks to Richard Boardman, Map Curator and
J.B. Post, Print and Picture Curator, Philadelphia
Free Library. Thanks to Lesley DeVine, owner, Kendrick
Co., Inc., for information on the history of this very
old firm.
Resources:
Germantown
bibliography