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ONCE UPON A TIME IN AMERICA….by Luigi Bagnato Abstract: The closing years of the 18th century are well remembered as the time of The American Revolutionary War when the American colonies fought for independence-the toll was high in human life. The world would never be the same. During the same period, another revolution was taking place. The process of making paper in the American Colonies at the end of the 18th century was similar to that used when paper was first invented in China in 105 AD , still made by hand, sheet by individual sheet. Through those turbulent war years of the American Revolution another revolution was taking place: The paper industry was being converted to mechanization. Paper making inventions abounded and the toll would be hardships, displacements and financial ruin or gain depending which end of the "paper revolution" a person was on. Paper making would never be the same. Papermaking would never be the same! There was unrest in The Colonies! The Stamp Act, passed without debate by the British Parliament in 1765 as a means of raising revenue in the American Colonies, aroused widespread opposition among the colonists, who argued that because they were not represented in Parliament, they could not legally be taxed without their consent. Even though the Stamp Act was repealed it was considered one of the chief immediate causes of the American Revolution. The passage of the Massachusetts Intolerable Acts in 1774 garnered strong resentment that led to the outbreak of the American Revolution (1775-1783). The First Continental Congress convened in September 1774 to formulate a response to the acts.
The war dragged on from The Boston Massacre, The Boston Tea Party, the first armed encounter at Lexington and Concord, and the many battles and skirmishes that followed. On April 30, 1789, George Washington , standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States. Finally, The Paris Treaty of 1893 ended the terrible conflict and the people in the colonies were putting the war behind them and devoting more of their energies to daily life. The intervening war years, while a sad period, were relatively good for the Abijah Burbank mill. 1783, the year of the Paris Treaty, Caleb, the son of Abijah took over operating the mill. In 1788 Caleb and his brother Elijah purchased their father's property for 600 pounds. Although they had no way of knowing, hard times were ahead. Their mill still did everything by hand. The work was hard. The workers toiled for long hours, usually from dawn 'til dusk, 6 days a week. Their mill operation was typical for the times. This however was the period just before the "changeover" from manual labor to mechanization in the paper trade. Rags to make paper stock were becoming scare and the price was volatile. In Central Massachusetts papermakers paid three pence a pound. By 1778 the price was three pence to two shillings a pound. By 1779 it was twelve pence to two shillings, by 1780 three shillings and in 1781 clean rags were costing ten shillings a pound. In the early 1800s Mathias Koops in England started his experiments in the use of wood, straw and the deinking of paper. It was possible wood pulp might become a good stable source of raw material for making paper. The Burbanks probably wished them good fortune in this venture. The area around Worchester abounded in trees. Papermakers started looking for alternative raw materials and many mills tested local sources of fiber as substitutes for rag pulp, including tree bark, sugarcane waste called bagasse, straw, and cornstalks.
The Burbanks probably felt extremely fortunate to be living in these times of rapidly advancing technology. Even so, they must have had great reservations for their future when considering the new technologies for making paper and the high cost to refit a mill to produce the quality and high productivity to remain competitive. The First paper mill in Massachusetts west of the Connecticut River was founded in Dalton in 1801. This was a one vat mill with a daily production of 20 posts (five to six reams) of paper. The personnel consisted of an engineer at $3.00 per week, a vatman and coucher at $ 3.50 per week and board, and a layboy at sixty cents a week and board. The superintendent, Mr. Crane was allowed $ 9.00 per week. In 1804 the Burbank brothers were using two watermarks, C. BURBANK and E. BURBANK on moulds that could make a sheet 19 by 23 inches. By 1810, there were over 180 mills producing paper in North America. As new mills began production and old mills increased productivity to be competitive, rags for making paper were becoming increasingly more scarce. The government instructed people to save rags. One papermaker used a watermark that said "save rags."
Note: The technical information and dates in this article are real as described in various historical documents. We have taken slight fictional liberties with the Abijah Burbank family story to produce the incidents in a narrative form but facts and dates are as reported in historical documents. What happened to the inventors and pioneers that changed the course of papermaking in the late 1700s and early 1800s? We know about a few. Nicholas Louis Robert: Although he said his machine can be "done by children" things got complex and he called for help. The help came in the form of a gentleman named St. Ledger Didot. Roberts and Didot came up with new patents and Roberts, St Ledger Didot and a Francois Didot had high expectations. With the disturbed conditions brought about by the Revolution they made little progress in France. Robert becoming financially involved sold his patent to Didot for 25,000 francs. Didot failed to pay him. He took back his invention and never did realize the great riches he had dreamed of. St. Ledger Didot: After defaulting on payment, Roberts took back his invention. Henry and Sealy Fourdrinier: Became interested in the new machine and Bryan Donkin was talked into building a new machine based on the Roberts invention. The machine made good paper, the Fourdrinier brothers having invested some 60,000 pounds in the venture. He started a sucessful company that designed and built paper machines in London. Like Roberts, the Fourdrinier Brothers made no money on the inventions. Their only reward was having the design named after them. Machines today using that process are still referred to as fourdrinier machines. Regards Caleb and Elijah Burank, their mill got into financial problems in the panic of 1836-1837. The mill passed to other hands and operated until about 1857. Even so the name Burbank is still known in modern times. Crocker Technical Papers, Inc. at Fitchburg, MA, just a few years back was known as the Crocker, Burbank Mill. The most enduring company in this story is the Crane Mill. They are still in production today, with mills at Dalton, manufacturing bank note papers by the yard.
We gratefully acknowledge the contributions of the following Internet
sites and books. Bibliography (Internet Sites) Arch Net-Arch Net the virtual Library, University of Connecticut Deutsches Museum Deutsches Museum · 80306 München Inveresk Paper Inveresk Paper, PLC Hammanasset Paper Mill Site Hammanasset Paper Mill Site - Connecticut Site No. 76-6 History Buff SiteThe History Buffs Page Manufacturing Interests In Massachusetts Paper mill histories in the Holyoke Region. Paperonline Paper History Papermaking Moves to the United States Starting with the first mill at Rittenhouse, PA Paper Museum Tour Welcome to the Museum! You are currently "standing" in the lobby of our virtual museum, ready to begin your tour. Books Making Paper: A look into the history of an ancient craft. Bo Rudin 1990
Papermaking: The
history and technique of an ancient craft. Dard Hunter 1947 On the flyleaf of Dard Hunter's book: Papermaking
(Author unknown, circa 18th century) This article researched and formatted by Luigi Bagnato
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Almost simultaneously with The Declaration of War against the
British, in 1776, Abijah Burbank of Worcester County started a
paper mill in Central Massachusetts on a tributary named Crooked
Pond. Abijah engaged a construction engineer and work commenced
with the construction of a building and included a large 12 foot
water wheel that would furnish the power to drive two engines.
Two large vats were installed. Rags for the stock were to be cut
by hand with a scythe fixed in a post, or using knives. With both
engines running full capacity for the normal 15 hour days, five
men and 10 girls could produce 250 pounds of paper daily with
a weekly payroll of 
The mould has a significant influence on the quality of the sheet.
The mould must be rigid to support the stock, provide even drainage
and constructed for hard use. The frames were made of oak wood.
The wood had to be narrow, straight grained, seasoned, free of
blemishes and knots. The boards were boiled in water repeatedly
dried slowly. Paper in the colonies from the mid 18th
century was called "wove" due to the way the wires were
wove on the mould. The watermark was made from very fine wire
on the screen surface. It was a meticulous art that required a
skilled craftsman. Support ribs were spaced equal distant on the
long side of the mould. Around the mould was a removable deckle
or frame which acted as a fence around it's edges. When paper
was being made, two moulds and one deckle were required at each
vat, so it was essential that the deckle fit the mould perfectly.
Mould making required great skill. There were few artisans that
could make superior moulds.
The stock was made from rag pulp in a wooden vat. The vatman submerged
the mold vertically in the vat of warm stock, rotated it and lifted
it out horizontally allowing excess stock to float off the edges
of the mold. By this action, the mold was evenly covered with
the macerated linen and cotton. He then shook the newly formed
sheet on the surface of the mold from front to back and then left
to right. These motions crossed and matted fibres making the sheet
of paper of equal strength in both directions, at the same time
expelling considerable water from the sheet. The vatman then passed
the mould to a second artisan known as a "coucher" and
proceeded to form another sheet.
The post was placed in a large wooden screw press. All the workers
of the mill were summoned to assist in tightening the press by
pushing or pulling a long wooden lever. It was generally the duty
of a "layboy" to blow a horn and notify all the men
in the mill to come help press the post. A two foot high post
could be reduced to 6 or 8 inches in this way. Before opening
the press, water is scraped from the edges of the felting, and
the post removed from the bed of the press. A layman, grasps each
sheet from the two corners closest to him and lifts the sheet
so it pulls away from the felt without strain. The sheets are
stacked carefully. The neat pile is again pressed slightly and
allowed to remain in the press overnight.
After the pressing was complete the sheets went to a drying loft.
The paper was taken from the pile after the last pressing, in
"spurs" of 4 or 5 sheets. In their moist condition,
they adhered to each other. If the sheets had been dried individually
they would have wrinkled but when dried in spurs the paper dried
smoothly without curling. Drying had to be done in an area free
of dirt and dust, the drying was usually done in a loft on the
upper floor of the mill. The favorite way to dry the spurs was
to drape them over a rope. Because inks were thick, the sheets
had to be sized after drying usually by dipping them in animal
gelatin or glue. This was particularly important for writing papers.
To smooth the sheet, workers simply rubbed each sheet by hand
with a glossy stone.
Clouds of a different nature became an increasing concern to papermakers
in the Colonies. There were strong rumors from Europe that a Frenchman
named Nicholas-Louis Robert conceived the idea of a machine to
produce a continuous roll of paper to fill urgent needs for banknotes
after the French Revolution. (In fact, Louis Robert invented a
prototype of a machine that made a continuous sheet of paper supported
on a wire cloth. The invention was patented on January 18, 1799).
The
name Fourdrinier first was known in paper circles when he was
issued a patent in July 24, 1806 for a machine that would make
a continuous length of paper. It was described as: A number of
moulds, of the description called laid and wove, hooked together
to form a long mold in such a manner that they shall slide along
backwards or forwards, but in no other direction. A vessel or
trough from which the paper stuff or material is caused to flow
upon the moulds, through the holes. A set of cylinders, upon which
passed, in the manner of a jack towel, an endless web of felting,
communicates with a pair of pressing cylinders. When the moulds
arrive at the first cylinder, the felt web takes off the paper
and conveys it to the press cylinders and afterwards to any fit
place of reception, so that continuing the process, paper of any
length may be made and with separate moulds.
Although
The Burbanks were pioneers in papermaking, they must have felt
the pinch of serious competition. A very reliable source reported
that Thomas Gilpin was secretly building the first cylinder machine
in America at Brandywine Creek, Pennsylvania that would produce
a sheet 30 inches wide at a rate of 60 feet per minute. The machine
would be based on a design introduced in 1809 by John Dickinson
of Hertfordshire, England.
The
Burbanks had been hearing stories of a new fourdrinier paper machine
that made a continuous, well drained sheet of superior quality
paper at higher production compared to the new cylinder machine
at Brandywine Creek. The unique design was reported to be a concept
that would completely change the future of paper making.
