Records of American Steel and Wire Company and its predecessors

Records of predecessor firms include records, 1868-1899, of the Washburn and Moen Manufacturing Company, Worcester, Mass., comprising about half of the total collection. The material on this company includes stock certificate stubs, stock ledger, directors' records, 1868-1886, bill books, letter books, 1890-1902, miscellaneous volumes and three boxes of folders. There is considerable material on the patent suits of the 1880's and 1890's, and the consolidation of the company into one of the largest in the field of wire making. Records of Washburn and Moen's predecessors include account books of Washburn and Goddard, 1822-1848; Ichabod Washburn, 1835-1842; I. and C. Washburn, 1842-1849; I. Washburn and Company, 1850-1861; and I Washburn and Moen, 1861-1865. Also included are records of Shoenberger, Shoenberger and Blair, Pittsburgh, Pa., 1860-1892; Crown Point Iron Company, Crown Point, N.Y., 1872-1897; Worcester Wire Company, Worcester, Mass., 1877-1899; American Wire Company, Cleveland, Ohio, 1882-1898; B. W. Company, Worcester, Mass., 1886-1890; the Cleveland Rolling Mill Railroad Company, Cleveland, 1874-1902; and scattered records of the American Steel and Wire Company, 1899-1910.

The collection also contains a large amount of material on the early days of wire making assembled by the American Steel and Wire Company's Industrial Museum. Of particular interest are the biographical folders relating to men prominent in the industry, the company histories, and the descriptions of special phases of wire making. Numerous pictures accompanied the Museum's collection; these have been removed from frames and placed in appropriate categories.