07/02/2020
A sneak-peak into the first project at VINTAGE QUIRC. The 1940 Two speed breast drill restoration and please remember,
It all starts with an idea, a dream, a goal 😊
Miller Falls Company story. 🧐
Levi J. Gunn and Charles H. Amidon were in their early thirties when they decided to go into business for themselves. Employees of the Greenfield Tool Company, they hoped to build wringers for squeezing water from freshly laundered clothes. Their employer manufactured wooden hand planes, so the men were well-versed in the technologies of the day and understood the dilemmas inherent in running a factory. Gunn, a blacksmith's son, had been involved with tool manufacture since his youth; Amidon, a shoemaker’s son, was a born innovator. The enterprise started humbly. Employees assembled wringers in rented rooms at a rundown steam mill near Greenfield’s first railway station.
The plant site was located on Cherry Rum Brook in the city's North Parish.
The men planned to power the plant with an overshot water wheel—a setup best suited for acquiring energy from a modest flow. Designed and built by Amidon, the wheel transmitted power to the factory’s machinery taking advantage of thick rope relatively than costly leather belting.
The road to the plant was laid out in the spring of 1862, and the construction of the factory took off soon after. Ashley Holland, a machinist, and early investor erected the stone dam. In the fall, the United States Patent Office approved Charles Amidon’s application for new clothes wringer. Manufacturing began before the final issue of the patent, and the firm exhibited Amidon’s wringer at the New York State Fair throughout that year. The wringer won a first-place award, an event followed in 1863 by awards at the Pennsylvania State Fair, the Syracuse Mechanics Fair, and the Maryland Institute.
