Salt Lake Iron Co.
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Salt Lake Iron Works
November 13, 1871
"Old iron paid for in cash at Salt Lake Iron Works, where business now commences, half block West of Tabernacle. C. W. Hawley." (Deseret News, November 13, 1871)
(The above was the first advertisement in a Utah newspaper for an iron works located in Utah.)
(The Salt Lake Iron Works took over from the Deseret Co-operative Novelty Works, which itself had started in about November 1870, with an advertisement showing that they were essentially a foundry and machine works. The last reference to the Deseret Co-operative Novelty Works was in May 1871.)
November 16, 1871
"Highest Price in Cash will be paid for Old Cast Iron at the Salt Lake Iron Works, formerly known as the Co-operative Novelty Works. - C. B. Hawley." (Salt Lake Herald, November 16, 1871)
December 31, 1871
From the Salt Lake Herald, December 31, 1871.
Salt Lake Iron Works. - We yesterday made a visit to these newly established works, situated on Third West street, just south of the U. C. depot. The buildings, which are frame, embrace a foundry 50 x 60 feet, including cupolas, a machine shop 30 x 50 feet, with a pattern room over it of the same size and a Blacksmith shop 25 x 30 feet.
They made their first run from the iron cupola yesterday, and considering that everything was new and stiff, it worked very satisfactorily. This cupola is four feet in diameter by fifteen feet high, independent of the smoke-stack which is twenty feet additional in height, and has all the recent improvements, having a blast all around it and is capable of running out from five to ten tons of metal daily. The molten metal will run out freely in fifteen minutes after the blast is turned on. In addition to this is a brass oven four feet square by thirty-five feet high with double flues for melting metal for brass castings.
The machine shop has five lathes, a planing machine, a gear cutting machine, and other necessary machinery and tools for a first-class shop.
The pattern shop has all the requisite fittings for carrying on successfully this important branch of the work; and the blacksmith shop has two forges and a full supply of tools suitable to that department. The machinery and blast are run by an Ames twelve-horse power engine.
The shops are well lighted there being some forty-five windows in the establishment. There is a comfortable office with store rooms and other buildings. Mr. C. B. Hawley is the proprietor and superintends the work in person, with competent foremen over each department. He employs, six pattern makers, six moulders, six machinists, three blacksmiths and six or eight laboring men.
January 13, 1872
"C. B. Hawley, of the Salt Lake Iron Works, received a car load of pig iron, shipped from Chicago December 1st, and a car load of coke. He is now prepared to receive orders for castings of any dimensions." (Salt Lake Daily Review, January 13, 1872)
February 17, 1872
"Salt Lake Iron Works. - About fifty hundred pounds of castings were turned out at these works, Thursday afternoon [February 15], for the Utah Central Mining Company. This is the English company that bought out Buel & Bateman's works and mines at Bingham. The castings are mainly for three furnaces, which the company are erecting at Sandy station." (Salt Lake Daily Tribune, February 17, 1872)
February 22, 1872
"Salt Lake Iron Works. One Block South Of Depot. E. T. Mumford, proprietor. C. B. Hawley, Superint't. The only complete works in Utah." (Deseret News, February 22, 1872)
December 2, 1872
"A Salt Lake Iron Company has been formed in New York, which has purchased the works here and propose running them on a largely extended scale. This is an important enterprise and deserves the patronage of all." (Utah Mining Journal, December 2, 1872)
December 16, 1872
"Salt Lake Iron Co. - Chas. Roome, President; Henry J, Davison, Secretary; L. V. Sutherland, Manager; Works: Block south of Depot." (Salt Lake Tribune, December 16, 1872)
January 13, 1873
"The Salt Lake Iron Works. - Under the supervision of Mr. L. V. Sutherland the Salt Lake Iron Company have completed their new foundry in this city. A thirty-inch cupola is now in operation, a carload of pig iron has just been received from Scotland, and all the necessary appliances for the complete working of a foundry are in working condition. Mr. M. Center, a moulder of great experience in San Francisco and elsewhere, is foreman of the foundry." (Utah Mining Journal, January 13, 1873)
January 17, 1873
"A Valuable Invention. — Among the many labor saving appliances for working mines there is none more worthy of attention than the Dexter Windlass. This machine, the invention of Mr. John A. Nelson, of the Salt Lake Iron Works, has been tested by the most experienced miners of the Territory, and has given complete satisfaction. The windlass will hoist five hundred pounds from a perpendicular shaft at the rate of one foot per second with the power of one man, and when worked by two men will raise from an incline one ton in the same time. The buckets and cars are lowered by a friction brake which ensures entire safety in its operation. The machines are now being manufactured at the Salt Lake Iron Works in models to suit the sizes of shafts, and are made of the very best material and of superior finish. Mr. Nelson the inventor, is foreman of the Iron Works machine shop and has one of these windlasses in working order at their foundry." (Utah Mining Journal, January 17, 1873)
August 16, 1873
From the Salt Lake Weekly Tribune, August 16, 1873.
Salt Lake Iron Company. - Description of one of our Great Manufactories. - The works of this company, which is principally composed of New York capitalists, are located one block south of the railroad depot, and comprises the most extensive and complete manufacturing establishment in the Territory. The greater part of the castings turned out are for smelting furnaces, quartz mills and refineries, but the company is prepared to do all kinds of work, from the smallest articles up to a steam engine.
About thirty-five men are constantly employed in the different departments, and the business is increasing so rapidly that the coming fall an extensive enlargement will be made and new buildings erected. An additional machine shop, with a frontage of sixty feet on the railroad, will be put on the lot adjoining the present works on the north, and the capacity of the foundry will also be materially enhanced.
The present machine shop, is fitted up with first class machinery and tools consisting of turning lathes, one of which is twenty-four feet in length, drilling apparatus, bolt cutters, planers, etc., and as fine work is manufactured as can be found anywhere. The skillful execution of orders for machinery for the principal mines, has commended the establishment to the different companies, and the Flagstaff, Last Chance, Mountain Chief, Galena, Chicago, Utah Queen, Davenport, and a number of others have almost all their work done here. A large casting for a water jacket is now being made for the Flagstaff mine, and smaller articles for several other companies. A full water jacket weighs about five thousand six hundred pounds, and a deck plate weighing three thousand six hundred pounds has been recently cast for a smelter.
Four columns for the basement of the Wasatch Hotel, weighing one thousand pounds each were recently turned out, and several flanges for the railing of the First National Bank have attracted considerable attention, as splendid specimens of workmanship.
In the foundry, casting is done about three days in the week, and from three and a-half tons to six tons of iron is used in a cast, averaging about fifteen tons a week. The iron used is Scotch pig mixed with Lake Superior pig, which combination forms a soft and very tough iron of an excellent character. In the month of July, five car loads of iron were received at the works, aggregating about one hundred tons, and all through the season the average amount of iron used, is one car load every five days.
With the present facilities, any casting under 5,000 pounds in weight can be readily turned out, and when the enlargement is made, a melting cupola will be erected with a capacity which will enable them to cast a single piece of ten thousand pounds in weight. Among the articles manufactured is a new and improved iron hoisting windlass, recently invented by A. M. Grant, which is worthy the attention of miners. It is fitted with apparatus, which can be thrown out of gear in a moment, or breaks applied instantly, and is a great safe guard against danger, and can be worked with much less power than other methods.
The pattern shop is a leading feature of the establishment. There is on hand at present, a great variety of patterns of all kinds, all of which were made here. The wheels vary in size from an inch and a half in diameter, to eight feet, and patterns for all kinds of work can be made by the skillful pattern makers employed. The stock of patterns now in the shop is valued at from seven thousand to eight thousand dollars, and many of them are fine specimens of first-class workmanship. The cog and bevel wheels are of all kinds and sizes, and the supply may be considered complete.
The forges in the blacksmith shop are in the hands of skilled mechanics, who have recently turned out work which has been universally admired. The bellows are all worked by steam from the engine, and large pieces of shafting and other wrought iron work can be managed without difficulty.
Taken altogether, the whole establishment is a credit to the enterprise of the owners and managers. Their business has grown to such an extent already as to make an enlargement an absolute necessity, to comply with the increased demand for mining and other machinery. They are prepared to, and do, furnish as good work, and at as reasonable prices as can be obtained either in San Francisco or Chicago. The works are at present under the superintendence of Messrs. L. B. Sutherland, manager; A. M. Grant, foreman of the machine shop; R. C. Guthrie, foreman of the foundry, and J. Gardner, foreman of the pattern shop.
August 30, 1873
The Salt Lake Iron Works was receiving its iron from Omaha at a cost of an additional $100 per car, Omaha to Ogden Junction. (Salt Lake Tribune, August 30, 1873) (This was another example of Union Pacific taking advantage of its monopoly in rail transportation.)
September 2, 1873
"Last evening, at half-past eight, L. V. Sutherland, Superintendent of the Salt Lake Iron Works, died at the Clift House [a Salt Lake City hotel], of typhoid fever. He had been sick some four days. His friends have telegraphed to New York in regard to the disposition of his remains. We extend to his wife our sympathy in this sudden bereavement." (Salt Lake Herald, September 2, 1873)
September 26, 1873
"Major [Edmund] Wilkes has leased the Salt Lake iron Works for three years, and will assume control on Monday [September 29]. These works, located near and south the U. C. depot, do a fine business, and the Major is a live, enterprising gentleman, who will make things move." (Corinne Daily Journal, September 26, 1873)
(Edmund Wilkes had resigned his position of manager of the American Fork Railroad and the Miller Mining and Smelting Co. on February 3, 1873. John F. Lowell, secretary of the two companies had resigned at the same time.)
October 2, 1873
"Salt Lake Iron Works. — Major Wilkes having leased the Salt Lake Iron Works, near the railroad depot, is prepared to manufacture all kinds of iron and brass castings, mining, milling and smelting machinery, building fronts, narrow gauge railroad work, and everything in that line. The Major is a practical man, and under his supervision we look for the Salt Lake Iron Works securing increased success." (Salt Lake Herald, October 2, 1873)
October 4, 1873
"Amongst the largest castings we have ever seen produced in Salt Lake City, is a fly wheel, twelve feet in diameter, cast in sections, just completed at the Salt Lake Iron Works. It weighs about 4,600 pounds, and is intended for a steam grist mill, at Kaysville; the proprietor of which, we believe, is Mr. Layton." (Utah Mining Gazette, October 4, 1873)
November 15, 1873
"We noticed at the Salt Lake Iron Works a few days since, a hoisting engine of fifteen horse power in course of construction for the Van Dyke Coal Company. We were informed that an order for a five Stamp Mill had just been received. Major Wilkes intends to fill all orders for machinery at such prices that there shall be no inducement to have them filled outside of the Territory." (Utah Mining Gazette, November 15, 1873)
June 30, 1874
"For Sale Or Lease. - Salt Lake Iron Works. With Machinery, Tools, &c., complete. Inquire of Bennett & Whitney, Attorneys, &c." (Salt Lake Herald, June 30, 1874)
November 21, 1874
"Another Iron Working Establishment. — We are pleased to learn that a number of prominent and well known citizens of this City have purchased the foundry and machine shops hitherto known as the Salt Lake Iron Works, which ceased working several months ago, and of which [sic: John Sloan & Co., see December 2, below] were the former proprietors. The purchasers have organized themselves into a company under the name and style of the Salt Lake City Iron Company. The works are situated a short distance south of the railroad depot. The well known ingenious and expert mechanic, Mr. William J. Silver, has been appointed superintendent, and work was commenced in the establishment today. Mr. Silver is having all his tools and machinery removed from his shops in the 10th Ward to the iron works. The company have already purchased ten tons of home-made iron from the Great Western Company of Iron Co., with which to commence operations." (Deseret News, November 21, 1874)
November 23, 1874
"The Salt Lake City Iron Company announce that they have purchased the Salt Lake Iron Works and added thereto Mr. W. J. Silver's tools and machinery, and are thus prepared to do all kinds of iron and brass casting, forging, turning, boring and fitting up. Mr. Silver is engaged to superintend the works, and he guarantees good and accurate work. Drawings, plans, and specifications of all kinds of millwork and machinery." (Deseret News, November 23, 1874)
December 2, 1874
"Iron Works. — In speaking of the organization of the Salt Lake City Iron Company and their purchase of the Salt Lake Iron Works, the News of Saturday inadvertently stated that the former proprietors of the works were John Sloan & Co., which was an error. It should have been stated that the Salt Lake Iron Company were the former proprietors and Major Wilkes was superintendent. Mr. Sloan's foundry is opposite the City meat market where he still carries on business, and is about to enlarge his premises to double their present capacity, with a view to going into the machine as well as boiler-making business." (Deseret News, December 2, 1874)
(The business of the Salt Lake City Iron Works slowly declined through 1875, under William Howard as president and W. J. Silver as supeintendent. The last advertisement was in July 1875, then restarted in March 1876, with William Howard as "Proprietor." The advertisements only lasted through March 1876. In December 1876, Thomas Pierpont was shown as "running" the Salt Lake City Iron Works. Then in December 1877 William Howard sued the company, with the court case continuing into the end of February 1878. There are no references after February 1878.)
(Thomas Pierpont, 1836-1908, was the master mechanic in charge of the Utah Central railroad shop in Salt Lake City as early as August 1873. In 1876 he organized the Salt Lake Foundry and Machine company, which moved to a new location in October 1878, opposite the Utah Central depot in Salt Lake City. In September 1884, Pierpont resigned as superintendent of the Salt Lake Foundry and Machine company, and until 1889 he was not part of the foundry industry in Utah. In 1889, Pierpont became associated with the Provo Foundry & Machine company, an association that continued under until hi death in 1908, then until his son's own death in 1954.)
(In February 1879, Silver moved his foundry and machine works from the location one block south of the Utah Central depot, to a new location at 149 West North Temple.)
(Read more about William Silver and his sons, the Silver Brothers)
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