A Bit About The Ford BIt Company
The Ford Bit Company
19th Century Trade Catalog Typography
Why trade catalog typography? Because I have a penchant for trade catalogs and even more for typography, Trade catalogs are nearly extinct now thanks to the world wide web. During the second half of the 19th century, the commercial printing business of designing trade catalogs was a speciality unto itself. This was mass marketing at it's finest. Trade catalogs had to grab the attention of both the wholesale and retail customers. What better way to do this than with eye catching typographic designs?
Hardware and Tool Manufacturer Trade Catalogs
"In 1916, the Millers Falls Company took advantage of an opportunity to “purchase outright the stock, machinery, good will and any other assets” of the Ford Auger Bit Company of Holyoke, Massachusetts. Although Millers Falls had been selling augers for decades, the purchase marked its first foray into the actual manufacture of the product. Ford Auger Bit had established a solid reputation on the basis of its manufacture of Ellsworth Ford’s 1891 design for an improved, single twist auger bit. The firm’s single twist, single lip models cut aggressively, provided good chip clearance and were favored by many workers for use in basic carpentry. Although single lip bits do not produce the clean, well-defined hole of the double lip varieties, they were marketed as being faster cutting, as operating with less friction and as being especially useful in end grain and green, wet or knotty wood. Since Ford Auger Bit was also making single twist, double lip and solid center bits at the time of its purchase, the Millers Falls Company had no trouble including a full array of augers in its 1917 catalog. Of special interest is the “Hummer bit,” a single lip bit designed for fast work in softwoods. The Hummer was capable of boring through inch-thick pine stock in six rotations—twice as fast as a typical single lip Ford bit and three times as fast as a cabinetmaker’s double lip model.
"In addition to offering four variations on standard-sized carpenter’s bits, the company sold machine bits, car bits and ship augers. Custom orders were also taken. Certainly the most interesting of these was the bit designed to drill through the timbers used in constructing the locks of the Panama Canal. At the time, the Panamanian auger—a monster boring device—was considered to be the longest auger bit in the world. The company continued to manufacture auger bits at its Millers Falls plant until 1946, when the line was sold."
Ellsworth Ford
Ellsworth Ford, the inventor of the Ford auger bit, was born in Hamden, Connecticut, in 1841 a scant two miles from the site of Eli Whitney's famous armory.(1) Ford's father, Elias, had worked at the armory in his youth but spent most of his life tending the farm he inherited from his father Moses who had, in turn, inherited it from his father, also named Moses. Though one might be tempted to to think of the Ford family's acreage as the promised land, the agricultural life held little attraction for young Ellsworth. Growing up a scant two miles from a factory that was home to some of the finest machinists and mechanics in southern New England offered a glimpse of an alternative career, one Ellsworth chose to pursue. Though the details of his early life are sketchy, the younger Ford is known to have worked in the bit trade at Augerville, the site of the W. A. Ives & Company auger factory.(2)
By the time of the 1870 Decennial Census, twenty-eight-year-old Ellsworth was living in the village of Westville, about six miles from Augerville, and employed as a bit filer. He patented an expansive bit in 1872.(3) Expansive bits had been in production for two decades. Ford's design incorporated a threaded collar which could be rotated to lock the tool's movable cutter in place. As interesting as the idea was, there is no evidence to suggest that Ford's 1872 expansive bit was put into production.
Ford's 1872 expansive bit
In the mid-1870s, Ellsworth Ford took a break from his work with augers and bits to take a position as a clerk in Augur's grocery in Whitneyville. The job was nearly his last. On February 10, 1876, Mrs. Andrew Bates and her three children were crossing the ice on Lake Whitney and fell into the water when the frozen surface proved thinner than expected. Two nearby men grabbed a ladder and went out onto the ice to rescue the family. They arrived too late to save the children and the shelf gave way under their combined weight. Hearing the commotion and cries for help, Ellsworth Ford left his post at Augur's grocery, grabbed a boat hook, and went to rescue the survivors. He succeeded in pulling the two men from the water and then crawled out on the thin ice and fastened a rope around the exhausted Mrs. Bates. He'd just finished the task when the ice gave way yet again, and he too fell in. After one of the men he'd just rescued pulled him from the water with the boat hook, Ford tried to get to the woman again but fell through once more. Extricated again, he was still on the scene when a late arrival, the woman's husband, pulled her from the water. Ford's efforts with the rope had saved her life.(4)
Ford's barrel hoop. Ford clerked at the grocery store through at least 1880, though he returned to Westville soon after. While there, he invented a wire barrel hoop which he believed would be cheaper, stronger, and more durable than those on the market. Ford's hoop consisted of a pre-sized half-round wire with a rib on the back that wouldn't move once driven into place. As is the case with his 1872 expansive bit patent, there is no evidence that Ford's wire barrel hoop was put into production.
Ellsworth Ford had better luck with his 1891 auger bit patent. His design was the third of three patents awarded for closely related designs awarded by the U.S. Patent Office in a two year period. The Office issued the first of the three patents to Josiah Bailey of Wilmington, Ohio, the site of the Irwin Auger Bit Company.
The Bailey’s auger featured a single spiral for most of its length. A short second spiral at the working end allowed for a second cutter and spur. Thinner on its outer edge than its inner, the gradually undulating spiral came as close as possible to having a solid center without infringing on Irwin's patent. The patent award, dated October 22, 1889, includes Bailey's claim that the thinner, outer edge of the spiral reduced friction between the bit and the wall of the hole. Bailey also maintained his design promoted the freer passage of large chips throughout the spiral's length.(5)
On June 17, 1890, Charles Irwin and employee Francis I. Hoeffle patented a single-spiral auger bit vaguely reminiscent of Josiah Bailey’s design a year earlier. The patent documents allow for a short second spiral to accommodate an additional spur and cutter as well.(6) The new auger went nowhere.
Ford's bit featured a single spiral thicker on its outer edge than near the center. The elder Bailey’s auger featured a single spiral for most of its length, and a short second spiral at the working end allowed for a second cutter and spur. Thinner on its outer edge than its inner, the gradually undulating spiral came as close as possible to having a solid center without infringing on Irwin's patent. The patent award, dated October 22, 1889, includes Bailey's claim that the thinner, outer edge of the spiral reduced friction between the bit and the wall of the hole. Bailey also maintained his design promoted the freer passage of large chips throughout the spiral's length.
- 1892 Ford bit company established
- 1894 2nd expansive bit new haven address
- 1900 census Ellsworth is a day laborer in New Haven Township, CT
- 1907 Ellsworth bites the dust after a short illness
- 1892 Ford Bit Company established March 18, 1892. Report of the Tax Commissioner for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for the Year Ending Dec. 31, 1901. p. 90.
- 1901 Ford Auger Bit Company established July 9, 1901. Report of the Tax Commissioner for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for the Year Ending Dec. 31, 1901. p. 90.
- 1908 trademark registration for word Ford for "bits and augers" Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office. May 19, 1908, p. 765
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