HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF MEDFORD, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, FROM ITS FIRST SETTLEMENT, IN 1630, TO THE PRESENT TIME, 1855.
Charles Brooks, Ed.

Since writing the above, we are called to record another destructive fire at Baconville of the factories there. They were burned Sunday evening, April 8, 1855.

Mr. Bacon brought his machinery from Boston to Medford in 1824, and manufactured hat-bodies, feltings, &c., employing eighteen or twenty men. Once only he counted; and in that year he formed 83,000 hat-bodies. This work was done by the use of Silas Mason's patent, and T. F. Mayhew's improved machine. He also planked many thousands yearly; which operation was by the use of Macomber's patent, and his own improvement. He also blowed the hair from fur, by the use of Arnold Buffom's patent blowing-machine. This process was truly ingenious. It was accomplished by placing the fur on the apron, which was drawn upon a cylindrical picker, revolving at the rate of five thousand times a minute; thence it was thrown to a fan revolving at nearly the same speed; this sent it through a trunk sixty feet long into a closet. The bottom of the trunk was lined with coarse cloth; the hair, being heaviest, fell and stuck to the cloth: the consequence was that the fur was almost entirely cleared of the hair, and thus the hats were finer. This business he continued till 1848, when he resigned it to his son, who has changed the business to the manufacture of all kinds of feltings and lambs'-wool wadding. Among the feltings he has invented a new kind, called sheathing felt, used for covering the bottoms of ships: it can also be placed under the copper, and is much used in covering steam-boilers and pipes.

The making of linseed oil was carried on by Mr. George L. Stearns, on land about fifty rods south of Mystic Bridge. He imported his seed from Calcutta. A convention of manufacturers of this oil was held at New York in 1841; and they agreed to send a committee to Washington, to induce Congress to shape the tariff of 1842 so as to protect them. The committee succeeded; and Mr. Stearns was one of them. The effect was the opposite of what they expected: it induced so many new men to begin the business that it ruined it. From 1835, the manufactory in Medford continued in operation to 1845, when it suspended activity. It resumed work for a year, when the building was burned in 1847.

The factory of Messrs. Waterman and Litchfield, for the making of doors, blinds, window-sashes, &c., is a large and flourishing establishment, near the entrance of Medford Turnpike.