1.   Historical note

2.   Scope and content

3.   Provenance

4.   Processing note

5.   Inventory

6.   Subjects


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 Joslin Manufacturing Company Records

 Cotton goods factory, of Scituate and Providence, R.I.

 Records, 1826-1925. Bulk, 1892-1925.

 Size: 3.75 ft.

 Catalog number: MSS 141

 Processed by: Cindy Bendroth, April 1991

Expanded by Rick Stattler, May 2001


©Rhode Island Historical Society

Manuscripts Division

 


Historical note:


            William E. Joslin (1842-1912) began manufacturing shoe and corset laces at the Rockland Mill in Scituate, R.I. in 1865. He gradually purchased other mills in Scituate and Providence, and incorporated as the Joslin Manufacturing Company in May 1892. The business was consolidated in 1899. In 1901 the company owned 2800 braiders, and their own spinning plant. Dyeing took place in the Richmond and Clayville Mills. Finishing was done at the Merino mills. The company had 650 employees in 1901. At that time there were four mills in operation in the town of Scituate: Rockland Mill, Clayville Mills, Ponaganset Mill, and Richmond Mills. In addition, the company owned one mill in Providence: Merino Mills in the Olneyville neighborhood. The Dyerville Mills in Providence were added in 1903. By 1905, the company billed itself as "the largest and most complete shoe-lace manufactory in the world."

            William E. Joslin was also president and stockholder of four related companies. The William E. Joslin Company on Daboll Street in Providence was sold off at an early point, and later became known as Elmwood Mills. The Joslin Himalaya Company, near Merino Mills in Providence, manufactured cotton yarns and braid until it was bought out by Joslin Manufacturing in 1918. The Clayville Manufacturing Company in Scituate manufactured flexible gas tubing from at least 1902 to 1908. Finally, the Scituate Light and Power Company was founded in 1909 to sell the excess electricity generated from the turbines at Clayville Mill. The company provided electricity for much of the towns of Scituate, Foster, Glocester and Burrillville.

            William E. Joslin brought his son William H. Joslin (1875-1933) into the business, and by 1909 the son was handling the bulk of company management. Joslin Manufacturing Company was broken up in 1925.


Bibliography:


"Official Souvenir of the Exposition of the New England Association of Arts and Crafts," 1902

Providence Board of Trade Journal, October 1902, 380-381; February 1903, 76; January 1905, 39; January 1909, 25.

Wessler, Edith S. The Jocelyn-Joslin-Joslyn-Josselyn Family, 239. Rutland, Vt.: Tuttle Co., 1961.



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Scope and content:


            The Joslin Manufacturing Company records include miscellaneous corporate records, and some records from the individual mills, mostly from 1892 to 1925. The records include the boxing department payroll (for piecework done primarily by women); two folders on various aspects of the Scituate Light and Power Company; yarn accounts from various mills, 1907-1912; stock accounts; deeds and agreements; World War I government contract information; writs ordering Joslin to attach the wages of employees who had been sued for debts; insurance records; and a variety of other papers. There are also a few scattered correspondence files.


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Provenance:


            The bulk of these records were donated by Walter E. and Ruth Joslin in 1991. In 1996, Tom Beardsley donated approximately thirty letters received by the company from 1908 to 1909. A 1923 letter from the company to the Hon. Byron J. Hall was transferred from Graphics in January, 2001. There was no accession information with the transfer. One additional box of records was donated by Gilbreth Brown in May of 2001.


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Inventory:


Box 1

            Box shop piece work, January 1917 - December 1919 (10 folders)


Box 2

            Scituate Light and Power, 1920s (2 folders)

            Bank accounts, July 1923 - Dec. 1924 (9 folders)

            Insurance


Box 3

            Sketch of William Joslin and the Joslin Mfg. Co., for Lamb’s Cotton Industry directory

            Price lists, 1901, 1905

            Correspondence folders:

                                    1906

                                    1908-1909, mostly circulars re cotton sales.

                                    1919

                                    1923

                                    1924


Box 4 (volumes)

            Yarn received at Dye House from Dyerville Mill, 1911-1912

            Dressing reports for Rockland and Merino Mill, 1913-1915

            Dyehouse records, 1910-1911

            Order book, undated

            Clayville Mfg. Co. yarn accounts, 1907

            Clayville Mfg. inventory, January 1907

            Stock accounts, Joslin Mfg. Co.,

                        April 1919

                        July 1919

                        October 1919

                        January 1920

                        April 1920

                        July 1920

                        October 1920

                        January 1921

                        April 1921

                        July 1921

                        October 1921

                        Jan 1922

                        April 1922

                        July 1922

                        October 1922

                        January 1923

            Ponaganset Mill yarn account, 1912

            Merino Mill yarn account, 1910-1912

            Biography (?) in Swedish


Box 5 (2001 accession):

Box 5, folder 1. Agreements and contracts - Coal, oil and cotton suppliers, 1911-1925

Box 5, folder 2. Agreements and contracts - Fire suppression, 1892-1912

Box 5, folder 3. Agreements and contracts - Physical plant, 1892-1913

Box 5, folder 4. Agreements and settlements with laborers, 1907-1913

Box 5, folder 5. Analysis of tipping metal, 1909

Box 5, folder 6. Correspondence, 1892-1925

Box 5, folder 7. Deeds - Merino Manufacturing Company and Samuel Hedley, 1885-1898

Box 5, folder 8. Deeds - Rockland Mills and Ponaganset Mills, 1826-1894

Box 5, folder 9. Deeds and leases, miscellaneous, 1852-1923

Box 5, folder 10. Financial - Accounts sent to R.G. Dun for collection, 1908 (with 1925 contract)

Box 5, folder 11. Financial - Checkbooks, 1907-1914 (19 volumes)

Box 5, folder 12. Financial - Clayville Mfg. Co. - Invoice book of stove tubing sold, 1906-1908

Box 5, folder 13. Financial - Clayville Mfg. Co. - Petty cash, 1901-1906; financial rep'ts, 1902-1908

Box 5, folder 14. Financial - Financial statements, 1914, 1915, 1925

Box 5, folder 15. Financial - Inventories, Richmond Mill, 1889-1899

Box 5, folder 16. Financial - Liberty Loan accounts, 1917-1919

Box 5, folder 17. Financial - Promissory note stubs, 1898-1899

Box 5, folder 18. Financial - Miscellaneous

Box 5, folder 19. Industrial statistics reports, 1896-1898, 1913

Box 5, folder 20. Insurance - Credit, 1897-1898

Box 5, folder 21. Insurance - Disability insurance (William H. Joslin personal policy), 1919-1924

Box 5, folder 22. Insurance - Fire insurance policies, 1893-1923

Box 5, folder 23. Interstate Paper Box Association - Price list, 1900

Box 5, folder 24. Joslin Himalaya Company - By-laws, deeds, draft minutes, etc., 1894-1918

Box 5, folder 24a. Machinery list - Truman Beckwith, n.d.

Box 5, folder 25. Matson Lace Tipping Machine Co. / Boston Spiral Tagging Co. patent, 1912-1924

Box 5, folder 26. New England Mechanical Arts expo, Crescent Park, R.I. - Agreement, 1902

Box 5, folder 26a. Plan diagram for pulleys in mill drawn by Mr. Hall, n.d.

Box 5, folder 27. Ponaganset Reservoir Co. - Assessment, 1903; and agreement, 1925

Box 5, folder 28. Property - Memoranda, etc., 1893-1918

Box 5, folder 29. Property - Valuation of Merino and Dyerville mills, 1921

Box 5, folder 30. Property - Water privilege analysis, 1909, 1914

Box 5, folder 31. Scituate Light & Power / Scituate Reservoir releases, 1917-1925

Box 5, folder 32. Shoelace manufacturers combination, 1910-1911

Box 5, folder 33. Stockholder agreements - Clayville Manufacturing Co., 1906

Box 5, folder 34. Stockholder agreements and extracts from minutes, 1899-1923

Box 5, folder 35. World War One - Contract information

Box 5, folder 36. World War One - Contract bonds

Box 5, folder 37. World War One - Priority applications

Box 5, folder 38. World War One - Questionnaires

Box 5, folder 39. Writs, 1915

Box 5, folder 40. Writs, 1916

Box 5, folder 41. Writs, 1917


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Subjects:


* Clayville Manufacturing Company (Scituate, R.I.)

Clayville Mill (Scituate, R.I.)

Dyerville Mill (Providence, R.I.)

* Electric utilities.

* Gas tubing.

Joslin, William E., 1842-1912.

* Joslin Himalaya Company.

Merino Mill (Providence, R.I.)

Ponaganset Mill (Scituate, R.I.)

Ponaganset Reservoir Company.

Richmond Mill (Scituate, R.I.)

Rockland Mill (Scituate, R.I.)

* Scituate (R.I. : Town) - Commerce.

Scituate Light and Power (Scituate, R.I.)

* Shoe lace industry - Rhode Island - Scituate.

Textile industry - Rhode Island.


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RIHS1822