The entries included here originate from “A Chronology of Paper and Papermaking” written and compiled in 1864 by Joel Munsell.

As time passes this resource will expand and eventually become a de facto starting point for any further research. If you have any additions or correction to make, please contact us.

670 BC        Numa, who lived three hundred years before Alexander, left several works written upon papyrus, which were still found at Rome a long time after his death. This is perhaps the earliest authenticated use of papyrus.

600 BC        Manufactories of Egyptian paper from papyrus, are supposed to have existed at Memphis. But papyrus manuscripts are found in the Catacombs, apparently several thousand years old.

440 BC        Herodotus alludes to the general use of parchment among the Ionians at this time, under the term of sheep and goat skins.

300 BC        For at least three hundred years before Christ, papyrus was exported in large quantities from Egypt.

270 BC        The Jewish elders, by order of the high priest, carried a copy of the law to Ptolemy Philadelphus, in letters of gold upon skins, the pieces of which were so artfully put together that the joinings did not appear.

200 BC        A better method of dressing parchment was found at Pergamus about this time, which led to the supposition that parchment was invented there, and hence derived its name.

15 AD          About this time, during the reign of Tiberius, a popular commotion arose in consequence of the scarcity of papyrus; the commerce in which had flourished a long time, but the supply seems to have been always less than the demand.

79                 Herculaneum was overwhelmed, a city so obscure that very little account has been given of it by ancient writers; yet eighteen hundred manuscripts on papyrus have been taken from its ruins.

95                 Du Halde says it was in this year that a mandarin of the palace manufactured paper of the bark of different trees, old rags of silk and hemp.

290              About this time the value of papyrus was so great that when Firmus, a rich and ambitious merchant striving at empire, conquered for a brief period the city of Alexandria, he boasted that he had seized as much paper and size as would support his whole army.

500              About this time Theodoric abolished the duty on papyrus, which contributed to the revenue of the Roman empire, and fresh imposts had been laid upon it by successive rulers, until they became oppressive. Cassiodorus congratulates “the whole world on the repeal of the impost on an article so essentially necessary to the human race, “the general use of which,” as Pliny says, “polishes and immortalizes man.”

572              There is a manuscript in the British Museum, which appears to have been written at this time upon a roll of papyrus eight feet and a half long, and twelve inches wide. The longest specimen of papyrus known is the one at Paris, measuring thirty feet.

600              About this time paper made of bark was used by the Longobards, for the imperial protocols, in order to render the forging of diplomas more difficult.

648              There was a manufactory of paper at Samarcand, similar to that which had long been made by the Chinese.

650              The Saracens having become masters of Egypt, the intercourse between that country and Rome was so much interrupted that the supply of papyrus became scanty and precarious. Previously to that event, all public records had been executed on papyrus, while it is found that at a date immediately subsequent parchment was substituted.

704              The Arabians are supposed to have acquired the knowledge of making paper of cotton, by their conquests in Tartary.

706              Casiri, a Spanish author, attributes the invention of cotton paper to Joseph Amru, in this year, at Mecca; but it is well known that the Chinese and Persians were acquainted with its manufacture before this period.

900              The bulls of the popes in the eighth and ninth centuries were written upon cotton paper.

900              Montfaucon, who on account of his diligence and the extent of his researches is great authority, wrote a dissertation to prove that charta bombycine, cotton paper, was discovered in the empire of the east toward the end of the ninth or beginning of the tenth century. But see 706.

1007            The plenarium, or inventory, of the treasure of the church of Sandersheim, is written upon paper of cotton, bearing this date.

1049            The oldest manuscript in England written upon cotton paper, is in the Bodleian collection of the British Museum, having this date.

1050            The most ancient manuscript on cotton paper, that has been discovered in the Royal Library at Paris having a date, bears record of this year.

1085            The Christian successors of Moorish papermakers at Toledo in Spain, worked the paper-mills to better advantage than their predecessors. Instead of manufacturing paper of raw cotton, which is easily recognized by its yellowness and brittleness, they made it of rags, in moulds through which the water ran off; for this reason it was called parchment cloth.

1100            The Aphorisms of Hippocrates, in Arabic, the manuscript of which bears this date, has been pronounced the oldest specimen of linen paper that has come to light.

1100            Arabic manuscripts were at this time written on satin paper, and embellished with a quantity of ornamental work, painted in such gay and resplendent colours that the reader might behold his face reflected as if from a mirror.

1100            There was a diploma of Roger, king of Sicily, dated 1145, in which he says that he had renewed on parchment a charter that had been written on cotton paper in 1100.

1102            The king of Sicily appears to have accorded a diploma to an ancient family of paper-makers who had established a manufactory in that island, where cotton was indigenous, and this has been thought to point to the origin of cotton paper, quite erroneously.

1120            Peter the Venerable, abbot of Clum, who flourished about this time, declared that paper from linen rags was in use in his day.

1150            Edrisi, who wrote at this time, tells us that the paper made at Xativa, an ancient city of Valencia, was excellent, and was exported to countries east and west.

1151            An Arabian author certifies that very fine white cotton paper was manufactured in Spain, and Cacim aben Hegi assures us that the best was made at Xativa, The Spaniards being acquainted with watermills, improved upon the Moorish method of grinding the raw cotton and rags; and by stamping the latter in the mill, they produced a better pulp than from raw cotton, by which various sorts of paper were manufactured, nearly equal to those made from linen rags.

1153            Petrus Mauritius, who died in this year, has the following passage on paper in his Treatise against the Jews: ” The books we read every day are made of sheep, goat, or calfskin; or of oriental plants, that is, the papyrus of Egypt; or of rags (ex rasauris ceterum pannorum),” supposed to allude to modern paper.

1170            The time when papyrus wholly ceased to be used is not certainly known ; but Eustathius the scholiast on Homer, says it was disused before this time.

1178            A Treaty of peace between the kings of Aragon and Castile, is the oldest specimen of linen paper used in Spain with a date. It is supposed that the Moors, on their settlement in Spain, where cotton was scarce, made paper of hemp and flax. The inventor of linen-rag paper, whoever he was, is entitled to the gratitude of posterity.

1200            Casiri positively affirms that there are manuscripts in the Escurial palace near Madrid, upon both cotton and hemp paper, written prior to this time.

1221            Frederic II of Germany, in consideration of the bad quality of paper made of cotton, its subjection to humidity, to alteration, and other defects, issued an order, nullifying all public acts which should be upon cotton paper, allowing two years to transcribe upon parchment all such as then existed.

1239            One of the earliest specimens of paper from linen rags, which has yet been discovered, is a document, with the seals preserved, with this date and signed by Adolphus, count of Schaumburg. It is preserved in the university of Rinteln in Germany, and establishes the fact beyond dispute that linen paper was already in use in Germany.

1270            By far the oldest manuscript written in France upon modern paper, is a letter from Joinville to St. Louis, which bears date a short time before the death of that monarch in 1270.

1270            Notwithstanding the most diligent search of the learned antiquary Montfaucon, both in France and Italy, he could find no book nor leaf of paper made of linen rags, before this year ; whence it was concluded that there was no hope of finding an exact date to the invention.

1280            At this time very little use was made of Egyptian paper for diplomas, in England and Germany, but parchment was the universal substitute; and yet no map of parchment made before the sixth century is known to have been discovered.

1308            Meerman satisfied himself that linen paper was used in Germany at this time, but was not able to decide in what country its invention originated.

1311            No other than Egyptian papyrus and cotton paper, it is asserted, was known in France before this time; although a letter is produced which is claimed to be linen paper, written before 1270. (See 1270.)

1314            The earliest undisputed French manuscript on linen paper is of this date, but it is not conclusive that it was fabricated in France.

1318            In Deutschland kommt leinenes Papier vor 1318 schwerlich vor; von diesem Jahre aber hat das Archivdes Hospitals Kauf beuern Urkunden auf lienenem Papier aufzuzeigen.— Conversations-Lexikon.

1319            Linen paper is said to have been found at Nuremberg by Von Murr of this date. (See 1342.)

1320            The earliest English manuscript on linen paper with a date that has been discovered is of the fourteenth year of Edward III.

1330            Mr. Hunter, of the London Society of Antiquaries, could find no water mark in specimens of paper which we had investigated from 1302 to this date. His researches were among account books rendered to the English exchequer by officers employed in Aquitaine, and in the public archives of England, by which he determined that the earliest paper used was all foreign, and without any manufacturer’s symbol. In a book of accounts of the constable of Bordeaux, of this date, he discovered the first mark, which was a ram’s face.

1338            Peter II of Valencia, issued a command to the paper-makers at Valencia and Xativa, under pain of punishment, to manufacture better paper, which was to be equal to that formerly made ; showing that the manufacture had degenerated.

1339            From a piece of very coarse cotton paper, bearing this date, in the possession of Meerman, who wrote about 1760, he argues that the art of papermaking was still neglected by the Spaniards, and that prior to the middle of the fourteenth century no linen paper had been manufactured in that country, yet the connoisseurs of Spain still persist in terming it linen paper.

1340            Tiraboschi, in his history of Italian literature, places the establishment of paper-making at Padua in this year, deriving his authority from a passage of the ancient history of that city by Cortusius.

1340            Peignot says it was about this time that the manufacture of paper was established in France, in the neighbourhood of Troyes and Essonne. Lombardy furnished paper to the French before this time.

1342            It has been claimed that the earliest manuscript in England on linen paper has the above date (see 1320). In the Cottonian Library of the British Museum, it is said there are several writings on this kind of paper, as early as the year 1335. Linen paper gradually supplanted that made of cotton.

1342            The Royal Society of Gottingen adjudged to John Daniel Fladd a prize medal of twenty-five ducats for the discovery of the most ancient linen paper, which bears this date. It is claimed that earlier specimens have been found. (See 1319.)

1350            There was a large paper manufactory at Fabiano in Italy, which, according to the description of Bartolus, had been long established, and enlarged from time to time, till it consisted of several mills belonging to different persons, although the whole formed only one manufactory of cotton paper.

1350            Although cotton paper was early introduced into Germany, and at the commencement of the ninth century was known under the name of Greek parchment, and although cotton and flax were spun and wove in that country in the tenth century, the manufacture of paper can not be traced beyond the middle of the fourteenth century, when it was made by stamping mills.

1352            Date of a bill which reads thus: ” To George Cosyn, for one quartern of royal paper, to make painters’ patterns, 10d.”

1360            Ulman Stromer began to write at Nuremberg the first work ever published on paper-making.

1366            The senate of Venice granted an exclusive privilege to the paper-mill at Treviso, that no linen paper shavings or offal should be exported from Venice than for the use of that mill. This would seem to show that linen paper was already in use there.

1367            It is thought that there was no linen paper used in Italy before this time. The knowledge of cotton paper came by means of the Greeks to Italy; and the art of making it in Sicily, through the invasion of the Saracens.

1367            A document of a notary of this date proves the use of linen paper in Italy; and Maffei states that he possessed a family manuscript of linen paper of the same date, and he therefore attempts to appropriate the invention of linen paper to Italy.

1376       Du Cange cites the following lines from a French metrical romance written about this time, to show that waxen tablets continued to be occasionally used till a late period :

 Some with antiquated style

In waxen tablets promptly write : Others with finer pen, the while

Form letters lovelier to the sight.

There are many ample and authentic records of the royal household of France, of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, still preserved, written upon waxen tablets.

1377            A charter of this date, given at Fabriano in Italy, relates to the lease of a mill with a waterfall, ad faciendas cartas. It was from the mills of this place that Bodoni, at the commencement of the present century, obtained the paper for his beautiful editions.

1390            Ulmau Stromer established a large paper-mill at Nuremberg, where were many Italian workmen. He employed two rollers, which set eighteen stampers in motion ; but when he would add another roller, he was opposed by the Italians whom he employed, who would not consent to the enlarging of his manufacture; but they were imprisoned by the magistrates, when they submitted, renewing their oaths. He died in 1407. This is the first mill known to have been erected in Germany, which is said to have made the first paper from rags in Europe. But see 1350, 1306, etc.

1400            There were paper-mills at Colle in Tuscany, which were moved by water power.

1450            It is said that copies of the Bible printed upon parchment, by Gutenberg, of this date, are found at Berlin, Brunswick, St. Blaise Monastery, and Paris, in three volumes, folio. But it is presumed to be a mistake.

1453            After the fall of Constantinople some Greeks established the manufacture of paper at Basle, in Switzerland.

1468            An edict of Charles VIII attests that there were paper manufactories at Troyes, Corbeil, and Essonne.

1471            Sweynheim and Pannartz, in a petition to the pope for assistance, informed him that the number of books they had printed and which remained on their hands was so great that he would admire how and where they could have procured a sufficient quantity of paper, or even rags, for such a number of volumes, which amounted to 12,475. This would probably have required about 1250 reams.

1498            An entry has been found in the privy purse expenses of Henry VII, as follows: ” For a rewarde geven at the paper mylne, 16s. 8d.,” which establishes the fact that a paper-mill preceded that of Spilman nearly a century, and was probably the mill mentioned below.

1498       In Wynken de Worde’s edition De Proprietatibus Rerum, it is stated that the paper was made by John Tate the younger, in these quaint lines:

 “And John Tate the younger Joye mote he broke, Whiche late hathe in Englond doo make this paper thynne, That now in our englyssh this book is prynted Inne.”

This mill was at Hartford. The watermark he used was an eight-pointed star within a double circle. A print of it is given in Herbert’s Typ. Antiquities, i, 200.

1500            Paintings of this date by Julio Clavio, on parchment, are preserved in the Vatican. The art of painting on parchment was common before the art of painting with oil colours was discovered.

1514            John Tate died, who is supposed to have erected the first paper-mill in England, about 1498.

1539            An ancient water-mark (erroneously so termed) of this era, consisted of a hand with a star at the fingers’ ends, and is supposed to have given the name to what is still termed hand paper.

1539            A favourite paper-mark of this time was the jug or pot, and is supposed to have originated the term pot paper, for a peculiar size. The fool’s cap was of a later date, and has given place in England to the figure of Britannia.

1540            About this time Henry VIII of England, in the wildness of his hatred of the pope, used for his correspondence a paper of which the water-mark was a hog with a mitre.

1558            Churchyard’s Spark of Friendships was first printed this year, and mentions the paper-mill of Spilman, which is often quoted as the first paper-mill in England under the date of 1588, q. v. (See also 1498.)

1562            A work printed in this year mentions a papermill at Fen Ditton, near Cambridge, England.

1564            Charles IX of France having put an impost upon paper, the university brought the subject before the parliament, when Montholon and De Thou advocated the abolition of the tax, and the university gained its cause.

1565            Charles IX of France, at the remonstrance of the university and the decision of the parliament, abolished the duty which he had laid upon paper.

1588            Nicholas, in his Progresses of Queen Elizabeth, gives a poem with the following title : “A description and Playne Discourse of Paper, and the whole benifitts that Paper brings, with Rehear sail, and setting foorth in Verse a paper-myll built near Darthforth, by a high Germaine, called Master Spilman, Jeweller to the Queenes Majestic” This is supposed to have been the second paper-mill in England, and is often mentioned as the first. It was erected by a German named Spielman, or Spilman, in reward of which he received from Elizabeth the honour of knighthood. (See 1558.)

1591            A document in the Land Revenue Records of England, reads thus: “Fenclifton, Co. Cambridge; lease of a water-mill called paper-mills, late of the bishopric of Ely, to John George, dated 14th July, 34th Eliz.” This is evidence of a third paper-mill in England at this time.

1635            Under the reign of Louis XIII of France, an impost upon paper was established, but with the condition that the fermier should pay each year the sum of ten thousand livres to the royal printing office and the university of Paris.

1640            The manufacture of wall paper was begun about this time; as a substitute for the ancient hangings of tapestry, or cloth, they reached a high state of beauty and perfection.

1646            Athanasius Kircher, a Jesuit of the seventeenth century, boasted of having paper, among other things made of asbestos.

1652            Christina of Sweden having invited one of the Jansens from Holland as a printer, granted him the valuable privilege of importing all his paper duty free.

1654            Under Louis XIV, the indemnity established by his predecessor for the tax upon paper was changed to an exemption from duty of thirty thousand reams of paper, of all qualities and fabrics, of which the distribution was left to the superior of the university.

1658            The French paper-makers produced fabrics so much superior to those of their neighbours, and their export trade bad become so flourishing in consequence, that paper to the value of two million of livres was this year sent to Holland; and they provided Spain, England, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Russia, but chiefly Holland and the Levant, with paper for printing and writing.

1661            Fuller, writing of the paper of his time, says that “it partook in some sort of the characters of the countries which made it; the Venetian being subtil, neat and court-like; the French light, slight and slender, and the Dutch thick, corpulent and gross, sucking up the ink with the sponginess thereof.” He complains that the English manufactories were not sufficiently encouraged, considering the vast amount expended for paper out of Italy, France, and Germany.

1663            England imported from Holland alone, paper to the amount of £100,000.

1670            Post paper seems to have derived its name from the post born, which at one time was its distinguishing mark. It does not appear to have been used prior to the establishment of the general post office, here given, when it became the custom to blow a horn, to which circumstance no doubt, we may attribute its introduction.

1670            The manufacture of paper was still carried on with so little success in England, that the deficiency of that indispensable fabric was imported from the continent, and principally from France.

1678            At the end of a book with this date is the following singular advertisement: “To the king’s most excellent majesty, this book is humbly presented, being printed upon English paper, and made within five miles of Windsor, by Eustace Burneby, Esquire, who was the first Englishman that brought it into England ; attested by Henry Million, who was overseer in the making of this royal manufacture.” (See 1498, 1558, 1588.)

1685            Among the French refugees who went over to England, were a number of paper-makers, who are supposed to have greatly improved the manufacture in the latter country.

1687            A proclamation was made for the establishment of a manufactory of white paper in England.

1688            It is stated in the British 31erchant, that hardly any sort of paper except brown, was made in England previous to the revolution.

1689            Edmund Bohun says in his Autobiography, that “paper became so dear, that all printing stopped, almost, and the stationers did not care to undertake anything.”

1690            Anderson states in his History of Commerce that it was in this year paper was first manufactured in England (see 1588); and that up to this time England imported paper from France to the amount of £100,000 yearly; but as the war with France occasioned very high duties to be laid on foreign productions, some French protestant refugees settled in England, and introduced the manufacture of white writing paper.

1690            William Rittinghuÿsen, now spelled Rittenhouse, a native of Broich, in Holland, emigrated to America and was among the early settlers of Germantown, Pa. In the year 1690, he in company with Wm. Bradford, the printer, established a paper-mill, the first in America, in Roxborough, near Philadelphia, on a stream called Paper-mill run, which empties into the Wissahickon, about two miles above its junction with the river Schuylkill. This mill supplied Bradford with paper while he lived in Philadelphia, and after he settled in New York. The paper was made from linen rags, the product of flax which was raised in the vicinity, and manufactured into wearing apparel. (For a sketch of this mill see Essay by Horatio G. Jones, of Phila., in Phila. Hist. Soc. Trans.)

1695            A company was formed in Scotland “for making white writing and printing paper,” the articles of which are preserved in the library of the British Museum.

1696            It appears by a document in the British Museum entitled the Case of the paper Traders, that a bill was now pending for levying 20 per cent upon foreign paper, parchment, vellum, and pasteboard, and 20 per cent upon English paper, &c. It is also stated that there were not at this time one hundred paper-mills in all England, and that the value of paper annually made was only about £28,000. It is further said that the paper-makers were generally very poor and could scarce maintain their families.

1697            William Bradford leased his fourth part of the paper-mill near German town, Pa., to William and Nicholas Rittenhouse, for a term of ten years, upon the following terms; that they should pay “ye full quantity of seven ream of printing paper, two ream of good writing paper, and two ream of blue paper, yearly.”

1700            Though several unsuccessful attempts had been made to introduce the manufacture of paper into Belgium, it was not until about this time that it became regularly established, by the aid of government; nor was its progress rapid during the eighteenth century.

1700            There were four hundred paper-mills in the provinces of Perigord and Angoumois, in France; but the art of paper-making had now arrived to such a degree of perfection in England and Holland, that the trade of these mills began to decline, and finally three-fourths of them were shut up.

1701            An effort was made in parliament to affix a tax upon cheap publications which had just come into vogue, yet the quantity of paper consumed by them was estimated at 20,000 reams a year.

1710            The second paper-mill in America was erected in that part of Germantown, Pa., called Crefeld, on a small stream that emptied into the Wissahickon creek near the manor of Springfield, by William De Wees, a brother-in-law of Nicholas Rittenhouse, son of the first paper-maker.

1711            The excise duty on paper was first imposed in England during the reign of Queen Anne, occasioned by ” the necessity of raising large supplies of money to carry on the present war.” The necessity seems not to have ceased since.

1712            Peter the Great of Russia visited Dresden and witnessed the operation of paper-making, with which he was so much pleased that he immediately engaged workmen to be sent to Moscow, where a mill was erected with great privileges.

1713            Thomas Watkin, a London stationer, revived the art of paper-making in England, which had gone to decay; he brought it to great repute and perfection in a short time.

1716            John Bagford, the most extraordinary connoisseur of paper ever known, died in England. His skill was so great that it is said he could at first sight tell the place where and the time when, any paper was made, though at never so many years’ distance. He prepared materials for a history of paper-making, which are now in the British Museum, numbered 5891 to 5988.

1719            Reaumur, in an essay published at this time, seems to have been the first author who perceived that paper might be produced from wood. Observing that the fabric of wasps’ nests was procured from wood, he took the hint, find explaining his own conceptions on the subject, desired that some one of those who had an opportunity should make the experiment.

1720            The Kings of Spain having granted monopolising privileges to many convents for the manufacture of paper, and when it came again into private hands, fixed such a low price upon printed books, that the trade went to decay. The Genoese, availing themselves of the opportunity, and procuring considerable quantities of rags from Andalusia, in this year sent back paper to Spain to the amount of 500,000 piastres.

1721            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain annually was estimated at three hundred thousand reams, which was equal to about two-thirds of the whole consumption.

1723            The Dutch were importing large quantities of paper from France, there being few paper-mills in Holland.

1723            The value of the paper annually made in Great Britain was estimated at £780,000.

1727            Dr. Brueckmann, a German naturalist, published his work on stones, in which he treats of asbestos, and four copies of the book were printed on paper made of that material.

1728            A patent was granted by the general court of Massachusetts to a company for the sole purpose of manufacturing paper, for a term often years, on condition that in the first fifteen months they should make 115 reams of brown paper and 60 reams of printing paper; the second year 50 reams of writing paper in addition to the above; and the third year and afterwards yearly, 25 reams of a superior quality of writing paper in addition to the foregoing; and that the total annual produce of the various qualities should not be less than 500 reams a year.

1728            William Bradford owned a paper-mill at Elizabethtown, N. J., which was believed to be the first in that state.

1730            The first paper-mill in New England went into operation in Milton, Mass., under a patent granted two years before. It was carried on several years, and is supposed to have been discontinued for want of a workman. This was probably the paper-mill of Daniel Henchman, an enterprising bookseller of Boston, who is said to have petitioned for and received some aid from the legislature of Massachusetts, and erected the first paper-mill in that colony.

1731            Daniel Henchman, who with legislative aid erected the first paper-mill in Massachusetts, produced a sample of his paper before the general court.

1732            Richard Fry, stationer, bookseller, paper-maker and rag-merchant, in Cornhill, Boston, returned the public thanks for following the directions of his former advertisement encouraging the gathering of rags, and hoped they would continue the like method, having received upwards of seven thousand weight already.

1734            Seba, a Flemish writer on natural history, whose first volume was published this year, called attention to the fact that his country ” does not seem to want trees fit for making paper, if people would give themselves the necessary trouble and expense. Alga marina, for example, which is composed of long, strong, viscous filaments, might it not be proper for this purpose, as well as the mats of Muscovy, if they were prepared as the Japanese make their timber?”

1746            The English had manufactures of papiers feints about this time, and more recently the Messrs. Potter erected at Manchester a colossal establishment, which by an ingenious machine printed four colours at a time, and which by the aid of eight machines, produced in a single day from 8 to 10,000 rolls, which was more than was produced by all the London manufactories.

1748            The decrease of exports of French paper from Rouen was so great that many of the mills were converted to other uses, principally to fulling-mills.

1750            About this time the cylinder or engine mode of converting rags into paper pulp appears to have been invented in Holland, but received very little attention abroad for several years after.

1750            It was in this year that Baskerville, to obviate the roughness of the laid paper of that time, had it made on wove moulds; his beautiful edition of Virgil (see 1757) was chiefly printed on this wove paper.

1751            Many suitable vegetables had been discovered, and schemes proposed for converting them into paper, as a substitute for rags, but none were carried into effect until now, when M. Guettard, in France, published his experiments and communicated new specimens of paper made from the bark, leaves, wood, &c, of different plants, shrubs and trees.

1752            The Loyal Society of Sciences at Gottingen offered a premium to trace the exact time of the discovery of the manufacture of paper from linen. (See 1763.)

1753            William Hutton opened the first paper warehouse in Manchester, England.

1756            The first attempt to manufacture paper of straw was now made in Germany, and was induced by the scarcity of rags. A treatise was printed on the subject, giving a plan for reducing all vegetables into pulp, and bleaching the same.

1757            An edition of Virgil was printed by Baskerville in England, principally upon what the French term papier velin. It was an English invention, and this was the first work printed upon it.

1759            Until this period rags were reduced to pulp by means of stampers, a slow process, requiring considerable motive power; to remedy this, cylinders with sharp steel blades for tearing the rags (invented in Holland, where the wind-mills, then used for propelling machinery, were found inadequate to put these stampers in regular and constant motion ), began to be used in other countries.

1760            The first paper-mill in New England, which is supposed to have been stopped for want of a workman to carry it on, was revived by a citizen of Boston, who obtained a furlough for a British soldier, stationed there long enough to put the mill in operation.

1760            The making of paper in England had scarcely reached any high degree of perfection until this time, when the celebrated James Whatman established his reputation at Maidstone. He had visited the most celebrated paper-mills in Europe, which enabled him to acquire a great celebrity in his profession, and his successors have maintained the reputation of the establishment to the present time ; a medal having been awarded them at the World’s fair in 1851.

1762            Gerardus Meerman, a Hollander, who wrote upon the origin of printing, offered a premium of twenty-five ducats to discover the time of the first manufacture of linen paper. Specimens were sent to him from different countries, which were claimed to be linen; but all his researches were lost and reduced to an uncertainty, through the existing remnants of cotton paper, which was in use some centuries before linen, because the two are in many respects similar, and cotton and linen rags may have been at first mixed ; it was therefore rendered more difficult to ascertain when the first paper was made from linen rags alone.

1763            The Royal Society of Science at Gottingen renewed their premiums of 1755 for the discovery of the period of the introduction of paper.

1765            Jacob Christian Schaffers, of Ratisbon, published a work in octavo, upon the different sorts of paper which he could make without the use of rags, giving specimens, among which were the coton du peuplier, hornets’ nests, sawdust, moss, beech, willow, aspen, mulberry, clematite, and pine; with hop vines, the peelings of grape vines, hemp, the leaves of aloes, and lily of the valley ; with arroche, moth-wort, masse d’eau, barley straw, cabbage stumps, thistle stalks, burdock, conferva, wheat straw, broom corn, and Bavarian peat. (See 1772.)

1768            Christopher Leffingwell began to make paper at Horwich, Connecticut, about this time, and was encouraged by the legislature with the promise of a bounty.

1768            Such was the reputation of the paper fabricated in Holland, that the French Academy of Sciences, at Paris, sent Demarets to that country for the purpose of visiting the mills, and studying the process.

1769            It was announced in the Boston News Letter that ” the bellcart will go through Boston before the end of next month, to collect rags for the paper-mill at Milton, when all people that will encourage the paper manufactory may dispose of them.

“Rags are as beauties, which concealed lie, But when in paper how it charms the eye; Pray save your rags, new beauties it discover, For paper truly every one’s a lover : By the pen and press such knowledge is displayed, As wouldn’t exist, if paper was not made. Wisdom of things, mysterious, divine, Illustriously doth on paper shine.”

1770            Christopher Leffingwell, who was manufacturing paper at Norwich, Ct, under the official encouragement of 2d. a quire on all good writing paper, and 1d. a quire on all printing and common paper (see 1768), now received bounty on 4,020 quires of writing paper, and 10,600 quires of printing paper, after which the government patronage was withdrawn.

1770            There were eleven large paper-mills in Holland in which wind-mills were used to drive the cutting and grinding engines, which performed more labour in an hour than the German water-mills with the stampers would do in six hours. In Saardam 1000 persons were employed in paper-making. They imported nine tenths of their stock ; but exported great quantities of paper.

1770            In the states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, there were forty paper-mills, which were supposed to make £100,000 worth of paper annually.

1772            There were two mills in operation in Italy for the manufacture of paper from maize, or Turkish wheat; but we have no account of their success, nor that the manufacture was more than an experiment.

1772       A book was printed in Germany, containing upwards of sixty specimens of paper, made of different materials, the result of one man’s experiments alone. The author was Jacob Christian Schaffers,* and a copy is in the Smithsonian Institution library.

 

*This work of Schaffers, prediger zu Regensburg, is entitled Sammtliche Papierversuche. It seems to have been the second work by this author on the subject (see 1765). Ratisbon is the more common name for the ancient city of Regensburg.

1774            Scheele discovered a gas now known as chlorine, which, in combination with lime, came to be employed in bleaching paper to a very great extent.

1775            There were, at the breaking out of the revolution, three small paper mills in Massachusetts; in New Hampshire none; and one in Rhode Island out of repair. The paper which these mills could make fell far short of the necessary supply. Paper, of course was very scarce, and what could be procured was badly manufactured, not having more than half the requisite labour bestowed upon it. It was often taken from the mill wet and unsized. The people had not acquired the habit of saving rags, and stock for the manufacture of paper was obtained with great difficulty. Everything like rags was ground up together to make paper, which accounts for the peculiar colours often observed in the paper of this time.

1775            The Maryland convention resolved that the sum of 400 pounds, common money, be advanced to James Dorset, of Baltimore county, he giving bond with sufficient security to repay the same within two years, without interest, either in cash, or writing or cartridge paper, or in such proportions of each as this or a future convention, or council of safety in their recess shall direct and order; that is to say; one third part thereof within twelve months, and the other two thirds within two years from the date of said bond ; he at the same time engaging to build a mill for that purpose within six months from the date of his said contract; and to sell to the inhabitants of this province any kind of paper which he may make, as cheap as the same can or shall be sold at any mill in the province of Pennsylvania.

1775            The provincial congress of South Carolina offered a premium of £500 currency to the first person who should erect and establish a proper paper-mill in that colony, upon producing three reams of good writing paper manufactured thereat.

1776            William Bellamy, having proposed to the provincial congress of South Carolina, that with some assistance from the public, he would erect and complete a proper mill for the making of paper and cutting files at the same time, a committee was appointed to take his proposal into consideration.

1776            A volume was printed in France upon white looking paper, made from the bark of the linden (basswood), at the end of which were some twenty specimens of paper, made from as many different kinds of vegetables. But the poor quality of the fabrics and the cost of producing them seem to have discouraged the inventors.

1776            The Massachusetts house of representatives, in view of the scarcity of paper, resolved that the committees of correspondence, and inspection, and safety, in the several towns, be required to appoint some suitable person in each town to receive rags for the paper-mills; and the inhabitants were desired to be very careful in saving even the smallest quantity of rags proper for making paper.

1776            Watson & Ledyard, having a paper-mill at East Hartford, Ct, wholly supplied the press at Hartford, which published about 8000 papers weekly, as well as the greater part of the writing paper used in Connecticut, and much of that used by the continental army.

1776            Thomas Loosley and Thomas Elms applied to the New York provincial congress to be exempted from military duty as indispensable to the successful pursuit of their business as paper-makers.—4 Force’s Am. Archives, vi, G15. By a resolve of the convention Aug, 14, the master workman and two attendants at each paper-mill were exempted from military duty.—5 Ib., i, 1510.

1776            The Pennsylvania council of safety took measures to prevent the paper-makers from joining the volunteers about to march to New Jersey, congress having resolved that they should be detained.

1777            The French Academy of Sciences sent a second deputation to Holland to visit the paper-mills and learn the process by which their line papers were produced.

1778            May 9. Congress ordered §200 to be paid to Charles Cist and James Claypoole towards defraying their expenses, on their employment by the treasurer in superintending the making of paper for loan-office certificates and bills of exchange.

1778            When the American army entered Philadelphia, in June, upon the evacuation of the British troops, there was a want of paper fitted for the construction of cartridges. It was advertised for and but a small quantity procured. An order was then issued demanding its instant production by all people in that city who had it. This produced but little, and most probably on account of its scarcity. A file of soldiers was then ordered to make search for it in every place where any was likely to be found. Among other places visited in July, was a garret in a house in which Benjamin Franklin had previously had his printing office. Here were discovered about twenty-five hundred copies of a sermon which the Rev. Gilbert Tenant had written (printed by Franklin ) upon Defensive War, to rouse the colonists during the French troubles. They were all taken and used as cases for musket cartridges, and at once sent to the army, and most of them were used at the battle of Monmouth. The requisites in cartridge paper were, of course, thinness, strength, pliability, and inflammability, and such paper was necessarily scarce, then Hist. Mag. viii, 151-2.

1779            M. Didot, the noted Parisian printer, having analyzed the vellum paper of the English, addressed a letter to M. Johannot d’Annonay, a French papermaker, inviting him to attempt a similar fabrication, which was successfully made by him. (See 1781.)

1779            There were ten paper-mills in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.

1781            M. Didot, of Paris, having in 1779 encouraged M. Johannot d’Annonay to attempt an imitation of the English vellum paper, received from that manufacturer a quantity of the desired fabric, which procured for the latter a gold medal from the king, Louis XVI. It is known among the trade as papier velin

1781            The scarcity of paper in New York at this time was so great that the journal of the second session of the assembly was not printed, the printer being unable to procure the necessary paper.

1781            Stockholm imported 18,579 reams of paper. The kingdom of Sweden had no more than twenty-four paper-mills within its borders at a period about twenty years later.

1782            Hamburg imported 80,000 reams of paper. The city had but two paper-mills of two vats each, which consumed about 60,000 pounds of rags in making a dark purple paper for sugar bakers.

1784            The value of the paper manufactured in England was reported at £800,000, the excise on which was nearly £46,868.

1784            It was advertised in Albany that rags were wanted at the paper-mill at Bennington.

1785            According to Count Ewald von Hartzberg there were in the Russian dominions 800 (?) paper manufactories, the revenue from which was $200,000 annually.

1785            The legislature of Massachusetts passed an “Act imposing duties on licensed vellum, parchment, and paper.” This was so unpopular that the same body found it necessary to repeal it.

1785            A gentleman who had directed his researches to national industry stated that there were 400 papermills in Germany, which furnished 20,000 bales, of ten reams each, per annum.

1786            The Society of Sciences at Philadelphia offered a premium for the best remedy to protect paper against insects, and another for the best method of making paper for St. Domingo which would resist insects. Several answers and samples were received, all recommending to mix the size with sharp and bitter or other ingredients which might kill the insects. But they were all rejected.

1786            The works of the Marquis de Villette were printed in London in 24mo, on paper made of marsh mallow; and at the end are specimens in single leaves of paper made of the nettle, hops, moss, reed, three species of conferva, couch grass, spindle trees, wayfaring tree, elm, lime, yellow willow, sallow willow, poplar, oak, burdock, coltsfoot, and thistle. These experiments were made at the manufactory of M. Leorier, at Bruges, and served to show that paper could be made of a multitude of articles; but they did not overcome the difficulty which existed, and which still exists, of disclosing a substance which should be more economical than linen and cotton rags.

1787            The consumption of French paper-hangings in the United States was so great, that the French government took off the export duty.

1787            A patent was granted to one Hooper, of London, for a new method of manufacturing printing paper, particularly designed for copperplate printing.

1788            Mr. Greaves, of Warrington, England, made paper from the bark and leaves of willow twigs.

1788            The Society for the encouragement of Arts conferred a silver medal on a French manufacturer, for the production of forty-four quires of paper from the bark of the sallow tree. About 600 pounds of the raw material were used in the production of that quantity.

1789            The manufacture of paper in Angouleme gave employment to 600 workmen, who produced annually about 1,400,000 pounds. The beating was done with mallets, which was still in practice quite recently. The price of paper was about 10cts a pound.

1789            The paper-mill nearest to Albany was at Bennington, Vt., which depended for stock upon the castoff rags of the children of the wilderness. The paper was frequently brought from the mill on horseback, and coarse and unbleached as it appears beside the poorest paper of our day, was of such value that it was customary to repair with paste the broken quires which always came with hand-made paper, so that no sheets were lost. There are several copies of the Albany Register preserved in a volume in the Albany Institute, which have undergone this process, and are so ingeniously done as not to be detected unless held up to the light.

1789            Homer, in his Bibliotheca Americana, informs us that at this time the people of North America manufactured their own paper, and in sufficient quantities for home consumption ; but that the price of labour was so high as to discourage publishing beyond their own laws, pamphlets, and newspapers.

1789            Neuerdings versuchte Guttermann im Serapeum der Stadt Ravensburg in Wurtemberg, die Ehre der Erfindung des Leinenpapiers znzuwenden.

1789            The celebrated munitionnaire Ouvrard, son of a paper-dealer in France, perceiving that the revolution would give birth to a multitude of publications, contracted for all the paper which the manufactories at Poitou and Angoumois could produce in two years, by which he realized a hundred thousand crowns.

1789            Was sold in London, the most complete specimen known to exist of manuscript written upon papyrus, dated 572 A. D.

1790            The paper-makers of France laboured themselves as the head-workmen of their establishments, assisted by their wives and children. This continued until the era of the introduction of machinery.

1790            The government of France, to cure the monopoly in paper, fixed by legislative act the price of all merchandize. It had the effect to stop all the mills.

1790            About this time the practice of blueing paper pulp had its origin. A paper-maker’s wife, superintending the washing of some fine linen, accidentally dropped her bag of powdered blue into the midst of some pulp in a forward state of preparation. The papermaker beheld in great astonishment a peculiar colour in his pulp which his wife, perceiving that no great damage had been done, took courage to disclose the cause of. Being pleased with an advance of four shillings a bundle upon his improved paper in the London market, he purchased for his wife a costly cloak, which he presented with much satisfaction to the sharer of his joy.

1790            Samuel Hooper, of London, produced paper of various qualities from leather cuttings and refuse paper.

1790            The annual increase of printing presses in Germany, and the want of rags and paper stock, induced the manufacture of many more quires of paper from a hundred weight of rags than formerly, which rendered the German printing paper very disagreeable.

1792            A Mr. Campbell of England obtained a patent for a mode of bleaching rags for the manufacture of paper. His process was similar to that pursued in bleaching cotton thread.—Hansard, 213.

1793            The first paper-mill in the northern part of the state of New York was erected at Troy by Messrs. Websters, Ensign & Seymour, in which from five to ten reams were manufactured daily. An earnest appeal was made by the proprietors to the patriotism of the ladies, who were invoked to aid domestic manufactures by the preservation of rags. They were besought to patronize the saving of all kinds of linen and cotton rags, for which would be paid at the mill, 3d. for clean white, 2d. for white, blue, brown, and check, and a proportionate price for all other rags.— Typographical Miscellany, 97.

1794            A paper-mill was built at Fairhaven, Vt., by Col. Lyon, at which paper for wrapping was manufactured from the bark of the bass-wood tree.

1794            A patent was granted to Mr. Cunningham of Edinburgh for an improved method of making paper.

1795            John Bigg, of England, obtained a patent for a simple and effectual process of bleaching rags and other substances suitable for the manufacture of paper. It consisted in using manganese and sea-salt for the bleaching department, and also in the vat.

1796            A Mr. Bidds undertook the manufacture of paper from the saw-dust of sapwood, suitable for the purposes of printing, somewhere in this country.

1798            M. Louis Robert of France, a workman in the establishment of M. Didot, at Essonne, announced that he had discovered a way to make, with one man, and without fire, by means of machines, sheets of paper of a very large size, even twelve feet wide and fifty feet long.

1799            The largest paper-mill in France was at Montargis, having thirty vats, requiring 1,620,000 pounds of rags, and 185,000 pounds of size. Another at Vougeot had twelve engines and twenty vats. The capacity of a mill in those times was computed by the number of vats it contained, handwork usually requiring a vat to each engine.

1799            The revenue from the excise duty on paper in England amounted to £140,000. The importation of rags from the continent was 7,307,117 pounds. It was estimated that twenty-four million pounds of rags were annually manufactured into paper.

1779            The first attempt to make paper in an endless web was successfully made in France by M. Robert at the paper-mill of Francois Didot, and a patent was procured for the same this year.

1800            Sometime during this or the previous year P. De Labigarre, who resided at Upper Red Hook, brought a bag of frog-spittle to the paper-mill at Catskill, which was manufactured into a poor kind of paper. Several persons became interested in the experiment, and it was supposed by them to be a great discovery.—Hist. Mag., iii, 90.

1800            The first paper-mill in Columbia county, New York, was transformed from a flour-mill on the upper great fall of Stuyvesant falls, by Elisha Pitkin. Its capacity was one vat.

1800            The marquis of Salisbury presented to the king of England a book printed upon paper manufactured of straw, which treated of the manner in which the ancients employed different materials to perpetuate the remembrance of events before the invention of paper.

1800            Was printed by Burton, of London, an historical account of the substances which have been used to describe events, and to convey ideas, from the earliest date to the invention of paper; printed on the first useful paper manufactured only from straw.

1800            The duty on paper manufactured in England was £315,802.

1800            The government of France awarded Louis Robert, the inventor of the paper-machine, 8000 francs, in consideration of the usefulness of his invention, and a patent for fifteen years ; but the troubles in which France was involved caused delay in the necessary experiments, which were both tedious and expensive, and permission was given to carry over the small working model to England, with a view of getting the benefit of British capital and mechanical skill to bring it into an operative state on a large scale.

1800            A successful experiment was carried out in England by Matthias Koops, by which 700 reams of clean and white paper were turned out weekly from old waste and written and printed paper alone, which had previously been thrown away.

1800            A paper-mill at Jaroslow, in Russia, with twenty-eight engines and seventy vats, manufactured 1100 reams of paper weekly, and consumed 800 tons of rags annually; there was another of thirteen engines and thirteen vats; they made paper-hangings principally for Moscow.

1800            There were upwards of 200 paper-mills in Spain, of which thirty-one were at Alcoi, and it was said that one Francisco Guarro manufactured paper as good as any Dutch.

1801            M. Seguin, an inventor of some note, obtained a patent in France for the manufacture of paper from straw, hemp, and other vegetables, which he alleged produced an excellent quality of paper when prepared by his process ; but this was so lengthy and expensive that it was not encouraged by paper-makers.

1801            John Gamble, an Englishman, who had accompanied Leger Didot from Paris with Robert’s invention for making an endless web of paper, obtained the first patent in England for that machine. Didot had agreed to pay Robert 25,000 francs for the patent and model.

1801            There were twenty-six paper-mills in Russia, and notwithstanding the plenty of rags, the exportation of which was prohibited, they imported paper annually to the amount of 220,000 roubles.

1801            The number of paper-mills in Germany proper was estimated to exceed 500, manufacturing two and a half million pounds of paper annually. But they made principally coarse paper, the finer qualities being imported.

1801            The paper-mill of John Clark of Springfield, New Jersey, was burnt, with a large quantity of paper stock.

1801            Matthias Koops succeeded in making “the most perfect paper from straw, wood, and other vegetables, without the addition of any other known paperstuff.” He printed a book on these fabrics, from which many of the facts here given have been gathered. He asserted that paper could be manufactured from any vegetable substance. He seems to have been the first to discover a mode of extracting printing and writing ink from waste paper, and obtained a patent for manufacturing paper from straw, hay, thistles, waste and refuse of hemp and flax, and different kinds of wood and bark, fit for printing and almost all other purposes for which paper is used. He claimed to have produced the first useful paper that had ever been made from straw alone.

1801            There were 500 paper-mills in France, notwithstanding the diminution during a great number of years caused by the gradual decrease of export, arising from the activity with which the neighbouring countries pursued the manufacture at home. These mills were supposed to consume annually twenty million pounds of rags and coarse paper stuff; and that fourteen million pounds of rags were annually exported, notwithstanding the severe prohibition.

1801            Robert Bage, an English paper-maker, died. William Hutton, the celebrated bookseller and author at Birmingham, purchased nearly all the paper which Bage made during forty-five years.

1801            Mr. David Buel, postmaster at Troy, New York, published the following homily under the head, ” Please to save your Rags. The press contributes more to the diffusion of knowledge and information than any other medium ; rags are the primary requisite in the manufacture of paper; and without paper the newspapers of our country, those cheap, useful and agreeable companions of the citizen and farmer, which in a political and moral view are of the highest national importance, must decline and be extinguished. The paper-mills of the state, could the poor and the opulent, the farmer and the mechanic, be persuaded into the laudable frugality of saving rags, would turn out ample supplies of American paper to answer all demands. The people of Massachusetts and Connecticut, with true American zeal, have introduced this exemplary saving into the economy of their houses. The latter, by fair calculation, makes yearly a saving of rags to the actual amount of §50,000. The ladies in several of the large towns, display an elegant work bag, as part of the furniture of their parlours, in which every rag that is used in the paper-mill, is carefully preserved. Were this example imitated, this state would not be drained of its circulating cash, for paper and other manufactures, which American artists can furnish. The poor by the mere saving of rags, maybe enabled to procure paper and books, for schools and family use, or more agreeable articles of dress or consumption. The rich, who regard the interests of their country, will direct their children or domestics to place a bag or box in some convenient place, as a deposit for rags, that none may be lost, by being swept into the street or fire ; the sales of which savings will reward the attention of the faithful servant, and encourage the prosperous habit of prudence and enterprise.”

1802            A patent was secured in England by W. Plees for a mode of colouring paper pulp, which consisted of mixing with the pulp snuff, bran, hay, or any substance possessing the colour which was desired to be imparted to the paper.

1802            Several patents were granted at this time in England and France, for improvements in the paper machine, most of which were of value, and caused more progression in the art than the substances offered for the production of paper.

1802            Burgess Allison and John Hawkins obtained a patent for making paper of the husks of Indian corn.

1802            M. Lozanna offered to the Society of Agriculture at Turin, a number of specimens of paper made of the papas of the scratula ercensis, the carduus nutans, and of the bark of the erigerone of Canada.

1802            The fourteen paper-mills at Alsace in France, which manufactured about 40,000 reams annually, exported about two-thirds thereof to Switzerland and Germany. The manufacturers in Langnecloc, Lyons, Guienne, Bretagne, and Poitou, wrought also principally for exportation.

1803            Mr. Bryan Donkin, after nearly three years of intense application, succeeded in producing a self-acting machine on the plan of M. Robert of France. It was to him that Didot and Gamble, on their arrival in England, entrusted the attempt to construct the novel automaton. It performed in such a manner as to surprise everybody.

1803            The average yearly import of rags into Great Britain was 3111 tons for this and the two previous years.

1803            In the cantons of Bern and Basil were several paper-mills, which manufactured paper so much admired for its strength and whiteness, that it tended to diminish the importation from France.

1803            The magistrates of a northern town in England had the following notice painted on boards in large letters, and fixed up in all places of public resort.

” To the Ladies.—Genteel women, who amuse their idle hours in working, frequently throw scraps of linen and cotton of various kinds into the fire.

“It is requested most humbly, that every lady will reserve these trifles, and direct their maid servants to sell them, because their so doing will prevent £60,000 being annually exported to foreign countries for the importation of old rags to make paper, and which in consequence, will become cheaper.”

1804            About this time William Baily began the erection of a paper-mill on the river Chateaugay, above the town of that name, in Franklin county, N. Y.; but it was never completed.

1804            Peignot estimated the quantity of printing paper consumed in Paris annually at 228,000 reams.

1804            The American Company of Booksellers offered a gold medal of the value of fifty dollars for the greatest quantity of paper, of the best quality fit for printing, not less than fifty reams, of other materials than linen, cotton or woollen rags; and a silver medal of the value of $20, for the greatest quantity of wrapping paper, not less than forty reams, manufactured of other materials than those usually employed for that purpose.

1804            There was at this time a paper-mill at Bellows Falls, owned by a Mr. Atkinson of New York and a Mr. Casey of Middletown.—Ford’s 31s. Journal.

1804            Messrs. Henry and Sealy Fourdrinier, wealthy stationers and paper manufacturers of London, purchased the patents of Didot and Gamble in Robert’s paper machine. It was by their improvements and extensive manufacture that the invention came to be called the Fourdrinier machine, by which it is still known, on both sides of the Atlantic. Their first experiments were made at Boxmoor, where they erected a machine and pursued their experiments at great expense.

1804            Mr. Donkin, since so celebrated as a papermachine maker, put up his second machine at Two Waters, in England, which was completely successful; and the manufacture of continuous paper became one of the most useful discoveries of the age.

Mr. Donkin, the builder of the Fourdrinier paper-machine, altered the position of the cylinders, so as to dispense with the use of the upper web, an improvement by which the machine was much simplified (the paper on the web being slightly pressed before passing through the pressing rollers); thus an all important advantage was attained. It was now capable of doing the work of six vats in twelve hours. By the hand process it took three months to complete the paper ready for delivery, from the time of receiving the rags into the mill; by the machine the paper may now be delivered the next day.

1805            It was about this time that the rice-paper of the Chinese, used for artificial flowers, was introduced into England. It was an item of the gossip of the day that the princess Charlotte paid seventy guineas for a bouquet made of this paper, which is not a manufactured article, but a vegetable production, cut spirally, and afterwards flattened by pressure. It seems to have come from the island of Formosa originally.

1806            Francis Guy, of Baltimore, procured a patent for paper carpets, which he claimed were equal to canvas floor cloths, much more beautiful, and above fifty per cent cheaper.

1806            The patentees of the Fourdrinier machine laid a statement before the public containing a comparative estimate of the expense attending seven vats, and that attending a machine employed upon paper sized in the engine, performing the same quantity of work as seven vats, at the rate of twelve hours a day. The expense of seven vats per annum was .£2,004 : 12s. ; a machine doing seven vats’ work was .£734: 12s.; balance saved by the machine per annum, .£1,870. The expense of making paper by hand at this time was 16s. per cwt.; by machine, 3s. 6d.

1806            The manufacturers at Angouleme first produced vellum-paper, which had been made in Holland since 1740, and at Annonay since 1781. An exhibition of manufactures was held at Paris, in this year, at which seven Angouleme manufacturers sent their products and obtained prizes.

1807            The paper-mill of Nathan Benjamin at Catskill took fire by accident, and burnt, with a stock valued at $9,000.

1807            Messrs. Fourdrinier stated before parliament that they had withdrawn from their stationery business the large sum of £60,000 to further the object of their enterprise ; so many difficulties did they encounter, in bringing the machinery to its then comparatively complete state, and so little encouragement or support did they receive from the paper manufacturers throughout the kingdom. The prices of their machines were from £715 to £1040.

1807            Gen. Walter Martin, proprietor of the township of Martinsburg, Lewis county, N. Y., erected a paper-mill, which was run by John Clark & Co. They gave notice that rags would be received at the principal stores in Upper Canada and the Black-river country, which (like many of the advertisements of the early paper-makers, both in England and America), was accompanied by a poetic address to the ladies, one stanza of which ran thus :

” Sweet ladies pray be not offended, Nor mind the jest of sneering wags ;

No harm, believe us, is intended, When humbly we request your rags.”

1808            The Sultan Selim III was assassinated, and the printing office and paper manufactory which he had established a few years before, at Scutari, the Asiatic suburb of Constantinople, were destroyed.

1808            John Gamble, who had superintended the construction and improved the paper-machine in England, after losing both his time and money-savings during eight years of irksome diligence, assigned over to Messrs. Fourdrinier, the whole right of his share in the patent to which he was entitled under the act of parliament, for improvements.

1808            Van Veghten & Son, who printed the Western Budget at Schenectady, issued their paper several weeks on a half sheet, alleging that they had posted to all the mills within thirty miles, without being able to procure a full supply, but only the promise of a sufficient quantity within two or three weeks. They took occasion to request the ladies to pack up all their rags, and send them to the office, where they would be paid three cents a pound ready cash.

1808            S. & A. Hawley & Co. erected a mill at Moreau, near Fort Edward, New York, and their appeal to the ladies for their rags was larded with these forcible and unique blandishments: ” Save your rags! This exclamation is particularly addressed to the ladies, both young, old and middle-aged throughout the northern part of this state, by the subscribers, who have erected a paper-mill in the town of Moreau, near Fort Edward—nor is it thought that this appeal to our fair countrywomen will prove unavailing when they reflect that without their assistance they cannot he supplied with the useful article of paper. If the necessary stock is denied paper-mills, young maids must languish in vain for tender epistles from their respective swains ; bachelors may be reduced to the necessity of a personal attendance upon the fair, when a written communication would be an excellent substitute. For clean cotton and linen rags of every colour and description, matrons can be furnished with bibles, spectacles and snuff; mothers with grammars, spelling books and primers for their children ; and young misses may be supplied with bonnets, ribbons and ear-rings, for the decoration of their persons, (by means of which they may obtain husbands) or by sending them to the said mill they may receive the cash. 1809. Mr. Dickinson, an English paper-maker of note, invented another method of making endless paper, which competed with the Fourdrinier machine. Instead of the travelling wire-cloth, he conceived the plan of a polished, hollow, brass cylinder, perforated with holes, and covered with wire-cloth, which revolved over and just in contact with the prepared pulp, sucking up the water by rarefaction, and leaving the filaments sufficiently strong to be carried by the usual process to completion.

1809            A paper-mill was erected near the Schoharie bridge, New York, on the Great western turnpike, by Wood & Reddington, and was ready for operation in February.

1810            M. Didot having failed to fulfil his obligations to Louis Robert, in the purchase of the paper-machine, the latter instituted a suit at law, and recovered his patent.

1810            The paper-mills in Massachusetts were constructed for two vats each, and could make, of the various descriptions of paper, from two to three thousand reams per annum. Such a mill required a capital of $10,000, and employed twelve or more persons, consisting of men, boys and girls. Collecting rags and making paper gave an employment to not less than 2500 persons at this time. The quantity gathered of rags, old sails, ropes, junk, and other substances of which the various kinds of paper were made, was computed to amount to not less than 3500 tons yearly.

1810            Thomas estimated the number of paper-mills in the United States at 185; of which seven were in New Hampshire, thirty-eight in Massachusetts, four in Rhode Island, seventeen in Connecticut, nine in Vermont, twelve in ‘New York, four in Delaware, three in Maryland, four in Virginia, one in South Carolina, six in Kentucky, four in Tennessee, sixty in Pennsylvania; that they manufactured 50,000 reams of paper, averaging $3 a ream, and weighing about 500 tons; and 70,000 tons of cheap book paper, at $3.50, weighing 630 tons; 111,000 reams of writing paper at $3, about 650 tons; and 100,000 reams of wrapping at 83 cents ; besides paper hangings and a number of other articles sufficient for home consumption.

1810            The Chevalier Landolina died in Sicily, an antiquarian who maintained that the ancients used the pith of the papyrus for the purpose of making paper; and supported his opinion by ingenious experiments made with a plant growing near Syracuse in that country, and which corresponds to the description given by the ancients of the papyrus.

1810            The census returned twenty-eight paper-mills in the state of New York, which manufactured 77,756 reams of paper, the average value of which was three dollars a ream.

1810            The second paper-mill in Columbia county, N. Y., was erected at Stockport by George Chittenden, whose sons continue its operation.

1810            The United States began to import rags largely from Europe. Previous to this the materials for paper making were procured in the country.

1811            Edward Smith of London theorized on the production of paper from nettles and the threads of worn-out sacks; originating many valuable suggestions relative to the manufacture.

1812            Gabriel Desetable, of Caen, in France, presented specimens of paper made from straw by means of an instrument said to be so simple that any person who pleased could make paper equal to the most practical workman.

1812            The number of paper-mills in the United States was computed to be 190.

1813            Dr. Colquohoum estimated the value of paper annually produced in Great Britain at £2,000,000; but Mr. Stevenson, an incomparably better authority upon such subjects, estimated it at about half that sum.

1813            It was announced that a discovery had been made of a method of preparing paper, on which, by writing with water only, the impression would be as legible and durable as with ink. It soon proved to be unworthy of notice.

1813            A machine was patented in England for cutting waste paper, &c, into shreds, preparatory to remanufacture.

1813            The Fourdrinier machine was now so much simplified, that instead of five men formerly employed upon one machine, three were fully sufficient without requiring that degree of attention and skill which were formerly indispensable.

1814            Bertholet introduced a new mode of bleaching into the paper-mills of France, and important progress was made.

1814            It was estimated that there were 187 papermills in the United States, which manufactured annually 340,000 reams of paper, valued at $820,000.

1815            The manufacturers of France began to devote their efforts to specialties ; Annonay, Angouleme, l’Auvergne, les Yosges, and le Limosin, had each its peculiar style of product. This precluded much competition between different centres of production, and enabled each to arrive at greater perfection in its specialty.

1815            The first paper machine was constructed in France. Although the idea of producing an endless web of paper was first attempted to be carried out in that country sixteen years before (see 1790), strange enough, this was the Fourdrinier machine, invented by Louis Robert, which had been improved in England ; but it was very imperfect when compared with an English machine imported about this time into France.

1816            It was a day’s work for three men to manufacture four thousand small sheets of paper, at this time, by the hand process.

1816            A paper-mill went into operation at Pittsburgh, Pa., with a steam engine of sixteen-horse power, on the principle of Oliver Evans, which employed forty persons, consuming 10,000 bushels of coal and 120,000 pounds of rags per annum; and manufactured $20,000 worth of paper annually.

1816            Of a quantity of Bibles printed by the British and Foreign Bible Society, one was found two years later crumbling to dust, although it had not been used, owing to the process used in bleaching the paper at the mill.

1817            Thomas Amies, a noted paper-maker of Philadelphia, produced a quantity of paper for the purpose of printing the Declaration of Independence, which was designed to surpass everything that had been attempted in that way in America. The mould and felts were got up expressly for the purpose, the size of the sheet was 20×30 inches, and nothing was used but the finest linen rags. Each ream weighed 140 pounds, and the price was $125.

1817            Thomas Gilpin & Co., paper-manufacturers at Wilmington, Delaware, put in operation a machine for making paper, at their mill on the Brandywine, which appears by the notices of it to have been a cylinder machine, and an American invention. The first paper printed on the product of this machine, was Paulson’s Daily Advertiser. It was stated that it would do the work of ten paper vats, and delivered a sheet of greater width than any other made in America, and of any length required.—Eminent Philadelphians, 411.

1817            Mr. Heath, an English pasteboard manufacturer, first introduced high glazing, now universally adopted ; but for many years his process was unknown.

1817            E. B. Ball, an English paper-maker, obtained a patent for making paper by the combination of new floss silk, flax, hemp, and Russia linen. These substances, under the usual process, were said to produce a white and durable paper.

1818            Roger Didot, formerly a paper-maker in France, but at this time carrying on the business in England, obtained a patent for certain improvements upon the machine already in use for making wove and laid paper in continuous lengths or separate sheets.

1818            The Prince of Wales Island Gazette was printed on paper which was said to have been made from rice, by which was probably meant rice straw.

1818            The value of rags gathered in the United States was estimated at $900,000 per annum.

1818            A bill was brought before congress to increase the duties on certain articles manufactured in America; among which were, paper for copperplate printing, or writing, 12½ cuts. a pound, and on all other papers 10 cts. a pound.

1818            The first paper-machine at Berlin in Prussia.

1819            The London Society for the Encouragement of Arts and Manufactures, awarded 30 guineas to Mr. Finley, for the invention of ivory paper, which was said to possess a surface having many of the properties of ivory, and at the same time the advantage of a much greater surface than ivory can possibly furnish.

1819            The paper-mill of Symonds, Case & Co., in Farmington, near Canandaigua, N. Y., took fire from a kettle of coals placed in the drying room to force the process of drying a lot of paper which had begun to mildew. Loss $5,000.

1820            Notwithstanding the great benefits derived by the perfection of the Fourdrinier paper-machine and the immense quantity of paper produced by these machines, the old and tedious process of drying in lofts was still practiced.

1820            M. Hungering, of France, secured a patent for making paper from pure straw. The invention related to a process of fabrication ; however, a white and durable paper was the result of his improvements.

1820            About this time machinery for the manufacture of paper began to be introduced into the United States from England and France ; but, being found expensive, was not much encouraged. It is believed to have been first used by Gulping on the Brandywine.

1820            Solomon Stimson, of Putney, Vt., advertised that he had discovered the art of making green paper for writing and printing, the utility of which was “to strengthen and preserve the eye.”

1820            A patent was granted for five years by the government of Denmark, to the inventor of a mode of making paper from seaweed. It was claimed to be whiter and stronger than the paper in common use, and cheaper.

1820            The paper-manufacturers of Baltimore petitioned congress for a tariff of 25 per cent on foreign paper. Congress was at this time using English paper, although the Gulping on the Brandywine, with a capital of half a million, were manufacturing paper which was claimed to be equally as good as the English, which they desired to furnish 25 per cent less. It is said in Allen’s Biog. Dictionary that Simeon & Asa Butler, of Suffield, Ct., manufactured the first letter paper used in the senate of the United States, the product of this country.

1820            The paper-manufactures of the United States were estimated at an annual average of three millions of dollars ; and the cost of materials and labour at two millions; employed 5000 persons, of which 1700 were males over 16 years of age, and the rest women and children.

1820            The paper-makers of Pennsylvania and Delaware, petitioning congress for a tariff on paper, say that in their district there were 70 paper-mills with 95 vats in operation until the importations after the war, since which they had been reduced to 17 vats. When paper was taxed, the amount paid by a vat was from $200 to $250. That these establishments cost about $500,000, and had employed 950 persons, consuming 2600 tons of rags, and producing paper to the amount of $800,000 annually.

1821            M. Janbeaurt, an inventor, of Marseilles, obtained a patent in France for the production of paper from beaten hemp and liquorice wood, which were reduced to a pulp and prepared for paper in the usual manner.

1821            A very useful improvement was added to the paper machine by T. B. Crompton, of England, who obtained a patent for drying and finishing paper by means of a cloth against heated cylinders, and the application of a pair of shears to cut the paper off into suitable lengths, as it issued from the machine or rollers. The paper was much better finished and cut than had been found possible until this improvement.

1821            A paper-mill containing two vats, was destroyed by fire at Esperance, Schoharie county, N. Y., owned by Henry W. Starin.

1822            A flood of unprecedented violence in the Brandywine carried away the extensive paper-mill of the Messrs. Gilpin. Though the building in which their costly machinery was placed, had been erected, it was thought, beyond all possibility of danger from such a cause, and had been guarded by every precaution which anxiety and mechanical skill could suggest. The flood rose to the top of the building. For two days the whirling torrent swept along with fearful turbulence, and when the water at length subsided, the edifice itself was a mass of ruins. Buried beneath these, the fragments of machinery, broken into shapeless paints, could hardly be recognized, and the costly portions, framed with necessary delicacy and minuteness, had totally disappeared. The labour of years and the expenditure of thousands of dollars had vanished in a moment. Advanced in years, Mr. Gilpin looked upon the wreck of his exertions and the injury to his fortune, with a certainty that he could not hope to replace what he had so suddenly lost.—Eminent Philadelphians, p. 411.

1822            The Philadelphia publishers consumed 30,000 reams of paper in printing Rees’s Cyclopedia. It was the largest work in the English language.

1822            The paper-makers united with the printers and booksellers in memorializing congress not to reduce the duty on imported books, stating that the cash value of books manufactured in this country was considerably more than a million of dollars annually, every article used in which was manufactured here, and a very important item, rags, of no value whatever, except for this purpose.

1822            An extensive paper-mill on Bronx river, New York, owned by David Lydig, was destroyed by fire, with all the machinery and a large quantity of paper stock. It was insured for $32,000.

1823            A roll of papyrus measuring eleven inches in length and five in circumference was discovered in the island of Elephanta, in the East Indies. It contained a portion of the Iliad written in large capitals, such as were in use during the time of the Ptolemies and under the earlier Roman emperors.

1523            It was complained by the newspapers that congress was using paper with a French water-mark, ” Napoleon empereur et roi, 1813.”

1823            There were 192 paper-merchants in France.

1823            France possessed only one manufactory of the papier continue, that of M. Canson, at Annonay, who had one of the Fourdrinier machines, made in England.

1823            A manufactory of straw paper was established at Okainon, near Warsaw, by Asile Henrick, who proposed to make paper suitable for roofing, which should be fire and water proof. The finer qualities were expected to diminish the cost of paper.—Revue Bib. du Pays Bas, ii, 224.

1823            The paper-makers of England were in the practice of using sulphate of lime and gypsum in the manufacture of paper to give it weight, to the extent of 12 per cent. This is the first complaint of the kind heard of.—Hansard, 232.

1823            A paper-mill was erected in England for the purpose of manufacturing paper from old sacks, ropes, &c. The paper produced was used for wrapping purposes.

1824            M. Laferet, of France, obtained a patent for making paper of beaten hemp, macerated in water. The Japanese macerate the same substance in lime-water.

1824            J. McGuaran patented in England a mode of producing paper from hop vines, which was of a dusky brown colour, and employed for wrapping. The vines were immersed in water, by which the rind was separated from the woody portion, when it was cut in small pieces and sent to the engine.

1824            A. Nesbit procured a patent in England for a mode of producing paper from moss, which afforded a pulp suitable for the manufacture of coarse paper.

1824            A beautiful paper was produced by the Japanese at this time from the mulberry tree, which was also of an excellent quality. It was prepared for manufacture in the usual manner.

1824            Louis Lambert, a Frenchman, took out a patent in England for certain improvements in the material and manufacture of paper. They consisted in reducing straw to pulp and extracting the colouring and other deleterious matter, so that it could be introduced into the ordinary rag engine, and employed in making paper.

1824            The Sieur Brepols, manufacturer of coloured paper at Turnhout, in Belgium, produced in great perfection a style of paper which was termed veau vacine at from 80 to 100 francs per ream of grand raisin size. Rev. Bib. da Pays Has, iii, 128.

1825            William Van Houten, a Hollander, had a patent taken out in England, for a mode of manufacturing moss into paper and felt. He had patented the same in France a year earlier.

1825            One of the paper-mills belonging to Messrs. T. & J. Gilpin, on the Brandywine, was destroyed by fire.

1825            Messrs. D. & J. Ames, Springfield ,Mass., were said to have the most extensive paper-manufactory in the United States; employing 12 engines, and more than 100 females, besides the requisite number of males.

1825            Specimens of brown wrapping and bleached and unbleached writing papers were exhibited in Boston, which were manufactured in England from pine shavings. The fabric was said to be firmer than that of any paper manufactured from the ordinary materials.

1826            A letter from Paris states that ” There is much talk here about a new sort of paper, made of hemp stock, which is to be so cheap that a handsome octavo volume of 480 pages, manufactured of it, may be sold for about 1s. 2½d. sterling.

1826            About this time a Mr. Sharp took out a patent in England for a mode of manufacturing paper of pine shavings. He had a mill at Hampshire.

1826            M. Canson, of France, applied to the Fourdrinier machine the principle of Mr. Dickinson, of England, of rarefying the air below the surface of the web, (see 1809) by means of suction pumps; an improvement which he kept secret for six years.

1826            M. Firmin Didot introduced into his mill at Mesnil, the drying process invented by Mr. Crompton, of England, which was the first employment of it in France.

1826            The first machine for making paper that was put up in Denmark, was built this year by Messrs. Donkin, of England. The first paper-mill in that country had been established at Fredericksburg by order of Christian HI.

1826            There were 80 printing offices in the city of Paris besides the government establishment, which consumed 280,800 reams of paper annually.

1827            Messrs. Canson Brothers, paper-makers of Annonay, in France, obtained a patent for a method of sizing paper. With respect to sizing machine-made paper, it is well known that sizing in the vat offers many advantages; but as a gelatine can not be employed without injury to the felt during the process of manufacturing paper, substitutes for gelatine were desirable. The base used by M. Canson was wax. M. Delcambre in the same year made another, the base of which was rosin.

1827            A three story brick building, occupied as a store house for paper and rags at the South Hadley canal, was accidentally burnt, (24th July) with most of its contents ; damage upwards of $6000.

1827            Mr. Obry conceived a plan of using alum and rosin previously dissolved in soda, and combining it with potato starch, for the purpose of sizing paper in the vat, which is the method now generally followed in France for writing and printing papers.

1827            MM. Firmin Didot Brothers and Lefevre established the first paper-machine, under a patent of importation, in Sicily.

1827            White & Gale, of Vermont, obtained a patent for a mode of finishing paper.

1827            Louis Pierre Poisson, of Paris, obtained a patent in France, for a process of making paper of liquorice root and paste-board scraps; which were mixed together, macerated, and converted into paper in the usual manner.

1827            Pierre Balilliat, of Macon, in France, obtained a patent for a chemical substance to substitute for linen rags in the manufacture of paper.

1827            A patent was granted to the count de la Garde, in England, for a method of making paper of various descriptions, from the bullen or ligneous parts obtained from certain textile plants, which were prepared by a rural mechanical brake; which substances were to be used alone in making paper, or mixed with other suitable articles, such as refuse paper and rags.

1827            Benjamin Devaux, of Paris, obtained a patent for a mode of making paper and pasteboard of hemp.

1827            The paper-mill of E. Peck & Co. of Rochester was destroyed by fire, with a quantity of paper and rags: loss about $6000, half insured. Dec. 21.

1827            William Van Houten made experiments with moss, and succeeded in producing paper from it. He had taken out patents in England and France two years before. (See 1825.)

1827            There were but four paper-machines in France although they had now been in use in England about twenty-five years.

1827            William Magaw, of Meadville, Pa, obtained a patent for a mode of preparing hay, straw, or other vegetable substances in the manufacture of paper; it was represented as being of a yellow colour, but even and strong, and receiving the ink as well as common writing paper.

1828            Paper was made at Chambersburg, Pa., from straw and blue grass according to a patent obtained by William Magaw. The paper was said to be firm and strong, and that machinery was being constructed sufficient to make 300 reams a day.

1828            It was estimated that the newspapers printed in New York consumed 15,000 reams of paper a year, worth from four to five dollars a ream. And that the newspapers in the whole United States required 104,400 reams, the cost of which was $500,000.

1828            James Palmer, an English paper-manufacturer, obtained a patent for the invention of certain improvements in the moulds, or other apparatus for making paper.

1828            George Dickinson, an English paper-manufacturer, obtained a patent for improvements in papermaking machinery, which came into extensive use. The lateral shaking motion of the wire-web in the Fourdrinier machine, as originally made, was injurious to the fabric of the paper, by bringing its fibres more closely together breadthwise than lengthwise, thus tending to produce long ribs or thick streaks in its substance. This he proposed to obviate by giving a rapid up and down movement to the travelling web of pulp. A similar contrivance was introduced by Mr. Donkin, in which the vibrations were actuated in a much more mechanical way.

1828            Elisha Hayden Collier, of Plymouth county, Mass., obtained a patent for the invention of a mode of manufacturing paper from a marine production, called ulva marina.

1828            Moses Y. Beach, of Springfield, Mass., invented a machine for cutting rags in the manufacture of paper, for which he obtained a patent.

1828            Victor Odent, of Courtalin, in France, obtained a patent for a machine to manufacture paper with economy and ease.

1828            Prof. Cowper, of England, obtained a patent for a paper-cutting machine. As other machines were introduced, his ingenious arrangement ceased to be used except as a model for others to improve upon.

1828            Richard Waterman and George W. Annis, of Providence, R. I., obtained a patent for a mode of making double paper. It consisted in bringing a sheet previously formed in contact with the stuff on the felt, and passing both between the press rollers. They claimed that any number of thicknesses might be treated in that way successfully.

1828            T. B. Crompton and Enoch Miller obtained a patent for cutting the endless web of paper lengthwise, by revolving circular blades, fixed upon a roller parallel to a cylinder, round which the paper was lapped, and progressively unwound.

1828            This 21st November, says Cobbett, I have not only received a parcel of paper made of the husks of my corn, but have sent it to have printed on it the title page of this very book (Treatise on Corn).

1828            April 16. The paper-mill of (Joss & Reed, at Montpelier, Vt., took fire while the workmen were at breakfast, and was damaged to the extent of about $3000: partly insured.

1828            A paper-mill was erected at Camden, Maine, by Ebenezer Barrett and John Swann, at a cost of $5000. They manufactured $40 worth of paper a day. It was burnt in 1841.

1828            Cyprian Prosper Brard, of Frejus, in France, obtained a patent for a mode of making paper from decayed wood, which was converted into pulp, and mixed with old waste paper.

1828            Mason Hunting, of Watertown, Mass., obtained a patent for an improved top-press roller, by means of which paper of any thickness might be made by a single and simple operation.

1828            A patent was taken out in France by Bernadotte and others, for a mode of making paper of animal substances, called aporentype.

1828            A mode of sizing, glazing and beautifying paper was patented in England, which consisted of the use of a fluid compound of alkalis dissolved in water with beeswax and alum.

1828            Marsden Haddock, of New York, obtained a patent for a machine to manufacture paper in the sheet by the dipping process. It seems to have been a mode of dipping faster than by the old hand process.

1829            William Debit, of East Hartford, Ct., obtained a patent for a machine for cleansing rags and preparing them for use in the manufacture of paper.

1829            Feb. A paper-mill at Milton, Vt, owned by Ayers, and occupied by Wellington & Hunting, was totally consumed by fire at night. The loss was computed at $5000, on which there was an insurance of $2800.

1829            John Dickinson, an English paper-manufacturer, obtained a patent for a new improvement in the method of manufacturing paper by machinery, and also a new method of cutting paper and other materials into single sheets or pieces by means of machinery. He also announced an improvement in the manufacture of paper, which consisted of introducing cotton, flaxen, or silken thread, web, or lace, into the paper, in such a way as to form the inner part.

1829 J         John W. Cooper, of Washington township, obtained a patent for an improvement in the art of making white paper from rags of cotton, linen or silk, be their colours ever so various, and of extracting from all kinds of rags all kinds of mineral colours, &c, &c.

1829            Rondeaux & Henn patented in France a process of making paper from leather cuttings, mixed with refuse paper. (See 1790.)

1829            Messrs. Sprague, paper-makers at Fredonia, New York, obtained a patent for a mode of making paper from husks of Indian corn. Their process was, to 128 gallons of water, put 10 quarts of good lime, or 6 pounds of good alkalis, and 110 pounds of clean corn husks or flag leaves; heat over a moderate fire two hours, when they will be ready for the engine.

1829            Louis Bomeisler, of Philadelphia, obtained a patent for making from straw, white and handsome writing paper. From 120 pounds of straw, after the knobs were cut off, he claimed that he could produce 100 pounds of pulp, which would make fine, white and handsome writing paper, not before known or used.

1829            Isaac Saunderson, of Milton, Mass., obtained a patent for improvements in the cylinder machine, which obviated the defect of cylinder-made paper, the inequality of its strength when tried lengthwise and across, in consequence of the greater number of fibres running in one direction than the other, and a consequent want of that perfect interlocking which takes place upon mould-made paper. To effect this improvement he introduced a horizontal whirl-wheel, and sheet-forming rollers, by which he was enabled to manufacture press papers, pasteboard, and bandbox paper.

1829            Reuben Fairchild, of Trumbull, Ct., obtained a patent for an improvement in the mode of manufacturing paper, the object of which was to obviate the defect in the paper made upon cylinder machines, in its being easily torn in one direction, in consequence of the fibres being mostly arranged longitudinally with the length of the sheet. The improvement was effected by what was called an agitator, a semi-cylindrical cradle of metal lying in the vat, and vibrating in the direction of the length of the cylinder. Culver & Cole, of Massachusetts, applied at the same time for a patent for a machine identical in principle with the above, but afterwards arranged a mutual ownership.

1829            The excise duty on paper in England amounted to £728,000.

1829            M. Jullien patented in France a mode of manufacturing paper from hay; also a process of colouring paper.

1829            Paper was obtained from the maguey in Mexico, equal to that made of rags; and congress passed a law prohibiting the government from using any other paper.

1829            Quirini obtained a patent in France for the production of paper from straw and refuse pasteboard.

1829            The paper-makers of Turin, during this and the previous year, produced various qualities of paper from willow twigs, poplar, &c, which were extensively used. Schaffers had made the same experiment more than sixty years earlier. (See 17G5, 1772.)

1829            The French paper-makers sought for the Fourdrinier paper-machine in England alone, and a French author makes the following painful acknowledgment for his countrymen : ” La construction de ces machines, qui n’offre pourtant rien de difficile, est restée jusqu’à ce jour exclusivement dans les mains des Anglaise.”

1829            It is stated that a French paper-machine was introduced into Windham, Conn., which is now used in the best mills in that state.

1829            Thomas Cobb, of England, obtained a patent for a mode of manufacturing tinted paper and embossing during the process of making, by pressing the pulp between rollers or plates, engraved with suitable devices. He claimed to have invented a mode of producing an embossed surface, giving a beautiful effect to papers coloured in the pulp, and not stained after the paper is made, as usual with paper-hangings; and by which also silks, velvets, or other coloured goods could be put upon the surface of paper, and when embossed produce a rich and beautiful appearance.

1829            There were about 60 paper-mills Bu Massachusetts, six of which had machines. They were all supposed to consume about 1700 tons of rags, &c, and produced about $700,000 worth of paper in a year.

1829            M. Montgolfier introduced a new fabric called papier linge, for table-cloths and hangings, which was said to be as soft to the touch as the finest Silesian linen but sold at Lyons for the price of mere paper. They were made in imitation of silk, or stamped with the most graceful arabesques, and sold at four and five sous the French yard.

1829            Straw paper was used for packing Nile’s Weekly Register, which circulated to the remotest parts of the country, and was regarded as the best paper then made for that purpose, and was cheap. It was manufactured at Chambersburgh, Pa., at less than $2 a ream, imperial size, and was machine-made.

1829            It was estimated that the quantity of paper manufactured in the United States amounted to nearly seven millions of dollars, and employed more than ten thousand persons. The quantity of rags and paperstock saved annually was computed to be two millions of dollars in value.

1830            A French writer states that at this time the English introduced a mode of sizing their paper, which gave it a great advantage over the French; that the house of Lacroix, however, soon acquired the process, which was in vogue as long as the manufacture by hand was continued. It was about this time that the struggle began in competition with machinery, and the victory of the latter was not decided until some years, to such perfection had the hand process attained. The French seem to have introduced sizing before this time. (See 1827).

1830            M. Brand, a French officer, made successful experiments in producing coarse paper from the pine tree, an account of which was published in the Courier Francaise of Nov. 27, 1830, issued in New York city.

1830            At Whitehall mill, in Derbyshire, England, a sheet of paper was manufactured which measured 13,800 feet in length, and 4 feet in breadth.

1830            At the custom house in London, a duty of £2,200 was levied on rags; £1,400 on superior kinds of papers for artists; and £701,000 upon paper.

1830            Wooster & Holmes of Meadville Pa., obtained a patent for an improvement in the mode of making paper from wood, by which one hundred pounds of wood should be productive of from five to seven reams of paper, according to their estimates.

1830            Joseph E. Holmes and Lewis Wooster, of Ohio, manufactured paper of the lime and aspen, upon which an edition of the Crawford Messenger was printed. They also made wrapping paper and book board of superior quality. They had a process of reducing wood to shavings with great rapidity. But Magaw, who had obtained a patent for making paper of “straw and other vegetable substances,” claimed that their use of alkalis was an infringement of his patent, and the process was abandoned.

1830            Richard Ibotson, of England, invented an apparatus for separating the knots from paper-stuff, which the sieves or strainers in use were inadequate to do effectually. It superseded the operation of picking the lumps from paper after it was made, which caused much damaged paper, and freed it from imperfections that caused serious damage to types and wood cuts.

1830            About this time Messrs. Phelps & Spafford, of Connecticut, succeeded in constructing paper-machines which did good execution.

1830            Ephraim F. and Thomas Blank, of the city of New York, obtained a patent for a composition called leather paper. The art consisted of making paper from the refuse shavings or parings of leather, adapted to sheathing vessels. The process was the same as with rags.

1830            S. Aimes’s paper-mills near Philadelphia, were destroyed by fire (May 10).

1830            Mr. Sanderson, owner of a mill at Milton, Mass., manufactured binders’ boards from three different kinds of salt grass, which grew in abundance near his mill; for which he obtained a patent.

1830            John Hall obtained a patent in England for a modification of Dickinson’s cylinder-mould continuous paper-machine, communicated to him by a foreigner. The leading feature of the invention was a mode of supplying the vat in which the wire cylinder is immersed, with a copious flow of water, for the purpose of creating a considerable pressure upon the external surface of the cylinder, and thereby causing the fibres of the paper-pulp to adhere to the mould.

1830            John Wilks, an English machinist, improved the Fourdrinier machine by adding a perforated roller to facilitate the escape of the water from the pulp-web, previously to its being subjected to the pressing rollers, which was denominated a dandy.

1830            John Dickinson, of England, patented a mode of making paper in two layers or strata, which were brought together on the second cylinder, and formed into a single substance, a mode chiefly advantageous in producing thick paper.

1830            A patent was granted to Thomas & Woodcock, of Brattleboro’, Vt., for an improvement in the manufacture of paper by means of a machine called a pulp-dresser.

1830            Thomas Gilpin, of Philadelphia, obtained a patent for an improvement in the mode of finishing paper, which consisted of calenders, or cylinders between which the paper passed to give it a polished surface.

1830            Thomas Barratt, an English paper-maker, obtained a patent for inserting the water-mark and maker’s name to continuous paper, so as to resemble in every respect paper made by hand. It is to this ingenious man that we are indebted for the improved means of finishing paper, owing to the perfection he attained in making cast iron rollers truer than was possible by the old mode of turning them in a lathe. This consists in grinding the rollers together, allowing merely a small stream of water to flow over them, without emery or any other grinding material; and by continuing the operation for many weeks, true cylinders are obtained. This is the mode now adopted in finishing rollers for all purposes requiring great accuracy.

1831            Jean Jaques Jaquier obtained a patent for making continuous paper with wire marks, similar to the laid papers usually made by hand; to which the preference was still given for their greater strength and peculiar appearance.

1831            Frederick A. Taft, of Dedham, Mass., patented an improvement in making pasteboard or other paper intended for sheathing.

1831            The Annsville paper-mill, owned by Gen. Pierre Van Courtlandt, of Westchester co., N. Y., and occupied by Mr. Ritter, was destroyed by fire on the 15th March, with a loss of §3000, and no insurance.

1831            May 10. The steam paper-mill at Cleveland, Ohio, occupied by J. Kellogg, was destroyed by fire. The loss was estimated at $7000; no insurance.

1831            The Franklin Repository, printed at Chambersburg, Pa., announced that there was being erected in that borough, a mill-house 150 feet long by 50 wide, and three stories high, in which it was contemplated to place eight machines, for the manufacture of straw paper, to go into operation the following spring.

1831            Edward Pine, of Troy, patented a machine for cutting paper made by cylinder machines, while it was wet.

1831            George Carvil, of Manchester, Ct., obtained a patent for a mode of cleaning rags. His apparatus was a common screen, with or without pins and knives, having wings composed of thin pieces of wood or metal, affixed upon its outside, extending from end to end, in order to create a wind by their motion.

1831            An impetus was now given to the manufacture of paper in the United States, by the recent introduction of machinery, and changes in the mode of manufacture, as well as the materials used. Old junk, rope, hemp, tow, bagging, raw cotton, cotton waste,, coloured and filthy rags, and other materials which had previously only been used in the making of coarser papers, were gradually brought into use for the finest grades, by the introduction of chlorine and other means of cleansing and bleaching, until they had risen 300 percent in value.

1831            E. N. Fourdrinier invented a very ingenious apparatus for cutting the web of paper transversely into any desired lengths, which performed its duty well.

1831            Mr. Turner, an English paper-maker, obtained a patent for a peculiar strainer, designed to arrest the lumps mixed with the finer paper-pulp, whereby he can dispense with the usual vat and hog in which the pulp is agitated immediately before it is floated upon the endless wire web of the Fourdrinier apparatus. It could also be applied advantageously to hand paper machines.

1831            The chiffonniers, or rag-collectors, of Paris, rose against the police because it was ordered in certain municipal regulations, that the filth of the streets should be taken away in carts, without time being allowed for its examination by those diligent savers of capital.

1831            John Ames, of Springfield, Mass., introduced a wire cloth cylinder for carrying off the dirt and filth which is beaten from the rags in the engine, as a substitute for the screens or washers then in use.

1831            There were about 600 persons engaged in the manufacture of paper in Ireland.

1832            James Sawyer, of Newbury, Vt., took out a patent for a machine for cleansing paper, called the piston pulp-strainer, which differed in its mode of action from that of Thomas L. Woodcock.

1832            Francis Goucher, of Pennsylvania, made an improvement in the machinery for washing pulp, for which he took out a patent.

1832            April 14. The paper manufactory of Taft, in Dedham, Mass., was burnt.

1832            Samuel Foster, of Brattleboro’, Vt., introduced a machine for cleaning and dusting rags.

1832            Nearly 12,000 quintals of paper were imported into Germany to supply the deficiency of its manufacture.

1832            Thomas French, of Ithaca, patented a filtering machine, which was designed to supersede the pulp dresser.

1832            John Ames, of Springfield, Mass., obtained a patent for an improvement in the mode of sizing paper by machinery, and for a pulp-dresser.

1832            M. Goumar received a medal of 200 francs value for a mode of neutralizing the acid in paper used for lithographic work. He simply passed it through lime water.

1832            The excise duty on paper in England had increased nearly ,£100,000 in three years, being £815000.

1832            It was said by the New York Journal of Commerce, that the improvements of paper-machinery had been so great in five years, that though they used a sheet a quarter larger, it cost them a quarter less money.

1832            Henry Brewer of England modified the parallel rod-strainer of Mr. Ibotson, by constructing square boxes with gridiron bottoms, giving a powerful up and down vibration in the pulp-tub, by levers, rotary shafts and cranks.

1832            Joseph Amies, an English paper-maker, improved the paper-machine by a peculiar mode of constructing the bottom of a strainer or sieve for arresting the knots and lumps in pulp.

1832            Jarvis & French, of Tompkins county, N Y., invented a mode of pressing paper by passing it between two hollow metallic rollers, which was used at the Falls Creek mill at Ithaca, by which the quality of the paper was improved and much labour saved.

1832            The manufacture of paper in the United States was estimated at $7,000,000 per annum, of which $3,500,000 was paid for rags, and $1,200,000 for labour. The price of paper had declined from 20 to 25 per cent, while the quality had advanced in about the same ratio.

1832            Coleman Sellers, of Philadelphia, obtained a patent for a pulp-dresser, for separating knobs and all gross particles from pulp.

1832            Mr. Towgood, of England, patented a papercutting machine, which dispensed with the reel and cut the paper as it came from the steam cylinders.

1832            Frederick A. Taft, of Dedham, Mass., obtained a patent for paper designed for covering buildings. He mixed finely ground coal and sulphur in the pulp, and added salt and lime to render it less combustible.

1832            Samuel E. Foster, of Brattleboro’, Vt., patented a mode of cleaning paper-makers’ felts. They were passed over a perforated roller filled with water or steam.

1832            The paper-mill erected at Martinsburgh, K Y. (see 1807), fell into ruin. It manufactured writing, wrapping and wall paper by the hand process, having no machinery but an engine for grinding.

1833            Henry Davy, of England, patented a rag-cutting and lacerating machine, the invention of a foreigner which consisted of an endless feeding cloth, which conducted the rough rags to a pair of feed rollers, on passing through which they were subjected to the operation of rotary cutters ; thence passed down an inclined sieve, upon which they were agitated to separate the dust.

1833            The value of paper exported from France was 5,323,261 francs.

1833            Feb. The paper-mill of Wiswall & Flagg in Exeter, N. H., was destroyed by fire with all its contents. The loss was estimated at more than $12,000, of which only $1000 was insured.

1833            A dinner was given by a Dublin printer to a large number of persons who had exerted themselves for the preservation of his premises from fire on a previous occasion, when the table was covered by a sheet of paper 125 feet long and 5 feet wide.

1833            Nov. 2. The paper-mill of Messrs. Laflin in Lee, Mass., was destroyed by fire, and $20,000 loss sustained.

1833            M. Tripot, of France, patented a process of manufacturing paper from seaweeds.

1833            Howland & Griswold patented a mode of applying the shearings or flocks of cloth, taken from the same in the manufacture thereof, for the purpose of covering the surfaces of papers, muslin, linen, leather and wood, for useful and ornamental purposes.

1833            Sydney A. Sweet, of Tyringham, Mass., invented a pulp-sifter, which was simply a sieve with a slight modification of similar machines.

1833            The Penny Magazine of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, in London, consumed 14,000 reams of paper a year. This required the constant working of two machines through the year. At the same time a paper-mill with one machine was held to carry on a notable business, requiring the labour of forty workmen.

1833            Edmund Blake, of Alstead, N. H., invented an apparatus for sizing paper in the sheet, without handling it in the usual manner, thereby preventing the liability to tear, and facilitating the operation by sizing a much larger portion at once than could be done in the way ordinarily pursued.

1834            Of an edition of 30,000 copies of a book published in England in 1818, it was said that not a perfect copy existed ; all of them having fallen to pieces owing to the process of excessive bleaching with chlorine, in manufacturing the paper.

1834            The quantity of paper annually manufactured in Great Britain during the five years ending with 1834, was 70,988,131 pounds.

1834            Clark Rice, of Watertown, N. Y., made an improvement in the washers for paper engines, which consisted in the peculiar manner in which the vellum or wire cloth is kept free from rags or pulp, in the various stages of washing and in which the egress of water is accomplished.

1834            A French inventor patented a mode of producing paper from the leaves of trees and the ligaments of asparagus. It was of no utility whatever.

1834            John Ames, of Springfield, Mass., invented an apparatus for cutting machine-paper into sheets of any required length, as it comes from the drying cylinders. He at the same time patented machinery for cutting or trimming paper in the ream, which was said to have been an old and well known contrivance.

1834            Writing paper was introduced in England, which, by means of a chemical operation it underwent, became perfectly black where it was touched with a fluid. On writing with a pen dipped in water, a legible character was produced.

1834            Joseph Truman, of Bridgeport, Pa., conceived a mode of preventing the fibres, in the manufacture of paper, from arranging themselves in one direction, as they were inclined to do. He did not seem to know what had already been done to obviate that difficulty by the agitator.

1834            A book was published this year in Sweden, the paper of which was made entirely of beet root. The paper was strong and durable, but not of a fine texture, nor white in appearance. Paper was also manufactured in that country at the same time, of husks and of Russia matting.

1834            There were about a dozen paper-machines in operation in France at this time, mostly constructed in England. They were henceforth to afford the only mode of manufacturing paper which could be pursued without loss ; before which the ancient system of handwork was rapidly to disappear.

1834            May. The paper-mills at Newtown Lower Falls, owned by Lyons, were burnt. Loss estimated at $50,000.

1834            The net produce of the duty on first and second class paper in England this year was £718,043; of which only £101,023 was from second class paper.

1835            In November, the mills of Brown, Tower & Co., in Hampden, Me., were destroyed by fire; loss $20,000; no insurance.

1835            Paper was made in Ireland from peat, but was of inferior quality.

1835            Haiti exported 31,192 pounds of rags.

1835            William Debit, of Hartford, Ct., improved the common duster by a combination with it of a shaft and knives and beaters.

1835            The Tibetans had a process of reworking old paper made from the bark of the sultarua, which, however, was inferior to the paper of the Hindus, made of the same material.

1835            The home duty on paper in England was recommended to be reduced one-half, and that it be fixed at l½d per pound on all descriptions of first and second class paper; and that the duties on pasteboard should be reduced in like manner; and that mill-boards, glazed paper for clothiers, and hot-pressers, sheathing paper and button-paper, and button-board, paying a duty of ,£1: 1s. per cwt. should be placed on the same footing as pasteboard, and be subject to a like duty of 14s. per hundred weight.

1835            John Ames, of Springfield, Mass., took out a patent for an improvement in the machinery for manufacturing paper, which seems to have been the manner of applying a drying cylinder to the machines in use.

1835            The quantity of paper manufactured in England was 70,655,287 pounds, on which the government duty was £838,822.

1835            The royal printing office at Paris consumed about three hundred reams of paper a day, nearly a hundred thousand reams a year.

1835            There were 750 paper-mills in operation in England, and the annual value of paper manufactured is stated by McCulloch as high as £6,000,000. Paper was burdened with an excise duty amounting to more than three times as much as the total wages of the workmen employed in making it, and the quantity annually produced did not exceed 50,000,000 pounds of first class, and 16,000,000 of second class paper, requiring a supply of about 100,000,000 pounds of rags.

1836            James Brown, of Esk Mills, near Edinburgh, adopted a new contrivance for rarefying the air under the web of the paper-machine, by using a rectangular box transversely beneath the horizontal wire-cloth without the interposition of any perforated covering.

1836            Robert Pose’s administrator, of East Hartford, Ct, patented an improvement in the paper-machine, which consisted of a mode of sustaining the web of wire in a slanting position, so as to form the end and in part the bottom of the vat containing the stuff, which by draining through the web was properly deposited on the web for the formation of the paper.

1836            The quantity of paper charged with duties of excise in the United Kingdom was 82,145,287 pounds, and 8,032,577 yards of paper-hangings. The amount of duty was £812,782.

1837            April 17. The paper-mill of Peabody, Daniel & Co., at Franklin, N. H., was destroyed by fire. Loss $20,000; insurance $8000.

1837            June 16. The paper-mill of Carleton & Co., at Shirley, Mass., was destroyed by fire; loss estimated at $25,000 ; insured $16,000.

1837            The paper-mill of Mr. Buddington, at Hotchkisstown, near New Haven, was destroyed by fire, Sept. 9; loss about $8000.

1837            Edmund Shaw, of London, claimed to have made an improvement in the manufacture of paper, by the application of a certain vegetable substance not before used for that purpose. This was none other than the husks and stalks of Indian corn. He was aware that some attempts had been made to produce paper from these materials, and also that they were abandoned because of the failure to produce good white paper from them.

1837            John Ames, of Springfield, Mass., patented a machine for sizing paper, without the use of feltings or jackets.

1838            The gross amount of paper-duty in Great Britain for the year, ending on the 5th January, was £554,497.

1838            J. V. Degrand, of London, obtained a patent for a certain pulpy product or material for manufacturing paper and pasteboard. He claimed to use only white woods, such as poplars, and excluded every possible bark or epidermis.

1838            Homer Holland, Westfield, Mass., obtained a patent for preparing the fibrous portion of corn husks, so as to be a suitable base for paper. His patent was for a process of macerating the husks in a solution of carbonated alkali, and then rendering the alkali caustic by adding the hydrate of lime, leaving the fibre strong and capable of being perfectly bleached.

1838            M. De Breza, of Paris, invented a chemical compound for rendering paper and other substances indestructible by fire, and for preserving them from the ravages of insects.

1838            The paper-mill of Messrs R. L. Underhill & Co., at Urbana, N. Y., was destroyed by fire; loss $32 000; insurance $2000. The owner of the building lost $4000; insured $2000. Mr. Underhill had been burnt out twice before within a twelve month.

1838            May 23. The paper-mill of E. Camp in Jefferson county, N. Y., was destroyed by fire. It was new and had been in operation but a short time. The loss was about $8000, no insurance.

1888            June 22. The paper-mill of A Bradley & Sons in Dansville, N. Y., was burnt. It was nearly new, having been in operation but little more than a year, and cost $20,000 in its construction. There was an insurance of $10,500.

1838            The quantity of paper imported into the United States during this year was $164,179 ; the quantity exported $94,335. The import of rags was $465,448.

1839            The import of paper into the United States amounted to $186,418; the export was $80,146. The import of rags was $588,318.

1839            Henry Crosby of London, obtained a patent for manufacturing paper from refuse tan (after it had been used for tanning, or any other purpose in which the fibre had not been destroyed), and hops. The latter substance was only used in combination with the tan (a species of bark) when it retained its fibre. These substances, when combined, were treated the same as rags. The claim of the invention was to the combination and products.

1839            Mr. T. B. Crompton, of England, succeeded in producing a uniform rarefaction under the wire-cloth of the paper-machine, by means of a fan.

1839            At the French exhibition of this year were specimens of paper made of the leaves of the banana tree and similar plants, but the experiments showed great waste in converting them into paper. With a view of reducing the cost of carriage by freeing the substances from foreign matter, M. Rocques established powerful works at Havana, to wash and convert them into pulp for the European markets ; but even in this state the absolute necessity of strong bleaching caused a waste of more than one-third of the original weight.

1840            The number of paper-mills in England was computed to be 700; nearly 80 in Scotland, and an inconsiderable number in Ireland. About 27,000 individuals were supposed to be engaged in the trade in the United Kingdom, producing about ,£1,200,000 worth of paper.

1840            The paper-mill of Phelps & Field, of Lee, Mass., was destroyed by fire, Nov. 27. But a small part of the machinery was saved ; loss $20,000; insurance $15,000.

1840            Dec. 10. The Eagle paper-mill of Peter Simmons, at Chatham, Col. co., N. Y.,was burnt, with all its contents.

1840            There were 13 paper manufactories in New Hampshire, employing 111 workmen, producing $258,600 worth of paper annually, and having a capital of $104,300 invested.

1840            The development of paper-making in Russia is said scarcely to have taken place before this time; (see 1785); that the Russians entered upon the fabrication of paper long after they had been engaged in other manufactures. (See 1712.)

1840            Lagrange Bull, of Martinique, made known the invention of a paper-pulp which was manufactured from the leaves of the banana tree.

1840            The quantity of paper imported by the United States this year was $146,790; the export $76,957. The import of rags was $564,580.

1840            Nothing, says Dr. Ure, can place the advantage of the Fourdrinier machine in a stronger point of view than the fact of there being 280 of them now at work in the United Kingdom, making collectively 1600 miles of paper, of from four to five feet broad, every day; that they have lowered the price of paper fifty per cent, and that they have increased the revenue, directly and indirectly by a sum of probably .£400,000 per annum.

1841            The rags used in the manufacture of writing paper in Great Britain were collected at home. But those used in the manufacture of the best printing paper were imported principally from Italy, Hamburg, and the Austrian States, by the way of Trieste.

1841            Feb. 12. The paper-mill of M. Safer, near Raleigh, N. C, was accidentally burnt. Loss $6000.

1841            March 10. The paper-mill of Henry Church & Co., at Rochester, N. Y., was burnt.

1841            Barrett & Swann’s paper-mill at Camden, Me., was destroyed by fire.

1841            The United States imported paper this year to the amount of $60,193; and of rags $496,227. The export of paper was $83,483.

1842            Mar. 3. The paper-mill at Fall creek, Ithaca, owned by Mack, Andrus & Woodruff, was destroyed by fire; loss about $8,000, insured $8,100.

1842            June 6. The paper-mill of Charles Perham, Groton, Mass., was burnt. Loss $16,000; insured $8,000. The fire was occasioned by the friction of the machinery.

1842            Oct. The paper-mill of William T. Parker, at Sudbury, Mass., was burnt.

1842            The importations of paper into the United States amounted to $92,771; and $408,280 of rags. The export of paper was $69,862.

1842            There were 356 paper machines employed in the mills of Great Britain and Ireland, having 372 vats.

1843            James Phelps, of West Sutton, Mass., made improvements in the washing machine, which consisted of an adjustable, rotating water elevator and strainer, which could be raised or lowered in the vat of the washing or beating engine. Also a rotating prismatic screen, or strainer, for straining the water from the paper-stock, in the vat of a washing or beating engine, in combination with devices for discharging the strained water, being not only more efficient than a cylindrical screen, but also admitting of more ready repair.

1843            The number of machines employed in the paper-mills of England, Ireland, and Scotland, was 367, requiring 362 vats.

1843            The United States imported paper amounting to $19,997; and exported $51,391; the import of rags $79,853: a great diminution in the annual business of these articles, owing to the enforcement of a new duty upon rags, which affected the paper trade also.

1843            The English, although they made a sufficient quantity of most sorts of paper for their own use, and exported annually about ,£100,000 worth of books, still continued to import certain descriptions of paper for engravings, from France, and a small supply of paper-hangings; the duty on both of which amounted to about £2800 a year.

1844            There were 600 paper-mills in operation in the United States, giving active use to a capital of $10,000,000, manufacturing at least a sum equal to its capital per annum, and affording maintenance to at least 50,000 persons.

1844            Roberts’s paper-mill at Weston, Mass., was burnt. Loss $6000; insured $1000.

1844            The paper-mill of Messrs. Sharpless, Huskins & Wallace, on Bedstone creek, Fayette county, Pa., was destroyed by fire. Loss estimated at $20,000. October. 28.

1844            The amount of paper imported into the United States was $104,648, and of rags $295,586. The export of paper was $83,108.

1844            The paper-mills of England, Scotland and Ireland employed 370 machines, and 359 vats.

1844            The German Zollverein imported annually about 8000 thalers worth of gray blotting and packing paper, and exported papers of finer qualities, to the amount of more than 256,000 thalers.

1845            The quantity of rags consumed in the United States was estimated to amount to $6,000,000.

1845            There were 89 paper mills in Massachusetts which consumed annually 15,886 tons of stock, producing 607,175 reams of paper, valued at $1,750,200, and employing 1369 workmen.

1845            The amount of paper imported into the United States was $98,000 ; the export $106,190. The import of rags amounted to $421,080.

1845            The number of paper-mills in Austria having machines was 40 ; the number working by the old process was 940. The total product was 314,000 quintals, selling at an average of 13 cents a pound. The number of persons employed was 12,000, besides rag-sorters. 1845. P. A. Brooman, of London, obtained a patent for producing paper from gutta percha, and an intermixture of other substances. The fibre of the gutta percha tree is said to be very strong.

1845            The quantity of paper charged with duties of excise in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, was 124,247,071 lbs. The exports amounted to 4,864,185 lbs.

1846            The import of paper into the United States this year was $194,220; of rags $385,397, being 3.89 cts per pound. The export of paper was $122,597.

1846            The Thuringian States of Germany had 41 paper-mills, with 53 vats, and employing 274 persons.

1846            E. F. Vidocq, of Paris, secured a patent for obtaining paper, by the usual process, from a combination of leather cuttings, scraps, &c, hemp, cotton, wool, oakum, and other substances.

1846            There were in Prussia 394 paper-mills, employing 6,393 workmen, and having 503 vats and 72 paper-machines.

1846            Bavaria had 176 paper-mills, with 257 vats and 11 machines, giving employment to 1884 workmen.

1846            The number of paper-mills in Saxony was 66, having 68 vats, and 6 machines, giving employment to 997 workmen.

1846            There were in the Grand Duchy of Hesse 21 paper-mills, employing 170 workmen ; having 18 vats and 1 paper-machine.

1846            The Electorate of Hesse, belonging to the Zollverein, had 28 paper-mills, having 39 vats and 6 machines, giving employment to 299 workmen.

1846            Baden in Germany had 32 paper-mills, having 33 vats and 14 machines, and employing 624 workmen.

1846            Nassau in Germany employed 196 persons in the manufacture of paper; having 27 mills, with 30 vats and 6 machines.

1846            The annual imports of paper by the German Zollverein was upwards of 9,000 Prussian dollars; the exports $270,589. The exports were mostly fine papers, and the imports were of the coarser qualities.

1846            Genoa exported 1,178 tons of paper to Mexico, Spain, and the Brazils.

1846            The quantity of rags imported into the United States from all countries was 9,837,706 lbs., of which 8,002,865 lbs. came from Italy. The aggregate value was $385,397, or 3.89 per pound. (See p. 85.)

1846            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 127,412,482 lbs., of which 4,836,556 pounds were exported. The paper-mills of those countries employed 384 machines and 378 vats.

1846            Dec. The Hollister paper-mills, at Windsor Locks, Conn., were burnt. Loss $12,000; insured for $8000.

1846            May 23. The paper-mill of Mr. Craig at Fondasbush, Montgomery county, N,Y., was burnt. The loss was $4000; insurance $1000.

1847            August 6. David Ames died at Springfield, Mass., aged 87. He was a manufacturer of paper more than half a century, and was the first to introduce modern improvements. He was a man of great enterprise, for some time held the office of superintendent of the United States armoury under the government, and was actively engaged in business until a very short period before his death.

1847            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 121,965,315 lbs., of which 5,852,979 pounds were exported. This gave employment to 405 machines, with 373 vats.

1847            The paper-machine had been so universally introduced into all the new, as well as the old vat-mills in the United States, that there were now only two mills of any note engaged in making paper by hand, and those were employed in producing particular sorts, requiring great strength and firmness.

1847            Denmark imported about 300 tons of paper from Belgium, France, and other countries.

1847            The Netherlands imported chiefly from Belgium and the Zollverein, 219 tons of paper valued at $7,167,60. The importation of rags was 700 pounds only. The exportation of paper the same year was 148 tons; principally to Java. The exportation of rags was only 1200 pounds.

1847            There were 66 paper-mills in the kingdom of Saxony, with 6 machines, employing 992 persons. The exports and imports were trifling.

1847            The proprietors of the New Orleans Bulletin announced that they printed their paper on an article manufactured by themselves, at a mill in the third municipality, which they believed to be the only successful attempt to manufacture paper so far south.

1847            The quantity of paper manufactured in the United States at this time was computed at 18 millions of dollars in value per annum.

1847            Two paper-mills were erected in Georgia this year, an event which the editor of the Savannah Republican remarked, that a few years before he despaired of living long enough to see.

1847            The quantity of rags imported into the United States this year was 8,154,886 lbs, of which 6,519,234lbs. came from Italy; the aggregate value was $304,216, being 3.73 cents per pound; of paper $195,571. The export of paper was $88,731.

1847            The quantity of paper imported into Denmark this year was 334,000 kilogrammes, paying $13,020 duties.

1848            The import of rags from Denmark was 53,290 pounds, amounting to $1,614.

1848            The United States imported paper amounting to $415,668; and of rags $626,607. The quantity imported from all countries was 17,014,587 pounds, of which 13,803,036 pounds came from Italy; the average price per pound was 3.68 cents. The export of paper was $78,507.

1848            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 121,820,229 pounds, of which 5,180,286 pounds were exported. The number of machines employed was 407, with 367 vats.

1848            Zenas M. Crane, of Dalton, Mass., obtained a patent for an improvement in machinery for cutting paper. Patents were also obtained for the same purpose by George L. Wright, of Springfield, Mass.; by Mark Wilder, of Peterborough, N. H.; by J. G. Kneeland and George M. Phelps, of Troy, N. Y.; and Alonzo Gilman of Troy, N Y.

1848            The importation of paper in Hamburg was of the estimated value of $239,568.

1848            Leghorn exported rags and paper amounting to 30,000 pounds, about half to England, and the other half to the United States.

1848            Sardinia produced paper which amounted in value to $2,400,000, none of which was exported.

1848            Spain exported 140,000 reams of paper, to the following countries: Cuba, 94,000 reams; Chile, 16,000 reams; Porto Rico 10,000 reams; to other countries, 20,000 reams.

1849            There were 74 paper-manufacturers in Belgium, employing 1893 persons ; 22 steam engines of 254 horse power in the aggregate ; 2 horse mills of 2 horses each; 68 water mills, and 7 wind mills. The United States imported paper from Belgium to the amount of 19,950 francs.

1849            W. Brindley obtained a patent in England for a mode of rendering paper water-proof. This was accomplished by saturating the web of paper as it passed from the machine, with linseed oil, and subjecting it to a high temperature until dried, by which it was rendered impervious to water.

1849            Grimpe & Colas, of France, invented paper for bank notes, which was intended to defy fraud and forgery. A committee of the Academy of Sciences had encouraged rival artists to make all possible experiments to test the infallibility of the paper, and no effort was spared to the accomplishment of that end, but without avail.

1849            An Englishman invented a method of splitting paper. The Bank of England sent him a one pound note, much worn, to test his skill. He returned it in two sections.

1849            The United States imported paper this year to the amount of $395,773; and of rags $524,755. The quantity imported from Italy was 11,009,6G8 lbs.; the aggregate quantity brought from all countries was 14,941,236 lbs., at an average of 2.51. The exports were $86,827.

1849            The export of paper from Belgium amounted to £36,040.

1849            France exported paper-hangings to the United States, to the amount of 214,000 lbs.; and imported upwards of 1,020,000 pounds of rags. The total export of paper was over 9,250,000 pounds.

1849            Messrs. Chambers of Edinburgh, petitioned parliament for a removal or reduction of the excise duty on paper, which was especially severe on low-priced books.

1849            The importations of rags and other materials into Belgium for the manufacture of paper, amounted to only 14½ tons. Their exportations of paper were about $12,000.

1849            Amos & Clarke obtained a patent in England for a strainer used in the paper machine.

] 849            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 132,132,660 pounds, of which 5,966,319 pounds were exported.

1849            Messrs. Amos & Clarke, of England, patented a paper-cutting machine, which obviated the difficulty that grew out of the increased velocity of the machines, by which the sheets were cut into irregular lengths.

1849            The number of paper-machines employed in the mills of England, Scotland, and Ireland, was 406, with 353 vats.

1849            The exports of rags during this year from Trieste to the United States were $9,656.

1850            The German Zollverein consumed over 1,180,000 cwts. of rags annually, in the manufacture of paper; employing 794 paper-mills, having 116 paper machines, producing annually about 36,964 tons of paper.

1850            Henry Pohl, of Paterson, N. J., improved the regulator, or pulp-meter, to measure the quantity of pulp for webs of different thicknesses.

1850            Specimens of paper were made in Algiers from the dwarf palm, which abounds in that country, and of which it was thought that four millions of quintals could be obtained every year, by causing it to be gathered by women and children, at a cost of about 18 cents a hundred pounds; which if beat into half stuff in its green state, would yield 36 per cent of its weight; and dry, 50 per cent: and that two hours beating would be sufficient to render this half stuff fit for making fine paper.

1850            M. Didot stated that there were 200 paper machines in France, producing 195 tons each per year, making a total of 39,000 tons; and 250 vats, producing over 2,000 more tons per year; being a gross amount of 41,000 tons, of all kinds of paper. A paper-machine occupied about 60 persons, and a vat 10.

1850            The export of paper and stationery from the United States to foreign countries was not less than a hundred thousand dollars.

1850            The number of paper-mills in England was 327; in Scotland, 51; in Ireland, 37. The number of beating engines in England was 1,374; in Scotland, 286; in Ireland 86. The number of machines employed was 412, with 344 vats.

1850            A German by the name of Evert, owning a large manufactory in Neustadt Elberwald, invented an incombustible and impermeable paper, which he termed stone paper, suitable for roofing houses, not easily broken, and capable of being produced at a low price. 1850. The amount of capital employed in the manufacture of paper in the United States was estimated at 18 millions of dollars; the annual product of paper, 17 millions; the number of mills, 700; the number of operatives employed, 100,000.

1850            The quantity of paper charged with excise duty manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland, was 141,052,474 pounds.

1850            The amount of duty paid on paper in England was £693,741; in Scotland, .£187,087; in Ireland, £44,090. The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 141,032,074 pounds, of which 7,702,080 pounds were exported.

1850            Great Britain imported 8,124 tons of rags, among which were 32 tons from the United States, and 23 tons from Egypt.

1850            The United States imported rags from nineteen countries. The quantity imported was 20,696,875 pounds at 3.61 cents a pound. Of these 15,861,266 pounds came from Italian and Austrian ports. The total value was $748,707. Paper was imported to the amount of $496,563.

1851            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 150,903,543 pounds, of which 8,305,590 pounds were exported. The number of machines employed in those countries was 413, with 330 vats.

1851            The United States imported rags of the value of $903,747, at 3.46 cents a pound. Of the 26,094,701 pounds imported, 18,512,673 were from Italy.

1851            There was exhibited at the World’s fair in London, a roll of paper, being a continuous sheet 2500 yards long.

1851            The export of paper and stationery from the United States was to the amount of $155,664 for the year ending June 30.

1851            It was estimated that there were produced at this time in Great Britain, 5,500,000 pieces of paperhangings, valued at £400,000.

1851            In the kingdom of the Two Sicilies there were 12 paper-machines, and 12 vats, employing 300 persons. The whole produce amounted to 306 tons annually, and paper was exported to Rome, Sicily, Leghorn, Malta, the Ionian Isles, and Greece.

1851            Messrs. Donkin & Co., of England, who perfected the Fourdrinier paper-machine, constructed their 191st machine. Of these 83 were made for Great Britain, 23 for France, 46 for Germany, 22 for the north of Europe, 14 for Italy and the south of Europe, 2 for America, and 1 for India. It was Mr. Bryan Donkin, who, as engineer, carried out the desired plans in perfecting the Fourdrinier machine, and produced, after intense application, a self-acting model, of which he afterwards constructed so many for home use and for exportation, which were perfectly successful in the manufacture of continuous paper.

1851            The quantity of paper produced in Austria was stated at 650,000 cwts. per annum. There were 900 vat-mills, and 49 mills using machines ; two-fifths of the product of paper was from the latter, which were chiefly driven by water-power.

1851            Brewer & Smith, who had made improvements in paper-moulds in England, patented the same in the United States.

1851            The paper-mill belonging to the Goodman Manufacturing Company, at South Hadley, Mass., was destroyed by fire. The company had failed a short time before, involving a loss of $20,000.

1851            There were 6 paper-machines in operation in Denmark, besides one in Holstein, and 20 vats, producing altogether about 1,312 tons per year.

1851            There were five paper-mills employing seven machines, in Sweden, and eight vat-mills.

1851            There were 17 paper-machines in operation in Spain, which were imported from England, France, and Belgium; also 250 vats. The annual produce of paper was 4,741 tons.

1851            There were 12 paper-machines and GO vats in the kingdom of Sardinia.

1851            M. Adolphe Roque, who had bestowed many years of patient investigation on the improvement of the manufacture of paper, succeeded in adapting to that purpose the fibres of certain filaceous plants, especially the banana and the aloe, whereby it was expected that “the present costly, laborious, patchy, rag process might be superseded by a raw material easily procurable in large quantities, and safely and economically worked into a clear, strong and durable texture.”

1851            The paper employed in the manufacture of books in Great Britain paid an excise of 14 guineas a ton, being about one-fifth the selling price of the article.

1851            Samples of paper made from alfa-fibre were exhibited at the London exhibition, in the Algerian section of French products. The plant is abundant on both shores of the Mediterranean.

1851            There were 20 paper-mills in Tuscany, and 2 English machines at the mill near Florence.

1851            In Switzerland there were 26 paper-machines and 40 vat-mills, producing together annually 11,607 tons. The wages of the men arc about 16 cents a day, and of women about 11 cents. No paper was exported.

1851            There were six paper-machines distributed among four mills in the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom of Italy.

1851            There were three paper-machines in operation in the Roman states.

1851            There was a paper-mill at Smyrna, having a machine, and. a vat-mill at Constantinople, which was all the Turkish empire proper afforded.

1851            There was a paper-mill in Egypt, at Boulac, near Cairo, which was a vat-mill.

1851            There were 13 paper manufacturing companies in Lee, Mass., running 25 mills, and producing at the rate of about 25,000 pounds of paper per day, valued at $6,300, or two millions a year.

1851            George West, of Tyringham, Mass., invented an improvement in the pulp-strainer, which consisted of a better separator of the impurities by a strainer, operated upon by a bellows.

1852            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 154,469,211 pounds, valued at two millions sterling, of which 7,328,886, pounds were exported.

1852            The number of paper-mills at work in England was 304; in Scotland 48; in Ireland 28; total 380. There were 1616 beating engines at work, and 130 silent. Sharp’s Gazetteer states the number of papermills to have been 800, employing 30,000 workmen; but the Jury Report of the London Exhibition of Industry, gives the number of mills as being only 415, including England, Scotland, and Ireland; some of which were idle.

1852            J. Mansell, of London, patented a mode of ornamenting paper, which consisted of imparting to it a resemblance to plain damask weaving, by passing it between plates.

1852            Jean A. Farina, of Paris, obtained a pulp for the manufacture of paper from the plant called spartum, or waterbroom, using both the stalks and the roots.

1852            Joseph Kingsland, of Saugerties, and Norman White, of New York, patented an improvement in the mode of drying- sized paper.

1852            There were exported from Cape Haytien during this year, 1436 pounds of rags.

1852            G. W. Turner, of London, improved the paper-machine by the application of the endless wireweb in combination with and passing round the cylinder, and taking the pulp up from the vat, carrying it forward and submitting it to the action of the dandy roller and pneumatic trough, taking the place of the fixed wire-web and endless felt, in the cylinder machine, and the wire-web upon which the pulp flows in the Fourdrinier machine. Also for a mode of passing the paper through a trough of size, between two endless felts, obtaining a uniform and thorough saturation.

1852            The export of paper from Germany was 40,000 quintals, a country which twenty years earlier imported largely.

1852            The prices of rags in England were; For 1st quality 26s. per cwt; 2nd quality 16s; 3rd quality l1s. 6d; 4th quality 7s.

1852            The export of rags from England, had seldom exceeded 500 tons a year, but this year no less than 2462 tons, mostly British and Irish, were exported.

1852            The United States imported rags from thirty-two countries, to the amount of 18,288,458 pounds, at 3.46 cents a pound, amounting to $626,729. The consumption of paper was equal to that of England and France together. Of the supply of foreign rags 12,220,570 pounds came from Italy.

1852            The United States exported to foreign countries paper and stationery to the amount of $119,535, during the year ending June 30.

1853            The value of rags imported into the United States from abroad for the year ending June 30, was $982,837, the quantity being 22,766,000 lbs. at 4.31 cts. Of this quantity 2,666,000 pounds were obtained in England. Italy was the greatest source of supply, the quantity furnished being 14,171,292 pounds. Rags were imported from twenty-six different countries.

1853            The value of paper and articles manufactured of it, imported into the United States for the year ending June 30, was $602,659, exclusive of books.

1853            The export of paper and stationery from this country was $122,212.

1853            The import of rags into Great Britain during this and the two preceding years averaged yearly 9,332 tons.

1853            The quantity of paper manufactured annually in Great Britain during the five years ending with this year, was 151,234,179 pounds; which was an increase of 114 per cent in twenty years, while the whole population in that period had increased not more than 16 per cent.

1853            It was estimated that in France about 70,000 tons of paper were produced yearly; in England 66, 000 tons; and that the production in this country was nearly equal to both France and England.

1853            France, with a population of 36,000,000 turned into paper annually 105,000 tons of rags, of which 6,000 tons were imported. Great Britain, with 28, 000,000 population, required yearly 90,000 tons of rags, of which 15,000 were imported. The annual value of paper manufactured in Great Britain was estimated at $17,760,000.

1853            Watt & Burgess patented in England a mode of producing paper from wood. The wood was first reduced to shavings or line cuttings. They took out a patent for the same in the United States in the following year.

1853            Brown & McIntosh, of Aberdeen, invented hollow moulds, composed of perforated metal, wire, or other suitable material, covered with felt, within which, after their immersion in pulp, a partial vacuum is created, so as to cause the pulp to adhere or be deposited on the felt surface in a layer of uniform thickness.

1853            B. A. Lavender and Henry Lowe, of Baltimore, Md.,produced samples of paper from southern canes, and from white pine shavings. They were sanguine that with proper apparatus, paper could be made of reeds, or wood, as the main staple, by their process, worth from 12½ to 16 cents a pound, at a cost not exceeding 6¼ cents a pound.

1853            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain and Ireland was 177,633,010 pounds, of which 13,296,874 pounds were exported. The import of paper during the year was not far from 200,000 pounds; the consumption therefore was about 5.40 pounds per capita of the population.

1853            The value of paper imported into the city of New York was $340,824.

1853            A German patented in England a machine for manufacturing paper from wood. It planed and cut the wood into small particles and shavings preparatory to being acted upon by the engine. The inventor stated that paper was manufactured in the cheapest manner from fir, pine and willow trees.

1853            G. Stiff obtained a patent in England for forming paper by using lime water in place of the ordinary alkaline solution, in making paper of straw, grass, and other materials.

1853            The importation of paper into France did not exceed 337,104 pounds ; the exports were 17,053,667 pounds. This gave 1G,716,553 excess of exports. Deduct this amount from 156,800,000 pounds, the quantity manufactured, and we have left for consumption, 140,083,447 pounds, or 3.89 pounds per capita of the population.

1853            J. P. Conely, of Dayton, Ohio, patented an improvement for separating paper by single sheets.

1853            The paper imported into the city of New York was 3,418 packages, valued at $860,628.

1854            A practical chemist exhibited in New York specimens of paper made entirely of straw, and others of grass, of a superior quality, which he asserted that he could produce for about half the cost of rag paper. He claimed the knowledge of a process for depriving straw of its silex, and other properties detrimental to the strength, opacity and pliability requisite in paper for general use.

1854            Samuel Nolan and Prof. Antisel announced the invention of a new paper-making machine, for the purpose of working a new material into paper, which should greatly reduce the high price to which paper had arisen.

1854            It was stated on the authority of the Demarara Royal Gazette, that paper of a good quality had been successfully manufactured in that region from the plantain.

1854            Mons. Vivien, of Paris, attempted to convert leaves into a paper suitable for wrapping. The leaves were collected at a suitable season, and cut into small pieces and pressed into a kind of cake, which was afterwards steeped in lime water and reduced to pulp in the ordinary manner.

1854            The quantity of rags annually consumed in Great Britain and France combined was stated at 436, 800,000, producing 291,200,000 pounds of paper, which was 4.55 pounds per capita; while the per capita of the United States was 10.80.

1854            The entire body of paper-makers in Holland, more than 160 in number, petitioned the government against the free export of rags, which they alleged would destroy their business, the neighbouring states having prohibited such exports or charged them with high duties.

1854            M. Kelin, of Belgium, invented a process for converting straw into paper, which differed from any other in use. The straw was steeped in water sixty hours, when the liquid was run off and the straw washed with a plentiful supply of water. It was then flattened by being passed between two rollers while in a damp state, and afterwards cut into fibres of suitable length, and exposed to the sun’s rays, until sufficiently bleached. It was now submitted to another steeping process, of three or four days and subjected to the action of a solution of hyper-chloride of potash or soda until the straw acquired a sufficient degree of whiteness, when it was put into the engine.

1854            T. G. Taylor patented a mode of manufacturing paper from the stalks of the hop plant, in England.

1854            John Evans also obtained a patent in the same country for a new manufacture of paper from Brazilian grass; and John Jeyes for the manufacture of paper from twitch or couch grass.

1854            S. G. Levis, of Delaware county, Penn., patented an improvement in the mode of making thick paper.

1854            Messrs. John Richmond and Ephraim Cushman, of Amherst, Mass., patented an improvement for drying thick paper. “We claim drying thick paper, and at the same time preventing it from warping out of shape, to wit, by placing the sheets in a pulpy state upon heated tables or platforms, and allowing them to remain until they harden to such a degree as to begin to warp out of shape, and then causing open or lattice weights to be let down upon them, which rest upon their edges or points at different parts of the sheets, and preserve them in flat positions until entirely dry.”— G. Gen. 339.

1854            E. L. Perkins, of Roxbury, Mass., obtained a patent for an improvement in polishing paper.

1854            E. Maniere obtained a patent in England for fire-proof paper. The invention consisted in applying asbestos to the manufacture of paper. The asbestos was rendered very fine and pulpy, and was mixed with the pulp of rags.

1854            A French paper-maker experimented with wood in the manufacture of paper. Having taken off the bark, the wood was cut into shavings, and the shavings, which were very thin, were placed in water six or eight days; then dried; then reduced, to the finest powder possible. This was mixed with rag pulp and subjected to the ordinary process. All white woods, such as poplar, lime, and willow, were deemed suitable.

1854            A French paper-maker exhibited at the world’s fair in New York, specimens of paper made of straw, which for whiteness, strength and beauty of finish appeared to be nearly equal to rag paper. It was manufactured by Coupier & Mellier, who patented the process in this country. Their success was superior to any of the 150 inventors who had patented as many different processes in England and France alone.

1851            The Ledger, a Philadelphia daily paper, having a very large circulation, perhaps 20,000 or 30,000 a day, was printed on paper made of straw, costing 9 cents a pound. It was a very inferior quality for the purpose.

1851            There were 6 paper-mills in North Carolina, consuming over 3 million pounds of stock.

1851            The quantity of paper manufactured in Great Britain, chargeable with excise duty, was 179,890,222 pounds, being an increase of more than a hundred million pounds, in twenty years. Of this quantity the exports were 16,112,020 pounds. The estimated value of the paper manufactured was .£2,000,000 sterling.

1851            There were 750 paper-mills in the United States, in active operation, having 3000 engines, and producing annually about 250 million pounds of paper, averaging about 10 cents a pound. This required 405 million pounds of rags, costing 4 cents a pound, for which our seamen had to scour every quarter of the globe. The cost of labour was estimated at 1¾ cents a pound; the cost of labour and stock united would be nearly twenty millions of dollars. The total cost of manufacturing $27,000,000 worth of paper was supposed to be $23,625,000. The demand, however, still exceeded the supply, so that the price was advanced 2½ cts a pound.

1854            The annual consumption of rags in Great Britain was computed to exceed 120,000 tons, three-fourths of which were imported, principally from Italy and Germany.

1854            The imports of paper and its manufactures into the United States during the year ending June 30, amounted to $727,829.

1854            The prices of rags in England were : 1st quality, 32s. to 34s. per cwt;, 2d quality; 20s. per cwt;, 3d quality 15s. per cwt;, 4th quality 10s .per cwt.

1854            The demand for paper in England affected the market in Jamaica so much that the two principal journals were compelled to reduce the size of their papers.

1854            The rise in the price of paper, 2½ cents a pound, obliged the publishers of cheap papers to increase their prices or reduce their sizes. Complaints of the price and scarcity of paper were universal. The New York Tribune was forced to go back to its former size. The Journal of Commerce said that it paid from forty to fifty thousand dollars a year for paper. The New York Times said that their bill for paper was sixty thousand dollars. The Daily Evening Register of Philadelphia was discontinued on account of the high price of paper. The Sun, the oldest of the penny papers, was also reduced in size. Others put up their prices.

1854            George W. Beardslee, of Albany, made experiments with basswood, which resulted in obtaining a beautiful paper; the woody fibre was reduced to a pulp of fine whiteness, and the paper was soft and strong, but it was supposed to contain a large percentage of rags.

1854            A paper-manufacturer in Otsego county, N. Y., patented a mode of working the fibrous parts of swingle tow into paper, in such a way as to produce a firm and very white article.

1854            By the reciprocity treaty with Great Britain, rags, the growth of the British North American colonies or of the United States, were to be admitted into each country, respectively, free of duty.

1854            R. & J. C. Martin secured a patent in England for obtaining a pulp from wood, by first saturating with water, planks and other pieces of wood, then subjecting their surfaces to a toothed cylinder, or other instrument having teeth resembling a saw or rasp; by which the wood was reduced to a suitable pulp.

1854            A patent was granted to Alexander Brown, in England, for the production of paper from the bracken or fern plants, of Scotland. Every part of the plant possesses strong fibres, producing a powerfully cohering pulp, requiring little or no sizing.

1854            James Sinclair patented in England the discovery of the use of thistles in the manufacture of paper, which had been known and experimented upon nearly a century.

1854            C. Hill manufactured paper in England from the stem and roots of horseradish, the rush and flag, and the vegetable remains of manures, which were bleached and reduced to pulp by the usual modes.

1854            The exports of paper and stationery from the United States is said to have been $187,325, and of books and maps, $191,843.

1854            J. Lallemand, of Besançou, France, patented a mode of making paper from peat.

1854            The quantity of rags imported into the United States this year was 32,615,753, pounds of which 24,240,999 pounds came from Italy. The total value of them was $l,010,443,at 3.09 cents a pound.

1854            Herr von Parmewitz, inventor of a process of making wool from pine trees, presented to the king of Prussia specimens of paper made of the same material. Paper was also made of the red pine at Giersdorf, which was said to be so white and good as to be fit for writing or drawing, and needed no sizing because of its resinous quality.

1854            Obadiah Marland, of Boston, Mass., obtained a patent for an improvement in paper-making machines.

1854            Woodward & Bartlett, of Massachusetts, patented an improvement in the machines for cutting rags.

1855            A specimen of paper manufactured from the common cane, the bamboo of the Mississippi river, was exhibited at St. Louis, and highly approved of.

1855            Watt & Burgess, of London, made elaborate experiments for the conversion of woody fibre into pulp. The wood was first boiled in caustic soda ley, and washed free from alkalis ; it was then subjected to the action of chlorine, or an oxygenated compound of chlorine, and again washed to remove the hydrochloric acid, when the wood was again treated with caustic soda ley, and became immediately reduced to pulp; which being well washed and bleached was ready to be manufactured into paper. Paper of this material, it was claimed, would cost only .£24 a ton, which if made of rags would cost £40.

1855            Henry Fourdrinier, surviving partner of the great firm engaged in the paper-manufacture, in England, died, aged 90. The Messrs. Fourdrinier exhausted a vast fortune in perfecting the paper-machine which bears their name, and died in poverty.

1855            J. N. Nevin, of Scotland, succeeded in fabricating rope and paper from the common garden hollyhock. It had the appearance and texture of such paper as was used for bags and parcels by grocers, and was very clean and firm.

1855            A French paper-hanger was engaged in producing a design requiring upwards of three thousand blocks, at a cost of $10,000, the design alone costing $6,000,

1855            March G. Daniel Joseph Patrice Hennessy died at Brussels aged 74 ; proprietor of the extensive paper mills at La Huepe in Brabant. He introduced improvements which completely changed the mode of manufacturing paper in that country, for which he received at various industrial exhibitions the gold medals awarded on such occasions. He claimed descent from the Irish kings, and his immediate ancestors were Jacobin emigrants.—Jour, de Imprimerie Belgique, part XII, feuilleton.

1855            The London Economist asserted that so great was the consumption of paper by the reading and writing population of Great Britain, that rags could not be procured in sufficient quantity to meet the demand.

1855            The paper-mill belonging to Messrs. Parker, at Westville, New Haven, Conn., was destroyed by fire.

1855            The paper-mill of B. B. Bradley, at Niagara Falls, was destroyed by fire.

1855            James N Kellog, foreman of Dupont’s papermill at Louisville, Ky., made experiments in manufacturing paper from undressed flax.

1855            The Saratoga Whig was printed on paper made principally of straw by Messrs. Buchanan & Kilmer at Roc City. These manufacturers employed a French process of bleaching, and were successful in making printing and writing paper of good quality from three fourths straw.

1855            The consumption of paper by The Times of London, was nearly 9 tons a day ; a quantity which, the sheets being laid open and piled upon each other, would rise to the height of fifty feet; so that the supply for eight days would exactly equal the height of St. Paul’s Cathedral.

1855            The rise of one halfpenny a pound in the price of paper in England affected the public journals so much that the loss thereby sustained by the The Times alone, was upwards of $10,000 per annum, inducing the proprietors of that journal to offer a reward of £1000 for the discovery of a new and readily available material for paper stock.

1855            An Englishman by the name of Watts patented a mode of producing paper from wood shavings and bran, which he expected would take the premium offered by the proprietors of The Times for the discovery of a new material for the production of paper.

1855            The extensive paper mill of Gaunt & Derrickson, at Trenton, N”. J., was almost totally destroyed by fire. The loss was estimated at $150,000.

1855            M. D. Whipple, of Charlestown, Mass., obtained a patent for preparing wood for paper-pulp.

1855            It is stated in the New York Paper-makers’ Circular, that the number of mills in operation in Austria at this time, was 535, giving employment to 12,000 workmen; and that there were 165 mills in the various kingdoms and duchies constituting the Zollverein states of Germany. But as this is less than half the number in operation ten years earlier, there would seem to be some mistake, or the machines had greatly diminished the hand-mills.

1855            A paper-mill which had stood twenty years at Essex, Vt,, was destroyed by fire, with its contents; loss $12,000.

1855            George W. Beardslee having made satisfactory experiments for the conversion of woody substances into paper, commenced the erection of a mill at Little Falls, N.Y., for the purpose of manufacturing paper of bass-wood and other ligneous substances, under the auspices of a joint stock company. The enterprise was unsuccessful.

1855            S.R. Andries, of Chamblee, Canada, exhibited paper made of gnaphalie, or life everlasting, which he claimed could be produced cheaper than any other substance for the purpose of being manufactured into paper.

1855            Horace W. Peaslee, of Maiden Bridge, obtained a patent for a machine for washing paper stock.

1855            G. E. Simon obtained a patent in England for a mode of manufacturing paper from plants of the different species of the family sparganium.

1855            G. Martonoi patented in England a peculiar process for producing paper from seaweed.

1855            TV. Barabee undertook the introduction of perfumes into the pulp of paper, which he thought of sufficient importance to secure by a patent, in England.

1855            The drawback on paper used in printing Bibles and Prayer Books in England, was £9958; in Scotland, £2088.

1855            The United States imported 40,013,516 pounds of rags, of which 23,948,612 came from Italy. The value of these rags was $1,235,151, or very nearly 3.06 cts. a pound.

1855            Richard Herring published a work, in London, on ancient and modern paper and paper-making, with 25 specimens of paper, and an engraving of the papermaking machine.

1855            Henry Glynn, of Baltimore, Md., obtained a patent for an improvement in the manufacture of paper pulp.

1855            Improvements in machinery and mode of manufacture, and the application of steam, had reduced the number of mills in Great Britain and Ireland to 380, or nearly one-half, in twenty years, while the quantity of rags annually consumed had risen to 201, 600,000 pounds, or over a hundred per cent.

1855            Louis Koch, of New York city, patented an improvement in manufacturing paper-pulp.

1855            Charles H. Hall, of Portland, Me., made experiments with barks of trees, and succeeded in producing wrapping paper advantageously. He fitted up a mill at Waterville for the purpose of manufacturing on a large scale.

1855            Kayaderosseros paper mill, near Ballston Spa, N. Y., erected in 1854, was stopped. It was designed for the manufacture of hanging paper, and had 4 engines of 500 pounds capacity, one of Gavit’s 72 inch machines, revolving iron bleach, and all the modern machinery for staining, printing, and decorating in the highest style of the art, costing about $85,000.

1855            The paper mill of C. & O. Clark, at Woodville, Jefferson county, N. Y., four engines, was burnt; loss $12,000. It was rebuilt the next year, and furnished with four large engines, and a G2 inch machine, and turned out one ton of print a day.

1856            The New York Mercantile Library received a unique work on paper-manufactures, prepared by T. H. Saunders, of London, for the Paris exhibition. It contains a history of this department of industry, followed by specimens of the different varieties of hand and machine made paper, and of papers destined to special uses, as bank notes, checks, photographs. It is estimated that the work could not have cost less than a thousand dollars.

1856            Henry Lowe, of Baltimore county, Maryland, made an experiment with southern cane, and produced a creditable specimen of paper, which was used in printing the Baltimore County Advocate. His mill was employed exclusively in manufacturing wrapping paper.

1856            The sum of £9094 was paid in England for drawback of duty on paper used in printing Bibles, Testaments and Prayer Books, and £1200 in Scotland.

1856            The mills of the Chelsea manufacturing company at Norwich, Ct., were producing 7 tons of paper daily; and the Pacific mills at Windsor Locks were supposed to be unsurpassed in their capacity by any mills in the world.

1856            The consumption of paper in the United States was computed to equal that of England and France together. Thus in France, with 35 millions of inhabitants, only 70,000 tons of paper were produced in a year, of which one-seventh for was exportation. In Great Britain, with 28 millions of inhabitants, only 66,000 tons were produced. While in the United States, young and but little advanced in manufactures, 200,000 tons were annually manufactured.

1856            The extensive paper-mills of Piersse & Brooks, at Windsor Locks, Conn., were burnt, involving a loss of $75,000, two-thirds of which was insured.

1856            Edward Grantless, a marble cutter, of Glasgow, obtained a patent for a mode of making paper of stone!

1856            It was claimed that an excellent pulp for paper was obtained by subjecting to a newly invented process, the Scotch fern plant, the stems, stalks, and even the roots of which possessed a strong fibre, which was found to be peculiarly adapted to the manufacture of a powerfully cohering paper-pulp; that the plants might be used either green or dry, but the latter was preferable.

1856            It was estimated that if all the paper consumed in one year by the newspapers in the city of New York was put upon wagons, containing two tons each, they would form a procession thirty miles in length requiring 6,000 wagons.

1856            Paper for wrapping purposes was made at a mill near Hagarstown, Md., from refuse leather scrapings about curriers’ shops.

1856            Lasare Ochs, of Belgium, patented a mode of obtaining paper from cuttings, waste, and scraps of tanned leather. The scraps are placed in sieves on the ends of arms or spokes on a wheel, and are made to revolve in a stream of water, which operation, if continued long enough, washes out the tannin from the leather. After this about 20 per cent of old hemp rope is mixed and the whole is cut up and reduced to pulp, from which the paper is made. A very strong, coarse wrapping is the result.

1856            Wm. Clark, of Dayton, O., patented improvements in making paper of the bark of the cotton stalk. Instead of using lime or other alkalis, he boiled coal tar with the material used, in a peculiar manner.

1856            Horace W. Peaslee, of Maiden Bridge, K Y., obtained a patent for a drying cylinder. He employed a spiral tubular heater, upon a nonconducting cylinder, in combination with an exterior metallic easing as set forth.

1856            The amount of paper imported into France during this and the two preceding years, was 23,000 tons, having a value of about $7,500,000. The amount exported was 114 tons, valued at $200,000.

1856            Francis Burke, of Montserrat, West Indies, invented a mode of preparing paper-pulp from the fibres of endogenous plants, without having recourse to the process of separating the fibrous matter from the component parts of vegetable substances, which is described in Wells’s Annual of Scientific Discovery for 1857, p. 89.

1856            Pierre J. Davis, of Paris, patented an improvement in bleaching paper, which is described in the same work as the above. Also, H. Hodgkins, of Belfast, Ireland.

1856            M. Didot, of Paris, patented a new method of bleaching paper-pulp. He immersed the pulp in a solution of bleaching liquor, made by saturating chloride of lime in water, and using the clear liquor, and then passed carbonic acid gas through it.

1856            Cowley & Sullivan, of England, patented a mode of bleaching straw pulp. The liquor (chlorine) is 1½ to 2° in Twaddle’s hygrometer, in strength ; that a lower strength will not bleach the pulp, and a stronger liquor will injure it, and not produce so good a colour. While the straw is undergoing bleaching, it is carefully watched, and as soon as it assumes a reddish colour, just merging on the white, a jet of steam is cautiously let on and continued two hours, until the liquor has attained a blood heat, or 90°, which is kept up about two hours longer, when the straw will be completely bleached, and fit for the beating engine. Unless the steam is gradually introduced, the colour will not be good.

1856            P. H. Wait, of Sandy Hill, K Y., patented an improvement in felt guides.

1856            Vespasian O. Balcom, of Bedford, Mass., obtained a patent for improvement in grinding paperstock, which consisted of a revolving pulp-tub, in combination with a grooved grinding roller, revolved thereon at a greater or different speed than the tub.

1856            Joseph Kingsland Jr., of Franklin, N. J., patented an improvement in the engine for grinding pulp—a process of reducing fibrous matter in water to pulp, by grinding it under hydraulic pressure, which creates a current that feeds the fibres into the grinder, and removes it there from as fast as it is sufficiently reduced, and renders the feeding independent of the grinding.

1856            The straw-paper mill of John R. Hoes, at 16 Stuyvesant Falls, Columbia county, New York, was destroyed by fire, with all the stock and machinery. The loss was $8,000, there being no insurance upon any part of it.

1856            The Overland Mail, published at Hong Kong, China, was printed on stout and heavy paper, of fine texture, made from the shavings of bamboo.

1856            There were twenty paper-mills with seventy-five engines in the town of Lee, Mass. These consumed 1,100,000 pounds of rags annually, and gave employment to 1000 people; the quantity of paper manufactured was 780,000 reams, worth $1,300,000.

1856            Israel Kinsey, of Hohokus, N. J., patented an improvement in feeding pulp to machines.

1856            William Clark, of Dayton, Ohio, patented a mode of making paper from straw.

1856            July 31. The paper-mill of G. W. Ingalls, at Ballston Spa, was destroyed by fire. Loss $20,000; insured $12,000.

1856            An English manufacturer produced pasteboard from beet roots.

1856            Dr. Terry, of Detroit, experimented upon a species of moss obtained in the Lake Superior region, and obtained a beautiful white paper, without any peculiar process. The moss existed in great quantities, on Isle Royal and other localities, and could be procured at a very moderate cost.

1856            An unusual freshet occurred in the Kayaderosseras river, by which the paper-mills situated upon it suffered to great extent by the loss of their dams or damage to the mills and machinery.

1856            The Syracuse Standard boasted that its daily was printed on paper made of rags imported directly from the land of the Pharaohs, on the banks of the Nile. These were said to have been stripped from the mummies.

1856            M. Maurice Diamont, of Bohemia, laid before the minister of finance a project relative to the manufacture of paper from maize, or Turkish wheat, and experiments were made at the imperial manufactory, which resulted in the production of various kinds of writing and printing paper, but at considerable additional expense over rag made paper. Another attempt was made three years later, with better success ; but the result was still unsatisfactory. A manufactory was then established at Temesvar to obviate the expense of transportation of the raw material; but the experiments were unsuccessful. (See 1862.)

1857            J. S. Blake, of Claremont, N. H., obtained a patent for an improvement in making paper, which was said to embrace a superior method of trimming the edges of the paper cut “From the pulp, the proper discharging of the strips cut from it, and the keeping of the felt-apron properly distended, to prevent creasing the paper, and preventing considerable waste.

1857            Messrs. Laflin Brothers disposed of their extensive paper-mill at Herkimer to a New York firm for $70,000.

1857            It was announced that a new mode of preparing straw for white paper, had been discovered, which was expected to become valuable.

1857            The paper-mills of Russia, 181 in number, gave employment to 11,730 persons, and produced paper to the value of $3,250,000.

1857            Edward B. Bingham of Brooklyn, N. Y., made an improvement in the cylinder machine, consisting in the employment of an endless apron, placed at each end of the cylinder, and close to it, and having a traversing motion to that of the cylinder; the apron laying the pulp like a cross-lap on a web of cotton batting, thereby rendering the paper made by such machine much stronger, and of a more uniform texture.

1857            J. A. Roth, of Philadelphia, patented, the combined application of sulphuric acid upon woody fibres, with that of the chlorine bleaching agents.

1857            Patrick Clark, of Rahway, N. J., patented a mode of cleaning felts and cylinders with the water that has been separated from the pulp, thus avoiding the necessity of introducing for that purpose water from any other source, into the machine.

1857            Louis Koch of New York, patented an improvement in the manufacture of paste-board.

1857            C. P. Sturgis, of Carlowville, Alabama, patented a process of manufacturing pulp from the bark of the root and stalk of the cotton plant.

1857            M. A. C. Mellier, of France, patented a mode of making pulp, by boiling in a solution of caustic soda in a temperature not less than 310° F., after it has been soaked and cleaned, and before submitting it to the action of a solution of chloride of lime ; and the use of a rotary vessel separate from that containing the steam heat.

1857            It was announced that paper was made in Belgium from refuse tanned leather. After the tannin was washed out of the leather, about 20 per cent of old hemp rope was mixed with the scraps, and the whole cut up and reduced to pulp, from which a fair quality of paper was said to be obtained by the usual process.

1857            A company was formed with a capital of $400,000, for the manufacture of paper in Havana, Cuba. The enterprise was induced by the great consumption of paper in that island, and the high price it commanded.

1857            A paper-mill at Nassau, Rensselaer county, N. Y., was destroyed by fire. It belonged to A. P. Van Alstyne, and was uninsured. Loss estimated at $12.

1857            R. H. Collyer, of Camden, N. J., claimed the exclusive use and employment for making paper and paper-manufactures, in any combination or proportion whatsoever of the residue prepared, so as to retain and preserve the albumino-mucilaginous substance, or in any other manner substantially the same of beet-root, mangle-wurzel, and other species of the genus beta, left after the sugar-making and distilling processes have extracted the saccharine matter.

1857            The paper of the notes of the Bank of England was distinguished by its colour—a peculiar white, such as was neither sold in the shops nor used for any other purpose; by its thinness and transparency, qualities which prevented any of the printed part of the note from being washed out by turpentine, or removed by the knife, without making a hole in the place thus practiced on ; by its characteristic feel, a peculiar crispness and toughness, by which those accustomed to handle it distinguished the true notes instantly, the wire or water-mark, which was produced on the paper when in the state of pulp, and which was easily distinguished from a mark stamped on after the paper is completed; the deckle edges—the mould contained two notes placed lengthwise, which are separated by a knife at a future stage of the process—this deckle producing the peculiar effect seen on the edges of uncut paper, and this edging being caused when the paper was in a state of pulp, precluded any successful imitation after the paper was made; also by the strength of the paper, which was made from new cotton and linen. In its waterleaf or unsized condition, a banknote would sustain 36 pounds; and when one grain of size had been diffused through it, it would lift 100 pounds.

1857            L. C. Stuart took out a patent in England for an improvement in drying sized paper, which consisted in passing it over and between a series of oblong cylinders, placed one above the other, and having their surfaces perforated with small holes, through which currents of graduated heated air are forced, which escape and come in contact with both sides of the paper after leaving the sizing vat. The series of cylinders and the paper between them are exposed to the open air, so that the vapour may be free to escape, and not run with the paper to be again absorbed by them. The novelty of this improvement consisted solely in the perforated cylinders, as the employment of steam heated rollers for the same purpose was common in this country.

1857            House & Co., paper manufacturers at Haddum Neck, made experiments with ivory shavings, and produced a quantity of paper upon which a part of an edition of the Connecticut Courant was printed. The paper was said to be inferior to rag paper, but it was thought that it could be improved upon. The fact was, undoubtedly, that there was just enough ivory shavings used to spoil it, as has been the case with most of the samples produced of paper made of new substances.

1857            William N. Clark, of Chester, Conn., obtained a patent for the use of ivory as stock to make pulp for the manufacture of paper.

1857            It appears by the returns of the paper tax in Great Britain, which is three cents a pound, that the whole amount of paper manufactured in that country during this year was 191,000,000 pounds.

1857            June 19. The paper-mill of James Howard ” & Co., at Manchester, near Pittsburgh, was burned with all its contents. It was the work of an incendiary. The loss was $25,000, and the insurance $10,000.

1857            June. All the old books, papers, drafts, checks, letters which had been preserved in the United States Bank, in the long course of its immense business, were sold at Philadelphia to a paper-maker, to be worked over into blank paper. The whole mass weighed over forty tons. Ten tons of it consisted of autograph letters of the first statesmen, politicians and financiers of this and other countries.

1857            Samples of writing paper, said to be of very excellent quality, were exhibited at an industrial exhibition in Vienna, manufactured from the leaves of Indian corn.

1857            A paper-mill was burnt at Brattleborough, Vt., early in September, belonging to Esty.

1857            The importation of rags into the United States was 44,582,080 pounds, valued at $1,448,125. Of 35,591 bales from Italy, more than one-third were linen ; the rest a mixture of cotton and linen. About 2000 bales were from the cities of Hamburg and Bremen. The exportation of rags from France and Rome was prohibited, and the few procured from Ancona were obtained by special permission upon the payment of large fees. The trade with Prussia and Germany was also prohibited by the high export duty. The exports from Alexandria and Smyrna were chiefly collected in Asia Minor by agents having license from the government, and could only be shipped after the domestic demand was supplied. In Trieste also, only the surplus was allowed to come away. The Trieste rags were collected all over Hungary. The largest shipping port was Leghorn. New York and Boston were the largest receiving ports.

1857            James Brown patented in England a mode of treating paper and paper material with glycerine, for printing and other purposes.

1858            Feb. 24. The paper mill at North Bennington, Vt, was burnt, with all the stock and machinery, involving a loss of $30,000, of which only $6000 was insured. It was owned by Houghton & Graves.

1858            Mr. Barry, manufacturer of a substitute for paper from animal substances, was prosecuted by the crown, in England, for not having taken out a papermaker’s license, and for not submitting his works to the usual discipline of the excise. The defendant contended that the article in question, being manufactured from hides, was parchment, and not paper. It so much resembled parchment, that a good many acquainted with such fabrics could not discover the difference. The court decided that the article being in the nature of paper, was paper within the meaning of the act, and the jury finding for the crown, the damages were put at £100.

1858            The oldest rag picker in Paris, died at the age of ninety one. This old man, like most of his profession, was rich once, and his money being squandered, he fell down the ladder of society, rung by rung, until he reached the bottom. He was well educated, and his brethren of the rag tie, looked up to him with respect. The rag pickers reserved him a number of streets into which no one was allowed to venture on his picking excursions, and gave him a monthly allowance of pocket money for his gin and tobacco. His comrades buried him, and his funeral was largely attended by rag pickers.

1858            Thomas Bonsor Crompton, the English paper manufacturer, died, aged 66, leaving a fortune of £5,000,000. Besides the Farnworth Mills, he became the proprietor of the extensive manufactory at Worthington ; supplied the principal newspapers and merchants of London with paper ; invented the continuous drying apparatus now in general use ; was also an extensive manufacturer of cotton, and for some time the proprietor of the Morning Post, and other newspapers. Indefatigable in business, he was at the same time an ardent sportsman, public-spirited, a conservative in politics, and noted for his hospitality.—Appleton’s Cyclopedia.

1858            Stephen Rossman, of Stuyvesant, New York, invented a lifting-roll to prevent the breaking or tearing of the paper as it passes from the upper of the second press-rolls to the dryer. This was attained by passing the web of paper between the lifting-roll and the upper press-roll. The slight cohesion of the web to the roll eases it off, and prevents its breaking, and if a slight break should occur in the web, it prevents the edge of the break from being carried under the doctor, and thereby increased. It was claimed that it affected a great increase in the quantity of paper produced in a given time, by saving nearly all the time that is expended when breakages of the web occur.—Scientific American.

1858            A patent was reissued to Ladd & Keen, assignees of Watt & Burgess, of England, for a mode of pulping or disintegrating shavings of wood and other similar vegetable matter for making paper.

1858            . J. & R. McMurray, of New York, patented an invention, the object of which was to obtain a very rigid frame, that would retain its form, so as to ensure a perfect cylindrical wire-cloth surface—designed to be used in paper machines, but applicable to other purposes also.

1858            S. S. Mills, of Charleston, S. C, patented a machine for separating the fibre from pulp in hemp leaves. The invention consisted in the use of a shredding cylinder, heckling device, and skutching cylinder, in connection with reciprocating clamps, or holders, arranged so that the separation of the fibrous portion of the leaves of hemp from the soft, pulpy portion, is readily effected, and in a perfect manner.

1858            Charles Marzoni, assignor of J. Gandolfi, patented the use of “the peculiar stone called adamantine,” as a means of tearing the woody fibre into a state suitable for pulp.

1858            March 3. The paper mill of S. A. Parks & Co., at Ballston, was destroyed by fire at night.

1858            March 18. The paper mill of the Westville Manufacturing Company in North Amherst, Mass. was destroyed by fire. The building and machinery were insured for $4000.

1858            May 4. The paper mill of Messrs. Hanna & Sons, at Steubenville, Ohio, was burned. Loss estimated at $50,000 ; insured for $9,000.

1858            May 24. The paper mill of Croswell & Son, near the village of New Baltimore, Greene county, N. Y., was destroyed by fire, together with $1000 worth of paper. The loss was about $15,000.

1858            The Housatonic paper mill of Platner & Smith, at Lee, Mass., was burnt. Loss estimated at $150,000, on which there was an insurance of nearly $30,000. It was one of the most costly mills in New England, the proprietors having procured the most perfect machinery that could be obtained.

1858            At a meeting in Leipsic of the Book-sellers and Publishers Union, it was unanimously determined to erect at their own cost, a paper mill, in consequence of the extortionate prices demanded by manufacturers, and the combination among them to keep it at the great price to which they had raised it.

1858            Martin Nixon, of Philadelphia, patented an improvement in the preparation of straw for pulp, which consisted in applying the steam whereby the solution was automatically and continuously delivered on top of the straw; and the process of boiling the whole straw by the combined action of an upward current of steam, and a downward current of alkaline solution, permeating the mass, and acting upon it in conjunction,

1858            Henry Lowe, of Baltimore, patented a mode of making paper from reeds, by first disintegrating the reeds by boiling in a solution of caustic soda, accompanied by agitation, and then reducing them directly to pulp without reducing to half stuff by the machine technically called the old rag engine.

1858            Aug. 12. The paper mill on Bath Island, near Niagara falls, was entirely destroyed by fire. Loss about $100,000. The New York Tribune was supplied by this mill.

1858            An effort was made to introduce the residue of beet root from the sugar manufactories of Europe for paper stock, Dr. Collyer having patented a mode of producing paper from that material.

1858            Sep. 14. A paper mill at Chatham Four Corners with the dwelling house and outhouses belonging to it, were burnt, and an old man named Levy Garvey was with difficulty rescued from the flames. The mill belonged to Mr Isaacson.

1858            Sept. 20. David Carson, an eminent paper maker, died at Pittsfield, Mass., aged 75. He established himself in business at Dalton in 1811, and during a period of thirty-one years obtained a wide-spread reputation as a manufacturer. He retired with a competency in 1842.

1858            D. Lichtenstadt obtained a patent in England for making pulp for paper and other fabrics from leather or any kind of animal fibrine, whether in large or small pieces, shavings or shreds, either tanned or untanned. The fibrine was first cleaned by being mixed for about two hours in a composition of water, caustic lime, and potash; then washed in cold water, and mixed with gypsum, or alumina, when it was ready for the pulping engine. When in the tanned state, it was treated with caustic lime or limy matter mixed with salammoniac, ammonia, or ammoniacal compounds, to extract the tannin, and afterwards washed successively in an acid liquid and water to remove the caustic liquor, when it was pressed and converted into pulp in the usual way.

1858            Thomas Lindsay, of Westville, and William Geddes, of Seymour, Conn., invented a mode of varying the width of paper while the machine was in operation. The invention consisted in having the lip or basin which conducts the pulp from the endless wire apron constructed in two parts, so that one part may slide over the other, and having the parts connected with the deckles, which, as well as the deckle-straps, were by a novel mechanism rendered susceptible of lateral adjustment.

1858            Henry Lowe stated that previous to his invention it had been found impossible, practically, to manufacture paper from reeds; he now obtained a patent for a mode of producing reed fibre from arundinaria macrospenna of Michaux and its employment in the manufacture of paper.

1858            A water-proof packing paper was brought into use in England, consisting of common paper covered with a very thin coat of gutta percha, dissolved in turpentine and put on the paper in a liquid form with rollers.

1858            Isaac N. Crehore and Francis Stiles patented an improved lead-plate, composed of sheet-metal knives, corrugated, or formed with a series of angles, or curved lines, through their entire length, for a rag engine; the lead-plate in use being objectionable from its liability to breakage, and the difficulty of repairing it when once injured or broken at any point.

1858            Oct. 3. The extensive paper mill of Thomas Rice, Jr., at Newton Lower Falls, Mass., was totally destroyed by fire; loss nearly $15,000, insured.

1858            June. 30. There was a decrease of six million pounds in the quantity of paper charged with duty in Great Britain in the half year ending with this date, against 1857, the relative quantities being 99,483,635 lbs, and 93,462,1301bs.

1858            Nov. 24. The storehouse connected with the extensive paper mill of Tileston & Hollingsworth, Milton, Mass., was destroyed by fire. Loss $20,000; insured $10,000.

1859            Palser & Howland; patented improvements in apparatus for the manufacture of pulp.

1859            John Meyerhofer, of the city of New York, claimed an improvement in making paper impervious to water, mixing the alkaline solution of rosin with the pulp, and then adding what is known as English sulphuric acid; and after, the sheets have been formed, drying them in contact with heated metallic surfaces.

1859            Morris L. Keen, of Rogers Ford, Pa., claimed an improvement in boilers for making pulp from wood; for boiling, under pressure, wood and ligneous materials for making paper-pulp, constructed with an expansion chamber, stirrers and discharge valve.

1859            Martin Nixon, of Philadelphia, patented an improvement in boilers for treating paper-stock: the boiler constructed to boil stock under a heavy pressure, by the combined action of an upward current of steam, and a downward current of hot alkaline solution, and admitting of the ready inversion of the boiler for the discharge of its contents when cooled.

1859            Palser & Howland, of Fort Edward, claimed an improvement by boiling straw or other stock for about four hours under a pressure of from 110 to 130 pounds, in a solution of caustic alkali, of a strength indicating from 3½° to 3¾° R.

1859            Paper was so scarce in Madrid that several printing offices were forced to suspend business, and the journals pressed the government to allow foreign paper to be imported free, or at a greatly reduced duty.

1859            The quantity of paper charged with duties of excise in the British kingdom, was 217,827,197 lbs. the exports were 20,142,350 lbs.

1859            Crocker & Marshall of Lawrence, Mass., patented a combination of internally-heated drying cylinders, with a steam-box for the purpose of continuously first thoroughly drying paper, and then superficially moistening it, by the direct application of steam prior to the operation of calendering; second, the combination of steam boxes so arranged as to moisten paper superficially by the steam therein contained, with rolls which calender by pressure.

1860            Jordan & Keney (in connection with Grant, Warren & Co.) claimed a reissue for an improvement in machines for grinding and sizing paper-pulp— constructed of a simple conical grinder and outer shell, and with pipes for the introduction of the rags and size, and the eduction of both, arranged with reference to the axis and ends of the grinder, so as to enable it to reduce the rags to pulp and mix the sizing therewith. 1860. Thomas G. Chase claimed to have made further improvements in rendering paper incorrodible, by the interposition of a mixed powder of calcined feldspar, sulphate of lime, with the metallic oxide of magnesium, calcium, and iron, between the block of caustic alkali, coated with paraffin and rosin and the paraffin wrapper. He also claimed the composition of paraffin and rosin for the purposes described.

1860            The patent of Messrs. Kendall expired, which had been taken out in 1846, for bleaching paper pulp. 1860. F. De Compoloro, of France, obtained a patent for an improvement in the manufacture of pulp claiming the employment of the cobs of Indian corn, either alone or with the husks.

1860            Xavier Karckeski, of New York city, patented an improvement in the manufacture of vegetable parchment; claiming the application to certain parts of the paper, of starch or some other gelatinous substance, either plain or coloured, for the purpose of producing a vegetable parchment, equal, or nearly so, in strength to the animal parchment, and of a uniform transparency, with indelible water-marks, in such a manner that it could be used with particular advantage for bank bills and other paper of the same character.

1860            The paper manufactured in Massachusetts amounted to nearly six millions dollars, which was over 58 per cent of the product of the whole Union ten years earlier.

1860            The Messrs. Smart, of Troy, N. Y., claimed an improvement in the manufacture of straw-paper, which consisted in treating the fibre for making white paper by the successive operations of boiling, washing, and separating, or beating, and then applying the chemicals used for bleaching to the pulp.

1860            Howland & Palser, of Fort Edward, N. Y., patented ah improvement in the preparation of straw for paper pulp. Their staple fibre, as they termed it, was made from common rye or wheat straw, or other stalks. In preparing it, the substance was first cut into short lengths by machinery, and winnowed to remove impurities, then crushed and abraded by being passed between iron rollers, after which it went through a process of steaming, boiling, &c.

1860            Jan. 12. The paper mill of Samuel Hanna, in West Fitchburg, Mass., was partially destroyed by fire; loss about $2000.

1860            Jan. 30. The paper mill of Wm. Clark & Co. at Northampton, Mass., was destroyed by fire. Loss upwards of $40,000; insured $41,000.

1860            April 15. The paper mill of Goss & Russel at Dover mills, Mass., was burnt.

1860            May 20. The Greenleaf & Taylor paper mill was burnt at Springfield,Mass. Loss $25,000, insured $18,000.

1860            May 27. A paper mill at Ashland owned by Morse was destroyed by fire. There was an insurance of $8000 on the building and stock.

1860            May 26. The paper mill at Saccarappa, owned by Josiah F Day of Portland, was burnt. The building was about 100 feet long; and four stories high. Loss estimated at $25,000; insured for $19,700.

1860            Messrs. Rowland & Palser, claimed a reissue for an improvement in the manufacture of paper pulp, in the destruction or carbonization of the gummy, resinous, and other matters from which the fibre is to be set free, without injury to the fibre itself.

1860            Edward L. Perkins claimed a reissue for an improvement in machines for drying paper and other fabrics, consisting of the combination of a drying chamber with inlet and outlet passages for insuring a circulation through it, an apparatus for heating the same, and suitable carrying-rolls for suspending the fabric vertically in the drying-chamber, and for carrying it into and through the same.

1860            Ephraim and John R. Cushman obtained a patent for an improvement in the manufacture of leather-paper stock; which consisted in heating the stock while in was in the beating engine, and removing the impurities as they arose.

1860            The rapid increase in the consumption of paper, especially of all kinds of book and news paper, during the period of a quarter of a century, was without a parallel; yet it was almost wholly supplied by American manufacturers. The long-established policy of the government, combining revenue with the encouragement of home industry, had drawn a very large capital into this branch of business, and the production of paper fully kept pace with the demand. Notwithstanding the fact that capital and labour were so much cheaper in Europe than here, prices of paper ruled so, low in this country, that under a revenue duty of twenty-four per cent—the rate for many years prior to this time—the quantity imported was never very large, and was pretty much confined to French writing papers. Competition reduced the profits below the average of other branches of manufacture; the market also became overstocked, and prices at this time were reduced beyond precedent, resulting in an actual loss, and many mills were compelled to close business.

1860            About sixty-five per cent of the whole amount of paper-stock was derived from domestic rags of cotton fabric, and twelve per cent from cotton waste, and rope and bagging used in baling cotton.

1860            Ebenezer Clemo, of Toronto, Canada, patented a mode of using nitric acid, the aqua fortis of commerce, in the conversion of straw and grasses into pulp; and for a subsequent treatment with a solution of hydrate or carbonate of an alkali, for the purpose of reducing the stock to a fine fibrous pulp, without subjecting it to the beating or other mechanical operation.

1860            Another plant, suitable for the manufacture of paper, was declared of easy growth in Algeria—the hibiscus esculentus, resembling the flax plant, also admirably adapted for the manufacture of coarse linen, being far stronger than cotton. Its culture was highly recommended in the African colonies, to replace the deficiency of rags, so severely felt.

Oct 24         A steam boiler in the paper mill of Platner & Smith, at Lee, Mass., was destroyed by explosion. A workman was dangerously injured; the damage to property was about $600.

1860            A new kind of paper for making cigarettes was discovered, and a manufactory established in Algiers for working this new invention. The paper in question is made from the refuse stalks and portions of the leaves which have been hitherto thrown away or burnt as useless. It has been calculated that the value of the rags from which the paper for the cigarettes has been usually made, amounted annually to from 9,000, 000f. to 10,000,000f.

1860            The census returns reported the consumption of five million dollars worth of paper, ink, &c, per annum in the city of New York, producing over eleven million dollars worth of books, newspapers, &c, employing more capital than any other business.

1860       A step towards the final cessation of paper duties in England was made by the house of commons, in the import duties of paper, as follows :

 

Old (per cwt) , New ( per cwt )

Mill-boards – £1 3 4 , £ 0 16 0

Pasteboard – £1 3 4, £ 0 15 0

Brown paper – £1 3 4, £ 0 16 0

Paper hangings – £1 8 0, £ 0 14 0

Fancy papers – £1 3 4, £ 0 16 0

Waste paper – £1 3 4, £ 0 16 0

1860            Joseph Storm, of Woonsocket, R. I., patented an improvement in paper-rag engines, or rag-pickers, of which an engraving is given in the Scientific American of March 17, 1860.

1860            Stephen M. Allen, of Niagara Falls, N. Y., claimed a new mode of treating fibrous materials, such as flax, hemp, jute, manilla, grass, sugar-cane, &c, in subjecting them to the action of air charged with moisture or vapour.

1860            May. The machinery for the first paper mill in Minnesota, arrived at the Falls of St. Anthony, where it was proposed to erect a manufactory. The consumption of paper in St. Paul was estimated at over fifty tons a year.

1860            There was exhibited in England a sheet of tissue paper which measured four miles (21,000 feet) in length, and six feet and three inches in breadth, the weight of which was but 196 pounds. It was manufactured in 12 hours.

1860            The quantity of paper supplied to the stationery office in London during the year ending March 31, was 3,601,119 lbs. The comptroller calculated that there was a saving to government, by the repeal of the paper duty, of ,£12,000. The sales of waste paper during the same period, amounted to £6269, which was ,£1000 more than any previous year.—Bookseller, May 26, 1860, p. 282.

1860            C. S. Buchanan, of Ballston Spa, patented an improvement in boilers for preparing paper stuff: 1. the combination with a rotary boiler, or vessel, of a cylindrical strainer arranged within the boiler. 2. In rotary boilers, provided with cylindrical and concentric strainers, he claimed the construction and arrangement of ribs in the form of gutters. 3. He claimed providing the hollow journals of boilers constructed to operate as described, by rotation with a tubular plug capable of being shifted on its axis, such plug having one or more openings at the inner end so arranged as to allow of their coinciding with the channels or ways on the boiler heads, for the discharge from the boiler of liquid or steam, or both.

1860            J. L. Jullion, of Aberdeen, Scotland, obtained a patent in this country for an improvement in the preparation of paper. He used compounds, prepared by precipitation, from watery or other solution of earths and acids, to consolidate and harden paper. 2. The use of chloride or oxy-chloride of zinc with glutinous matter as a size for paper. 3. The use of any of the before-mentioned prepared inorganic bodies, mixed with the sizing agent, to facilitate the absorption of writing and printing ink.

1861            July 20. The paper mill of Hunter and Patton, at North Bennington, Vt., was wholly destroyed by fire. Loss $20,000; insured $18,000. The mill had been closed three weeks, and the fire was attributed to spontaneous combustion.

1861            Oct. 1. The excise and import duty upon paper in England was abolished. (See London Publishers’ Circular, Oct. 1801.)

1861            J. E. Malloy, of New York city, patented an improvement in the preparation of fibre, claiming a process of separating- fibre from fibre-yielding plants, consisting of the separate and successive steps of combining, rubbing and washing the plants in cold water; the whole forming one continuous operation performed while the fibre is fresh and the plant undessicated.

1861            J. H. Patterson, of Schaghticoke, patented an improvement for drying pasteboards, designed to facilitate the curing or drying wet paper or pasteboard sheets, by placing them in frames.

1861            At a meeting of paper manufacturers at Pittsfield, twenty-one of the thirty-six fine-writing paper mills of the country, and three-fourths of the capital invested (some $4,000,000), were represented. It appeared that the production of fine paper had been doubled within the previous ten years. It was recommended that for three months from the first of March the production be reduced one-third.

1861            Experiments having been made with success at Baltimore, for converting the cane of the southern swamps into paper stock, mills were erected at Wilmington, N. C., for preparing the fibre upon a large scale for supplying paper mills.

1861            Joseph Jordan, Jr., of East Hartford, Conn., obtained a patent for an improvement in mills for grinding pulps by a peculiar arrangement of the knives.

1861            Gelston Sanford, of New York city, patented an improvement in mills for grinding pulp. He constructed the side of conical-shaped staves, with roughened surfaces, set alternately in reverse position, so that the space between them can be adjusted as set forth, in combination with the serrated rubbers.

1861            Henry Lowe, of Baltimore, Md., obtained a patent for an improvement in the process of recovering soda used in the manufacture of stock. He reclaimed the soda from the spent solution of caustic soda after its action upon reeds, straw, or other fibrous material, by charging the solution with carbonic acid gas, in a suitable vessel, so that the organic matter will be precipitated.

1861            James Piercy, of Bloomfield, N. J., patented an improvement in washers for pulp.

1861            Harlow Kilmer, one of the proprietors of the manilla-paper manufacturing company, at Rock City, Saratoga county, slipped from the wheel and was caught in the cog gearing of the machinery, and his body cut entirely in two. He was 50 years of age.

1861            Feb. 13. A paper makers’ council was held at Pittsfield, Mass., consisting of manufacturers of fine writing papers, to consult upon the depressed condition of the trade. It was found that the production of fine papers had doubled within ten years. An association was formed for the purpose of securing the members from the recurrence of similar gluts in the market, and it was decided that from the first of March the production should be reduced one-third.

1861            The state of Georgia having seceded from the United States, the Macon Telegraph, which had been printed upon paper manufactured in Georgia and South Carolina during the previous three years, was now printed on paper imported from Belgium.

1861            May 29. A paper mill at Lee, Mass., owned by Prentice C. Baird, was burnt with all its contents. There was an insurance of $14,000 on it.

1861            June 11. The straw paper mill of G. Chittenden & Son, at Stockport, Col. Co., N. Y., was destroyed by fire, together with 500 reams of paper and 300 tons of straw. Loss estimated at $15,000, of which $1000 was insured.

1861            There were 15 paper mills in the seceded states, which produced 75,000 pounds of paper daily, while the consumption was over 150,000 pounds, and the entire suspension of newspapers was apprehended.

1861            T. H. Dodge, of Washington, D. C, patented an improvement in letter paper, which consisted in tinting the whole or a portion of the blank side, and combining with it the official embossed postage stamps.

1861            A. Randel, of New York city, patented an improvement in preparing stock, by a combination of differentially moving crushing rollers with the shredding cylinder and spiked concave.

1861            Benjamin Lambert, of England, patented an improvement in the treatment of printed paper to remove ink and recover the pulp, to render it fit to be remade into paper.

1861            Straw paper, which was first made in Philadelphia in 1854, of a poor quality, was now so much improved as to be used by one of the daily papers. There were two or more manufacturers in New York state, and one in Cincinnati.

1861            Moritz Diamant, an Austrian, invented a mode of preparing pulp from corn leaves, which was accounted a great discovery, and was stated to have been “an industrial fact confirmed by success,” calculated considerably to influence the price of paper. This discovery was not absolutely new; in the eighteenth century the manufacture was in operation in Italy with remarkable success; but, strange to say, the secret was kept by the inventor, and was lost at his death. Many attempts since made to revive the manufacture, recoiled before the difficulty of removing the silica and resinous matter contained in the leaves, and which obstructs the conversion of pulp into sheets. It was claimed that Diamant, a Jewish writing-master, had rediscovered the process, and it was applied on a large scale at the imperial manufactory of Schlogelmühle, with such success that the paper obtained left nothing to be desired in strength, homogeneity, polish, and whiteness; in short, that in several respects the paper was superior to that made from rags! (See Scientific American, vol. v, 18G1, p. 203).

1862            A. S. Lyman, of New York city, patented an improved process of separating the fibres of wood and other substances for the manufacture of pulp, by subjecting them in a close vessel to the combined simultaneous action of a whipping, beating, rubbing, grinding or picking apparatus, and of water at a high temperature and pressure.

1862            An association was formed among the manufacturers of fine writing paper in the early part of this year, who met at Springfield, Mass., and raised the price of writing paper from thirteen and fourteen cents a pound to seventeen cents for flat cap, and from fifteen to twenty-five cents for letter and note paper.

1862            The catalogue of the Austrian department of the London International Exhibition, drawn up in three languages, was printed partly on paper made from the stalks and husks alone of maize, or Turkish wheat, and partly from a mixture of maize with linen and cotton rags. 1862. All the paper mills in Trenton, N. J., suspended operations because they could not get cash for the manufactured article, and had been heavy losers by the failure of consignees in the city of New York. The number of mills in Trenton was four.

1862            Jan. 16. The paper mill of Messrs. Bestow [?] and Fairchild, at Williamsville, was destroyed by fire, at a loss of $20,000, partially covered by insurance.—Buff. Express.

1862            Feb. 15. The paper mill of Charles Van Benthuysen at Cohoes was burnt. He stated his loss at $15,000. It had been constructed in the best manner, three stories high, and was just ready to commence operations.

1862            April 21. The paper mill of E. P. Bussell, at Manlius, N. Y., was burnt.

1862            James Harper, of East Haven, Conn., patented an improvement in machinery for making paper. He combined, with the Fourdrinier wire-cloth apron, the couching belt, so arranged as to couch the paper from the wire-cloth by direct contact of the perforated cylinder, when those parts are so arranged that the cylinders support the wire-cloth and the couching-belt, respectively, directly opposite their points of contact with each other, and the combination with each other, when arranged, of the Fourdrinier wire-cloth, couching-belt, and beater.

1862            Henry Hayward, of Chicago, patented an improvement in safety paper; claiming the described means of designating varieties in the value or character of printed sheets of paper, in which threads of fibrous material are incorporated into and among the pulp, as described, to wit, the use of threads of different colours or characters arranged as specified.

1862            William McFarlane, of Glasgow, called attention to the value of the trash of the sugar cane as a material of paper, assuming that for every 2,200 tons of it 2,000 tons of finished pulp might be obtained. The cost in London was estimated thus; fuel, £1,000; wages of a skilful workman one year, £200; capital invested (£300), at 10 per cent, £30; loss by wear and tear, £30; freights from Jamaica to London, £7,000; and profits on the whole transaction, £10! the price of 2000 tons of pulp, £14,000 in London, being £7 per ton, or less than one half the price of rags.

1862            The paper makers held a meeting at the Astor House in the city of New York, in the autumn of this year, and resolved to increase the prices of printing paper. The result was that paper which had usually been sold for nine cents a pound was gradually increased to twenty-two, of the ordinary news quality, notwithstanding a vast quantity of old paper was procured from all quarters for stock.

1862            Oct. 6. The paper mill of D. & D. S. Mason & Co., at Bristol, N. H., was burnt. The building and machinery cost $18,000, and was insured.

1862            June 27. Louis Piette, editor of the Journal des Fabricants de Papier, died at Paris, aged 59. He published in 1831, a treatise on paper-making, which went through several editions, and had prepared the second edition of a treatise on the colouring of paper pulp, which was published the year after his death, with 229 specimens of coloured paper. Although educated for the bar, he devoted his life with eminent success to the improvement of the manufacture of paper, and received medals in England, France, and Germany for specimens which he produced at industrial exhibitions in those countries from 1842 to 1855.

1862            K W. Taylor and J. W. Brightman, of Cleveland, Ohio, patented an improvement in machines for drying sized paper.

1362            S. S. Crocker, of Lawrence, Mass., patented an improvement in machinery for cleaning pulp, by the combination of large and small receptacles, arranged to work together.

1862            H. D. Pochin, of England, prepared an anhydrous rosin-soap for sizing paper, as follows; take 150 parts by weight of rosin, 75 of soda ash, such as contains 46 per cent of alkali, and make the rosin-soap by beating and grinding. Then take 10 parts of such rosin-soap, and 18 of the ammoniate of alum, and form a solution of such a strength as may be required for paper of a common class. For fine paper, a rosin soap was made with 165 parts of rosin, and 165 parts of soda ash.

1862            The Niagara Falls Paper Mill Company received orders from New York to run paper on reels in quantities equal to about 2,000 sheets, as by an improvement in feeding the cylinder press, the paper was fed, cut and printed at one operation, saving the labour of eight men.

1862            It was stated by the London Mechanics’ Magazine that excellent paper was now made in Europe from the leaves of Indian corn; there being a paper mill in operation in Switzerland, and another in Austria, which made paper exclusively from that material.

1862            A paper mill on the Fox River, Illinois, was using considerable quantities of sorghum in the manufacture of wrapping paper, and the proprietors were putting in the necessary machinery for preparing it for printing paper.

1862            Nov. 21. Ordinary news paper, which sold early in the year at 8 cents net cash, was now 17 cents cash; all writing papers were at 40 cents a pound, and No. 1 printing, 30 cents.

1863            Henry Pemberton, of East Tarentum, Pa., patented the manufacture of pulp from the stalks of the sorgo sucre or Chinese sugar barre, as a substitute for linen and cotton rags in the manufacture of white or the better qualities of paper.

1863            A safety paper was invented in England, designed to prevent forgery or alteration of shares, bank notes, checks, bills, or any paper demanding security. It consisted of a single sheet formed of several layers of pulp, superposed, of different nature and colours, according to requirement. The middle layer of the paper required only to be coloured of a delible or destructible colour; the chemical acid employed in obliterating the writing would also destroy this colour, and it could not again be restored while the paper surface remained white.

1863            G. E.Eutledge, of Dayton, Ohio, improved the process of manufacture by a current in that portion of the fluid pulp in which the sieve cylinder rotates, in the direction corresponding therewith, by which the periphery of the cylinder and the fluid pulp in which it rests are relatively at rest.

1863            Dr. Aloyse Chevalier Auer de Welsbach, of Vienna, Austria, procured a patent in this country for a process of obtaining and separating the textile material contained in the husks, leaves, and stalks of Indian corn, by exposing the same, together with a solution of lime and soda, or equivalent substances, to the action of hot or boiling water, and preparing the material in a peculiar manner.

1863            John. F. Jones, of Rochester, N. Y., invented an improvement which consisted in a certain construction of what are termed the cylinder moulds, and the various kinds of boards produced from fibrous materials whereby provision is made for carrying away the water from their interiors through hollow journals, thereby dispensing with the use of packing inside of the vat by the substitution of stuffing boxes outside, thereby facilitating the repacking, and obviating much of the waste of stuff which is unavoidable with inside packing.

1863            James R.McElfatrick, of Fort Wayne, Indiana, obtained fibrous material from the bolls of the sycamore tree, for stock. It furnished a short staple of a buff colour, which was thought to be as suitable as any other fibre, and could be procured in unlimited quantities in the Western states.

1863            John F. Schuyler, of Philadelphia, patented some new machinery for planishing paper.

1863            A. H. Tait, of Jersey City, and W. H. Holbrook, of New York city, made an improvement in the manufacture of pulp, passing the straw between grinding surfaces, and treating the stock, after it has passed through a weak alkaline and chlorine treatment with or without acid, to a second application of weak alkali and chlorine, with or without acid.

1863            P. A. Chadbourne, of Williamstown, Massachusetts, patented a mode of manufacturing stock from wood, which consisted in rasping, filing, or scraping wood, while submerged in water, or saturated therewith, by the action or flow of a stream, whereby the fibre of the wood is strengthened or made sufficiently tough to avoid injury by the action of the rasps and other tools employed in the reducing of the wood, and a perfect separation of the individual or ultimate fibre from several united or connected fibres attained, and the rasps or other tools also kept, while in operation, in a perfectly clean state in proper working order.

1863            Stephen M. Allen, of Woburn, Mass., obtained a patent for the manufacture of paper from wood, by cutting the wood in suitable lengths, crushing it in such a manner as to preserve the integrity of the fibre in its longitudinal direction, alternating, steeping, and washing the same at increased temperatures, and finally boiling, grinding, and bleaching the same.

1863            Jonathan Faw, of Lockland, Ohio, obtained a patent for an improvement in the rag engine.

1863            A company was formed, composed of proprietors of the wood-pulp patent, who purchased the interest of C. S. Buchanan in his patents for making paper of straw.

1863            The importation of esparto grass, or alfa fibre, into Great Britain during this year was about 18,000 tons, and the use of it was estimated to have caused an increased consumption of 4,000 tons per annum of soda ash and bleaching powders. Nearly all the news paper used contained portions of it, and some of the cheaper grades consisted of only one-fourth rag material.

1863            A new pulp-strainer was invented by Henry Watson, of Newcastle on Tyne, and Joseph Millbourn, of Dartford, England.

1863            John Cowper, of England, made an improvement in the mode of reducing rags and waste substances generally, by means of an endless feeder, upon which the material to be operated on is fed between a pair of fluted rollers, which deliver it to a rotating cylinder provided with teeth.

1863            Congress reduced the duty on printing paper to three per cent, at the request of the publishers, who asked for a total repeal of all duty. The high price of exchange nullified all benefit to them of the reduction of the custom.

1863            Stephen M. Allen, of Woburn, Mass., claimed the invention of a new article of manufacture, which he denominated tibrilia leather, or leather paper, consisting of leather scraps and vegetable fibre combined; also, the combining leather scraps steeped in warm water previous to being immersed in alkaline solution with the unrotted and reduced fibre of flax, hemp, or other like vegetable fibre.

1863            G. S. Sellers, of Hardin county, Illinois, made an improvement in preparing woody fibre for paper stock, by pressure in the line or nearly so of the fibre.

1863            J. F. Jones, of Rochester, N. Y., improved the machine for making paper and paper boards. He claimed, 1. The arrangement and combination of two or more cylinder-moulds, vats, felts, and press-rolls, whereby, in the same machine, any desired number of continuous webs of pulp of indefinite length may be either deposited one upon another for the continuous manufacture of boards, or may be kept separate from each other for the manufacture of several continuous distinct sheets of paper. 2. The combination with such a system of cylinder-moulds, vats, felts, and press-rolls, of a series of guide-rolls, for separating the several webs of pulp as they are delivered from the press-rolls. 3. The combination of such system of cylinder-moulds as herein before specified, and a continuous series of drying-cylinders and calendering-rolls, in such manner that the manufacture of boards or of several webs of paper may be carried on by a continuous process. 4. The arrangement of several spouts, pipes, and valves, and self-acting feed-gate, in combination with each other and with the several vats. 5. The save-all, composed of a vat, a cylinder-mould, a coucher and a scraper combined and applied in connection with one or more paper-making machines. 6. The combination of pressrolls, to obtain two pressures from three rolls. 7. The employment of calender-rolls on the top of drying cylinders, to equalize the water in the board, and make it of uniform dryness as it passes over the dryers, and partially effect the glazing and calendering process while the board is being dried.

1863            J. B. Fuller, of Claremont, N. H., discovered a new mode of preparing vegetable fibre for paper. He claimed, 1. curing vegetable fibre in a vessel by means of jets of steam. 2. An open grinder, receiving the fibrous material directly from the curing vessel, so that the grinding operation is independent of that of the curing, but the vegetable fibre is ground while hot. 3. Separating the fibre from the overflow water by means of the sieve and brush. 4. Heating the interior of the grinder by the introduction of steam. 5. A column of water rising sufficiently above the grinder to produce the hydrostatic pressure necessary for curing the fibrous materials to pass through the grinder, as specified. 6. The double volute, a spiral channel for cooling the cured vegetable fibre and imparting the heat thereof to the uncured vegetable material travelling in the intervening volute channels in the opposite direction, was composed of three layers of different thicknesses, of which the central was coloured with a delible or easily removable colour, and the external layers charged with silicate of magnesia or other mineral or vegetable matter.

1863            M. L. Keen, of Roger’s Ford, Pa., patented a boiler for making pulp, provided with a perforated diaphragm or well; also an arrangement of the discharge pipe and valve for the purpose of blowing out or discharging the contents of the boiler under pressure.

1863            The imports of paper at the port of New York were $125,141, yielding a revenue of $39,684; at Boston, $306,840, yielding a revenue of $90,688; at Baltimore and Philadelphia, none ; giving a total revenue of $130,372. The secretary said it was impossible to state how much of this was for printing paper, but expressed the opinion that the diminution of the tariff would considerably increase the revenue. An effort was made by publishers to get the duty removed, on account of the high price of paper.

1863            Feb. 16. The newspaper and book publishers of Boston appeared before the legislature of Massachusetts to urge the importance of memorializing congress for relief against the paper monopoly, as it was termed. It was shown that the cost of school books alone was five millions of dollars annually, and that this combination added twenty per cent, thereto.

1863            William Boaler, of Manchester, Eng., invented an improved dyer fabric for paper-making; which consisted in the substitution of a more suitable kind of cloth for the ordinary dryer felt in use for expelling and absorbing moisture.

1863            Rags were exported from Madras this year to the amount of 2,022 cwts., being the first time that this article had appeared in the list of exports from that place.

1863            Experiments were made in England with potatoes for the production of half-stuff’, for coarse and fine paper, by one Sellers.

1863            It was stated that paper was made at this time in large quantity from the swamp-flag, or cat-tail, and that the demand for it was greater than the supply; that it was used for card-board, and paper-hangings, for which it was well adapted.

1863            Feb. 28. The paper mill of G. & W. U. Moore, on the Katerkil, was destroyed by fire. Loss $8000; insured $4000.

1863            Jan. 14. The entire edition of the Boston Journal was for the first time printed on paper made of basswood, tilia americana.

1863            Joseph Prosper Olier, of Paris, France, took out a patent in this country for a safety paper, which was composed of three layers of different thicknesses, of which the central was coloured with a delible or easily removable colour, and the external layers charged with silicate of magnesia, or other mineral or vegetable matter.

1864            Feb. 19. The paper manufacturers and paper companies of Great Britain and Ireland, 211 in number, representing 271 mills, petitioned parliament for an abatement of taxes and the exertion of the government for the removal of all restrictions abroad upon the export of all paper-making materials — the export duties in some parts of Italy having been doubled in amount; that in France and Belgium a duty of £5 per ton was levied on the export of rags; in Holland upwards of £4 per ton ; and more than £9 per ton in Prussia and the Zollverein; while the export from England was free.

1864       The official statistics of the French customs exhibit the following returns for the first five months of three years, on paper and pasteboard:

1862. 6,156,000 francs.

1863. 6,993,000 fr.

1864. 8,159,000 fr.

1864            Feb. 21. The steam paper mill of Chauncey Watson, at Middleburgh, was burnt. Loss $8000; insured for $4000.

1864            Feb. 13. The boiler in Buchanan & Bullard’s paper mill at Schuylerville, N. Y., exploded, and passed through eleven buildings, killing two persons, and destroying the building in which it had been used.

1864            George A. Corser, of Leicester, Mass., invented an angular bed-plate for engines, for working stock; it is described as composed of two or more sets of angular plates, arranged in such a manner that the angles of the adjoining sets are inverted in relation to each other.

1864            The price of newspaper reached 28 cents, a pound, and fine book paper 45cts. A renewed research was made among the garrets and store-rooms, induced by the payment of 8 cents a pound for waste paper. Thousands of tons of old books and newspapers, school and account books, correspondence and business papers of all sorts, were turned over to the mills, without lessening the price of white paper.

1864            George Escor Sellers, Sellers Landing, 111., discovered a method of preparing disintegrated vegetable fibre for paper stock, by the removal or change in the nature of the incrusting or adhering non-fibrous matter by fermentation and washings, previous to bleaching with chlorine. 2. The use of chlorine as a solvent for the non-fibrous portions of vegetable substances that have become discoloured and hardened by heat in the process of disintegration, combined with boiling and hot-water washing to remove them from the fibre previously to bleaching. Mr. Sellers also patented a mode of forming, drying, and packing paper stock; claiming the above-described mode of reducing pulp to a condition for transportation, by a system of alternate exhaustion and compression; also the use of the same mode for the combination of pulp or fibre and other matters of various qualities, for the purpose of producing boards or cards suitable for use in the arts.

1864            W. F. Ladd, of Tarrytown, and S. A. Walsh, of New York city, invented a boiler for pressing vegetable substances. In this improved apparatus the material to be reduced to pulp is to be treated either with or without alkali, and is at all times submerged in the liquor or solution employed in the boiling process. By an arrangement of a perforated diaphragm in the boiler the material is kept at a certain point while the liquor rises above it, and the heat is applied either by a coil of steam, or by a travelling furnace arranged to run back and forth under the boiler; this furnace can be removed when it becomes necessary to stop the boiling; the contents can then be discharged through a grate into any suitable receiver.

1864            Philip Lichtenstadt, of New York city, patented a process for preparing fibre from the bamboo; separating and disintegrating the fibre contained in that article, by treating it with a solution of lime, nitrate of soda, and oxalic acid, and preparing the textile material for manufacturing purposes. He made experiments under disadvantages at a mill near New York.

1864            J. A. Roth, of Philadelphia, patented a mode of preparing fibrous material from corn -stalks, by solving and abstracting the components of the stalks by the application of one or more water baths in a boiling state, over 212 ° Fahr. 2. The use of the chemical agent, after the water bath or the boiling of the material under treatment has been completed. 3. The combination of treatment or process of the fibres of the stalks, and also the neutralizing of substances still adhering to the fibres after being washed by the application of sulphuric acid or its equivalent.

1864            Henry F. Anthony, of New York city, invented a mode of albumenizing paper by combining or mixing the nitrate of ammonia directly with the albumenizing fluid.

1864            A. K. Eaton, of New York city, patented a process of manufacturing paper-pulp from straw or other substances, by subjecting it to a grinding process, commencing in the early stages of the treatment with hot alkalis, and continuing the grinding in connection with the alkaline treatment, 2. Purifying the alkali held in solution in the refuse liquor by passing it through a filter, rendering it suitable for use again, and completely reproducing it when necessary by making it into combustible cakes.

1864            During the last thirty years calico had been the favourite material for book covers; but it was so increased in price, owing to the war, that an enterprising firm conceived the idea of forming a paper substance having all the strength and flexibility of cloth, to take its place outside of books. This substance appears to receive gilt impressions with the distinctness of morocco, and as it can be washed with soap and water when dirty, it may be surmised that hereafter the phrase, “musty” literature, will fall into disuse. It is said that its cost will be something like one-half the price of the present embossed cloth.

1864            July 20. The extensive paper mill of—Nixon at Manayunk, near Philadelphia, was destroyed by fire. Loss over $100,000.

1864            John F. Jones sold the Genesee paper mills at the Lower falls to the Rochester Paper Company, for $25,000. They commenced business with a capital of $100,000, and contemplated an extensive business, including the manufacture of straw and junk board.

1864            The exports from France of paper and pasteboard, for the first four months of this year, were 6,269,000 francs; against 5,624,000 francs for same period in 1863, and 4,925,000 francs in 1862.

1864            It was announced that an active trade was carried on in Chester county, Pa., in poplar wood, designed for the manufacture of paper. The mills at Springfield were run by ‘New York capitalists, and were extensive. The price given for the wood delivered on the line of Chester Valley Pail Road, was four dollars a cord.

1864            Lucien Bardoux, of Poitiers, France, took out a patent for a process of making pulp for paper and paste-board, adapted to vegetable as well as animal substances, which had been patented in his own country in 1861.

1864            Jacob Storer, of Portsmouth, N. H., invented a mode of preparing vegetable fibre by the use of steam and vapour of water for conveying alkalis and other chemicals.

1864            Richard Magee, of Philadelphia, invented a mode of coating writing paper, which he obtained a patent for as a new article of manufacture.

1864            W. B. Newbery, of Dorchester, Mass., patented a mode of producing paper from espartero, or Spanish grass, either alone, or in combination with manila, jute, gunny or other fibrous materials.

1864            The paper makers of Great Britain complained of the injury which their trade sustained by the recent commercial treaty with France. Mr. Maguire addressed the house of commons on the 20th July, representing the grievances of the trade, and demanding an investigation. The complaint was of the tax of 12 per cent, on rags exported from France. Notwithstanding the tax, Great Britain imported 4,215,630 kilograms during the year preceding, from France.

1864            The manufacturers of straw paper in several departments of France met at Avignon 22d May, and resolved to form an association, and to establish a minimum price for their fabrics. They decided to augment their prices from 1 to 2 francs per 100 kilograms (about two to four dollars per ton). The manufacturers of another portion of France met at Avignon on the 16th June, and resolved to increase their prices 2 francs on thick and 4 francs on thin paper per 100 kil. A general meeting of the straw manufacturers of the empire was to be held at Paris on the 5th August; and on the 11th of the same month a convention of the paper makers of all denominations was called at Paris, to consult upon affairs of trade.

1864            The Journal des Fabricants de Papier, of France, calculated the annual consumption of paper in the world at from thirty-one to thirty-two millions of quintals; that the English employed annually 15 millions; France 5 millions; the German states, 1 million; Austria ½ million; and the rest of the world 10 millions of quintals.

1864            The duty on rags exported from Russia by its western frontier was reduced one-half; that is, from 14f francs to 7? francs per kilometre.

1864            Docks were established in Paris for the accommodation of the manufactures of paper in the departments, to facilitate trade in their products.