Vulcan Iron Works Negatives 1971.210
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Vulcan Iron Works negatives 1971.210 This finding aid was produced using ArchivesSpace on September 14, 2021. Description is written in: English. Describing Archives: A Content Standard Audiovisual Collections PO Box 3630 Wilmington, Delaware 19807 [email protected] URL: http://www.hagley.org/library Vulcan Iron Works negatives 1971.210 Table of Contents Summary Information .................................................................................................................................... 3 Historical Note ............................................................................................................................................... 4 Scope and Content ......................................................................................................................................... 4 Administrative Information ............................................................................................................................ 6 Related Materials ........................................................................................................................................... 7 Controlled Access Headings .......................................................................................................................... 8 Collection Inventory ....................................................................................................................................... 8 Railroad ........................................................................................................................................................ 8 Locomotives .............................................................................................................................................. 8 Equipment ............................................................................................................................................. 213 Charts, specifications, and advertisements ........................................................................................... 221 Correspondence ..................................................................................................................................... 225 Mining and manufacturing equipment .................................................................................................... 229 Factory, mill, and shop views ................................................................................................................. 302 Drawings .................................................................................................................................................. 319 Air compressor fittings ......................................................................................................................... 319 Brakes for mine applications ................................................................................................................ 320 Cast drums for electric engines ............................................................................................................ 323 Cement kilns general plans and accessories ........................................................................................ 337 Coal: cages, elevators, jigs, and sheaves ............................................................................................. 349 Conical drums for electric engines ....................................................................................................... 354 Electric locomotives general plans ....................................................................................................... 362 Fans and accessories ............................................................................................................................. 365 Floor plans of vulcan buildings ............................................................................................................ 373 Hoists, parts, accessories and repairs ................................................................................................... 373 Link Belt Co. ........................................................................................................................................ 429 Locomotive details and general plans .................................................................................................. 438 Nicholson automatic engine stops ........................................................................................................ 461 Steam locomotives and accessories ...................................................................................................... 462 Varieties of engines, largely for use in coal mines .............................................................................. 474 Wood lagged drums for electric hoists ................................................................................................ 481 People ....................................................................................................................................................... 484 - Page 2 - Vulcan Iron Works negatives 1971.210 Summary Information Repository: Audiovisual Collections Creator: Vulcan Iron Works Title: Vulcan Iron Works negatives ID: 1971.210 Date [inclusive]: circa 1880s-1943, 1948 Physical Description: 175 Linear Feet General Physical 7,675 glass plate negatives : b&w ; 8 x 10 in. or smaller. 1,400 Description: negatives : b&w ; 8 x 10 in. 2400 photographic prints: b&w ; 8 x 10 in. Language of the English . Material: Abstract: Vulcan Iron Works was a producer of mine and industrial locomotives, mine hoists, and other colliery machinery. Vulcan's locomotives were designed for mine, logging, plantation and factory work, including steam, electric and battery models for underground haulage. A large number were sold to strip mine and earth moving contractors. The majority of the collection consists of original negatives (glass plate and film) dating from about the 1880s to 1943. These are builder's photographs, recording the construction of locomotives and machinery, although there are some photographs of the plants themselves (interiors and exteriors), employees at work, the town of Wilkes-Barre, and equipment installed and in service, particularly at collieries in the anthracite fields. About half the pictures are of locomotives and the rest are of mining equipment. There are also 1,340 negatives of drawings and plans, chiefly of mining equipment hoists. The collection also contains about 2,400 copy photographs made to preserve the images on original nitrate negatives which had extensively deteriorated. The collection is organized into five series: Railroad; Mining and manufacturing equipment; Factory, mill, and shop views; Drawings; and People. ^ Return to Table of Contents - Page 3- Vulcan Iron Works negatives 1971.210 Historical Note Vulcan Iron Works was a producer of mine and industrial locomotives, mine hoists, and other colliery machinery. Vulcan's locomotives were designed for mine, logging, plantation and factory work, including steam, electric and battery models for underground haulage. A large number were sold to strip mine and earth moving contractors. Richard Jones (1816-1847) founded the Vulcan Iron Works in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, in 1849 to produce specialty iron products for the local anthracite coal industry. The company incorporated in 1867. By 1881 its facilities included a machine shop, a foundry, a blacksmith-boiler shop, and a pattern store and office, all located near the Lehigh Valley Railroad, the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad, and the Pennsylvania Canal. In addition to general machine work, the company made mining machinery, castings, and forgings. Branch shops were built in West Pittston and Tamaqua, Pennsylvania, and in 1888 Vulcan acquired the Wyoming Valley Manufacturing Company, makers of locomotives. This soon became a major part of Vulcan's activities, with the company making all types and sizes of locomotives for domestic and foreign industries. The company did a modest export business to Canada, Latin America, Russia and East Asia. Vulcan's other product lines consisted primarily of material movement and processing machinery: hoisting engines, shaft cages, bucket elevators, crushers, picking tables and jigs for separating slate from coal, as well as mine fans. Most were sold to coal mining firms in the Appalachian coal fields and to remote operations of firms like Bethlehem Steel that were headquartered in Pennsylvania. It also sold grinding mills and rotary kilns to the portland cement industry that grew up on the southeastern border of the anthracite fields as well as some sugarcane processing machinery in Louisiana and Cuba. World War I led to further expansion, and in 1919 Vulcan built a steel plant with open-hearth furnaces to supply their needs. By 1929 the company employed about 1,600 persons, manufacturing locomotives (both gasoline and diesel-electric) and electric hoists for mines. The collapse of the anthracite industry in the 1930s destroyed a large part of the company's market, and heavy trucks gradually replaced locomotives in stripping and construction haulage. Locomotive production ended with builder's number 4877 in May 1949. Machinery production continued into the mid-1950s. ^ Return to Table of Contents Scope and Content The majority of the collection consists of original negatives (glass plate and film) dating from about the 1880s to 1943. These are builder's photographs, recording the construction