Forgotten Tales in Forgotten Objects: Carriages of the L.C. Bates Museum

Emily Ambeliotis

Fig. 1. Training Sulky. Hinckley, Maine: L.C. Bates Museum. Photo: Emily Ambeliotis.

Although the L.C. Bates Museum’s founder, George Walter Hinckley, believed deeply in the power of museums to serve as an educational tool, claiming they were of equal importance to schools as libraries, the educational merits of the museum’s Vehicles and Presses exhibit are not 2 obvious at first glance (Goff). Relegated to the basement of the museum and displayed among heaps of rusting farming tools, the exhibit’s horse-drawn carriages blend in with the dusty scene and many are in desperate need of restoration (figs. 1 and 2). In this paper, I will argue that the neglected state of these carriages parallels the overlooked American carriage-makers, who pioneered methods of industrial production of vehicles often attributed to the automobile industry. I will first introduce the carriages of the L.C. Bates Museum; second, explain the evolution of carriage industry; and finally, describe how carriage-makers transformed the industry to build world-renowned businesses that paved the way for automobile production in the early to mid-1900’s.

Fig. 2. Sulky and Shay. Hinckley: L.C. Bates Museum. Photo: Emily Ambeliotis.

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The Origins of the American Carriage Trade

To better understand the value of the carriages in the L.C. Bates Museum, we must first look at the two-part evolution of carriages as both carriers of goods and people. By the early 17th century, animal-drawn carts had long been in use in England and fashionable coaches had begun to reach popularity among London’s upper classes (Stratton 270). Founders of the Colony of

Massachusetts Bay enlisted English wheelwrights as early as 1629 to build carts and wagons for farming purposes (Stratton 397). From the mid-1600’s through the mid-1700’s, wealthy colonists in cities such as New York, Boston, and Philadelphia slowly began to ride coaches, emulating the habits of the British upper-class. During this period, the demand for coaches surpassed that which the few American craftsmen could supply, resulting in increased importations of carriages and horses from Europe. The first prominent vehicle repair shops emerged in the 1770s and, following Congress’s ban of imported English carriages after the Declaration of Independence, many repair shops transitioned to carriage-making (Stratton 402). The carriages in highest demand over the following years of the Revolutionary War were those suited for carrying guns.

By 1788, however, American carriage-makers had shifted their production back to pleasure- riding coaches and founded the coach-maker’s society, whose membership consisted of the six most prolific carriage-makers of New York City (Stratton 405). The carriage trade had become a significant contributor to the national economy; sales were accordingly subject to a luxury tax beginning in 1794 (Stratton 416).

The ability of American carriage-makers to respond to local demand and produce a wide-range of quality vehicles led them to ultimately dominate global carriage-makers. Early pioneers of carriages in New England included James Brewster of New Haven, Connecticut and Lewis 4

Downing of Concord, New Hampshire. Brewster opened his shop in 1811, capitalizing on the demand for lighter pleasure vehicles due to local infrastructure improvements. His success over the next decade led him to relocate to New York in 1827 (Mitchell 17). Surprisingly, Brewster was an early proponent of the railroad industry, even becoming the first president of the railroad line between Hartford and New Haven. Brewster correctly predicted that railroads would not replace carriages, but stimulate the economy outside of cities and support local carriage industries (Mitchell 17). In New Hampshire, Downing opened his carriage shop in the 1810s, which would become home to the world-famous Concord wagon and coach (Mitchell 18). The

Concord coach was constructed to withstand the rugged conditions of New England roads and became preferred over English coaches in rural South Africa and Australia during the 19th century (Mitchell 18). Following the peak of the horse and buggy age in the late 1800’s,

American carriages became the most popular worldwide, due to the country’s high volumes of native wood, specialized mechanics, and craftsmen (Mitchell 24).

Fig. 3. Mail cart, Portland, Maine, 1890. Photograph. Portland, Maine: Maine Historical Society. [Vintage Maine Images] 5

Successful carriage-makers produced all types of vehicles to support both changes in the needs of carts for transporting commodities and changing tastes of coaches for the elite. For the majority of the 1800’s, carriages were the main carriers of mail (fig. 3) and used for farming and emergency services (Duggan 2). Across America, as the number of farms doubled between 1860 and 1870, carriage-makers shifted their production to fill the increasing demand. During the

Civil War, carriage-makers also began producing gun carriages, ambulances, and other government wagons (Mitchell 20). Among the elite, coaches used for pleasure rides served as status symbols. The riders’ tastes were portrayed in the style of carriage, the breed of the horse, and decorative fashionings, which may have changed on a seasonal basis (McShane and Tarr

87).

Fig. 4. Road cart. Hinckley, Maine: L.C. Bates Museum. Photo: Emily Ambeliotis.

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Fig. 5. Early buggy. Hinckley, Maine: L.C. Bates Museum. Photo: Emily Ambeliotis.

The carriages on display in the L.C. Bates Museum exhibit served as both service vehicles and pleasure vehicles. The road cart sulky and the early, buggy-style cart likely transported produce or mail figs. 4 and 5). The sulkies, shay, and piano-box buggy each represent fashionable designs for pleasure riding (figs. 6 and 7). Pleasure vehicles up through the mid- to late 1800’s were still predominantly ridden by the urban elite; by the turn of the 20th century, however, carriages had become more affordable and widely available to the middle-class (Berkebile). The ability of rural

Mainers to afford such vehicles would not have been possible without the transformations made in carriage production during the peak of the American horse and buggy age. 7

Fig. 6. Alonzo Garcelon and his daughter pose with his one-horse shay on East Avenue in front of their family farm. 1905. Lewiston, Maine: Muskie Archives and Special Collections.

Fig. 7. Piano-Box Buggy. Hinckley, Maine: L.C. Bates Museum. Photo: Emily Ambeliotis 8

The Evolution of Carriage Production

Changes in the methods of carriage production by American carriage-makers accelerated increases in varieties of the vehicles and the vehicles’ popularity. In his first year of business,

Downing singlehandedly crafted each of his carriages without power machinery. Over the next decade, he upscaled his shop, employing around forty men in specialized branches, ranging from blacksmithing to trimming (Mitchell 19). Increased demand for carriages led to the transition from carriage-makers to carriage-assemblers, in which shops like Downing’s pieced together factory-made parts. Messrs G. and D. Cook of New Haven were the first to incorporate mass- production into their shops in the 1850s, employing around three hundred men, who could collectively produce a carriage an hour (Mitchell 25). The advent of mass-production did not diminish the ability of carriage-builders to create specialized vehicles for a wide range of purposes and riders. Between 1836 and 1902, the U.S. Patent Office issued over 25,000 patents for various carriages, wagons and associated parts (Duggan 2). During the 1860s and 1870s, the transition from blacksmiths to machines facilitated price reductions while improving quality

(Duggan 2).

Carriage-making set the foundation for innovative manufacturing and business techniques often attributed to the automobile industry. The Carriage Builders National Association (CNBA) was a private organization founded in 1872 that sought to mitigate competition amongst industry leaders by stabilizing prices, through releasing dimensions of models, calculating manufacturing costs, and pricing repairs by cities, among other efforts. Carriage-makers, however, resorted to branding to keep up the high costs of their luxury carriages by altering models, opening showrooms, and designing large magazine spreads (Duggan 9). In the 1880s, the CNBA 9 sponsored a technical school that emphasized all aspects of carriage-making, from artistry to manufacturing technique and business management skills. The technical school educated thousands of carriage-makers from the late 1800’s through the early 1900’s, anticipating government-sponsored vocational programs for educating automobile mechanics and drivers, which did not emerge until the first World War (Duggan 9). The CNBA technical school set the foundation for future vocational schools, providing transferable skills to vehicle-makers and using the practices of successful carriage brands to transform the automobile industry.

The transition from carriages to automobiles began in the late 1800s in American cities; by the

1930’s, automobiles had become the preferred vehicle of transportation for the middle class

(Geels 445). The transition in cities from horse-drawn to motorized vehicles involved a series of intermediary innovations in horse-drawn public transportation, infrastructural improvements, and the expansion of the professional working class, who could afford and make use of electric vehicles (Geels 446). Horse-drawn vehicles such as those displayed in the L.C. Bates Museum likely remained popular in rural areas after the transition to automobiles in American cities, due to delayed expansions of smoother roads and electricity.

Conclusion

In this essay, I have sought to explain how carriages were not just an inevitable step toward motorized vehicles, but complex inventions that propelled American businesses to world renown and laid the crucial foundation on which the American automobile industry would thrive.

Though not as eye-catching as Charles Hubbard’s dioramas, the minerals, or many of the other collections of the L.C. Bates Museum, the carriages of the Vehicles and Presses room offer 10 hidden insights to the curious visitor. Museum visitors would be wise to pay a visit to this basement exhibit, for the vehicles displayed within, though unassuming in appearance, carry histories that are truly fascinating.

Sources Cited

Berkebile, Don H. Carriage Terminology: An Historical Dictionary. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian, 2014.

Duggan, Edward P. “The Education of American Carriage Makers, 1880–1916.” The Journal of Transport History 11.1 (1990): 1–11.

Goff, Rachel. “The Beginning of the L.C. Bates Museum”

Geels, F. W. “The Dynamics of Transitions in Socio-technical Systems: A Multi-level Analysis of the Transition Pathway from Horse-drawn Carriages to Automobiles (1860–1930).” Technology Analysis & Strategic Management 17.4 (2005): 445–478.

McShane, Clay, and Tarr, Joel. Horse in the City: Living Machines in the Nineteenth Century. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007.

Mitchell, Edwin V. The Horse and Buggy Age in New England. New York: Coward-McCann, Inc., 1937.

Stratton, Ezra M. The World on Wheels: Or, Carriages, with Their Historical Associations from the Earliest to the Present Time, Including a Selection from the American Centennial Exhibition. Boston: The author, 1878.