Palmer, Newton & Company’s Salamander and Albany Fire Brick Works provided the specialized brick needed for stove linings, furnaces, and various manufacturing processes. That they were located on Rathbone St. (now no more than an alley footpath, and appropriately named for any one of a number of the stove-building Rathbones) is no surprise; they would have been adjacent to some of the big stove-makers of Albany.
Bishop’s “A History of American Manufactures from 1608 to 1860” (Volume 2, mind you) speaks well of this enterprise:
To obtain linings that were good conductors of heat, and yet strong enough to bear transportation without fracture, has long been a desideratum of Stove and Range manufacturers, and judging from the extent of their business, we infer that this firm has attained the desired result. They supply not only the foundries of Albany and Troy, but the extensive Range manufacturers of Boston and Providence, and also many dealers in New York, Baltimore, and other places. Among the specialties of this firm’s manufactures, we might mention fire Brick Grates for Thompson’s patent furnace for burning wet tan. This improvement is of immense value to tanners, enabling them to use as fuel the tan which was heretofore an encumbrance to them, and thus save not only the expense of its removal, but of purchasing other fuel.
This billhead from the Biggert Collection dates to 1863 and depicts the factory with that industrial age enthusiasm for smoke-filled skies. The letter’s author is sending bricks for a stove that he acknowledges will not fit, and suggests that perhaps the recipient could cut them down. I’m not sure what tool I would use here in the 21st century to cut down firebrick, but whatever it would be, I’m betting it wasn’t around in the 19th century.
Related articles:
- S.H. Ransom – again with the stoves (hoxsie.org)
- Rathbone, Sard & Co. – The Acorn Line (hoxsie.org)
- Fuller, Warren & Co. Stoves (hoxsie.org)
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