page_title: Claremont, New Hampshire
section_title: Industry
hierarchical_section_title: Claremont, New Hampshire / History / Industry
caption_attribution_description: English: Ashley's Ferry, Claremont, New Hampshire. Established by Col. Joseph I. Hubbard, the Connecticut River ferry between Claremont and Weathersfield, Vermont was taken over by Oliver Ashley in 1784. The site is now Ashley's Ferry boat ramp.
context_page_description: Claremont is the only city in Sullivan County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 13,355 at the 2010 census, and in 2019 the population was estimated at 12,932.
context_section_description: Claremont's first millwright was Col. Benjamin Tyler, who arrived in the area from Farmington, Connecticut, in the spring of 1767. Tyler built mills using stone quarried from his land on nearby Mount Ascutney, and built Claremont's first mill on the Sugar River on the site of the Coy Paper Mill. Tyler also invented the wry-fly water wheel, which was the subject of the Supreme Court case Tyler v. Tuel. His grandson John Tyler evolved the technology to create the Tyler Water Wheel and the Tyler Turbine. Tyler's grandson was Benjamin Tyler Henry, inventor of the Henry Repeating rifle, manufactured in neighboring Windsor, Vermont, and used in the Civil War.
  The water power harnessed from the Sugar River brought the town prosperity during the Industrial Revolution. Large brick factories were built along the stream, including the Sunapee Mills, Monadnock Mills, Claremont Machine Works, Home Mills, Sanford & Rossiter, and Claremont Manufacturing Company. Principal products were cotton and woolen textiles, lathes and planers, and paper. Although like other New England mill towns, much industry moved away or closed in the 20th century, the city's former prosperity is evident in some fine Victorian architecture, including the 1897 city hall and opera house.
  In 1874, businesses in Claremont included Monadnock Mills, manufacturing cotton cloths from one to three yards wide, Marseilles quilts, union flannels, and lumber, and employing 125 males and 225 females; Home Mill (A. Briggs & Co.) producing cotton cloth and employing 8 males and 20 females; Sullivan Machine Co., manufacturing Steam Dimond Drill Machinery for quarrying rock, turbine water wheels, cloth measuring machines, and doing general machine and mill work, employing 56 males; Sugar River Paper Mill Co., manufacturing printing paper and employing 30 males and 20 females; Claremont Manufacturing Co., manufacturing paper and books, and doing stereotyping and book and job printing, employing 34 males and 34 females; Russell Jarvis, manufacturing hanging paper and employing 7 males and 2 females; John S. Farrington, manufacturing straw wrapping paper and employing 5 males and 1 female; Sullivan Mills (George L. Balcom), manufacturing black doeskins and employing 20 males and 18 females; Charles H. Eastman, in the leather business and employing 4 males; Sugar River Mill Co., manufacturing flour, feed, and doing custom grinding, and employing 8 males; three saw mills employing a part of the year, 10 males; Blood & Woodcock, in the business of monuments and grave stones and employing 8 males; and Houghton, Bucknam & Co., in the business of sashes, doors and blinds, employing 8 males.
  The Monadnock Mills Co. and Sullivan Mills Co. were responsible the two most prominent collections of manufacturing structures in the Lower Village District. Monadnock Mills' textile operations began with its founding in 1842, and lasted through 1932, shuttering operations following the decline of the textile industry in New England during the 1920s. By the 1920s, Sullivan Mills Co. had become New Hampshire's largest machining company, as well as Claremont's largest employer. Sullivan's Machinery division merged with Joy Mining Machinery in 1946, becoming Joy Manufacturing Co. Its founder, inventor Joseph Francis Joy, stayed on as general manager of the facility. which remained the dominant employer in Claremont through the 1970s, when manufacturing technology had advanced sufficiently to hamper sales and productivity. Parts of the campus suffered fires in 1979 and 1981, and the branch was closed in 1983 and sold in 1984.
caption: Ashley's Ferry, circa 1906
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