The Paper Mill at Catawissa, 1895
"The largest manufacturing establishment in Catawissa was the paper mill established in 1811 by Benjamin Sharpless.
Benjamin Sharpless 1764-1857
He was a resident of Sunbury, and while on a visit to a brother in Ohio became acquainted with the process of papermaking.
A History of Columbia County, Pennsylvania From the Earliest Times
By John Gosse Freeze · 1888
Returning to Catawissa, he formed a partnership with John Clark, bought the old Shoemaker gristmill, and altered it to accommodate for the estate, until was sold to Edward and John McReady of Philadelphia.
It was destroyed by fire in 1882, but soon rebuilt for the exclusive manufacture of wood pulp.
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PAPER MILL BURNED.
The paper mill at Catawissa was burned last night. It was operated by McCready & Co., of Philadelphia. The loss, is estimated at $75,000. About 150 man are thrown out of employment. Daily globe. (St. Paul, Minn.), April 21, 1883.
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1884
1897
McCready Brothers met with financial reverses and the plant was sold at sheriffs sale to a syndicate which reorganized it as the Pennsylvania Paper Mills in 1900.
Paper Mill shown in the bottom right corner
After three years operation, the mills closed down to install modern machinery to double the output, but the new equipment was mainly experimental and did not fulfill expectations, so that after the expenditure of $275,000, the mills passed into the hands of a receiver.
Employees of The Paper Mill, 1904
1908
The plant was then appraised at $396, 000. The receiver failed to rehabilitate the mill, and at the end of two years it was sold by order of the court to the New York and Pennsylvania Paper Company, owners of five other mills.
They dismantled the mill, distributed the machinery among other plants, and in 1913 sold the buildings to Mrs. Josephine Beckly.
A portion of the plant is now [1915] used by Clinton F. and Frederick Long as a manufactory. They produce the Panama Canal Puzzle, a simply constructed glider for children and an adjustable stilt which can be made to fit almost any child. These toys they have designed and patented themselves, and from a small beginning have built up a trade that covers the entire union and reached into some foreign countries.
Starting in 1912 with a small workshop, they now have a capacity for almost unlimited employ in the busy season sixty hands." - Historical and biographical annals of Columbia and Montour counties, Pennsylvania By J.H. Beers, 1915
Central Forging Co, Catawissa (The Former Paper Mill)
Located on the "North Side Of Catawissa Creek" in the old Paper Mill, Central Forging Company was created in 1918. The company manufactured Steel Unions. Fred Long, an employee of the company, became it's president in 1922.
When Central Forging fell into financial difficulties, Maxi Manufacturing purchased the companies assets and formed a subsidiary, Catawissa Valve and Fittings Co.
Pennsylvania Paper Mills
Closed & Idle Since 1911
As Shown On The 1913 Sanborn Fire Map
On the 1930 Sanborn Fire Map, The Old Paper Mill is shown as the Catawissa Valve & Fitting Co MFG Forges Steel Unions
Maxi Machinery is shown on 2nd street, that building is the "Old Valve Factory" that still stands today. It is NOT the same building as the old paper mill.
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Stories & History From Catawissa, Pa
For More Local History & Stories From Nearby Towns:
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"The early settlement of Catawissa and the fine and unfailing water power of the creek made the place at once a point of importance As early as 1789 Jonathan Shoemaker built a grist mill on the north side of the creek just above the present site of that known as the McKelvy mill And in 1799 Christian Brobst built one a quarter of a mile above Shoemaker's "
Runaway Horses, 1906
An old industry
That will soon again forge to the front - A few particulars.
The plant of the Catawissa Fiber Company is to be improved. The scheme proposed by the Company has met with such favor as to warrant them in going ahead wit the proposed improvements. A meeting of the subscribers will be held some time this week to perfect an organization, and inside of two weeks work will be commenced upon the new buildings. These will be brick, and a further extension of the mill towards the bridge 40x60 feet, and a further extension of that building in the same direction 50x125 feet.
The first named will be for the machinery used in preparing the wood pulp and fiber for the paper machine, and are called engines. Two of these are for washing the material, and are known as washing engines. These the Company have on hand, being a part of the old mill plant. Two new engines engines, called beating engines, will be purchased to complete the complement of machinery for the engine room. The 50x125 building will accommodate the paper machine, an 86-inch fourdrinier, upon which the pulp will be manufactured into manilla paper. The building will be built large enough to accommodate two machines, the other a 96-inch machine, but the business will be started with but one.
The product of the paper machine goes to the bag department, about one hundred yards distant. Here are now four bag machines, manufacturing what is known to the trade as the flat-bottom bag. The capacity of these machines is 350,000 bags per day. As soon as the patent on what is known as square bag runs out, which will be in December next, attachments will be upon two of these machines to make square bags. Two additional machines, for manufacturing what is called the satchel-bottom bag, will be placed in this room, each with a capacity of 100,000 bags per day. This will make the capacity of the plant over a half million per day.
When finished the plant will be the most complete in the United States. It will virtually be taking in hemlock slabs and turning out paper bags. The present capacity of the paper mill will be eight tons of chemical fiber per day. The capacity of the paper mill will be seven tons per day, and the bag works will use nearly all the paper product. But the excess of both the pulp and paper mills will allow the Company to take part in that trade, and they can make all the profit there is in the three departments. If pulp mills make money selling their product to paper manufacturers, and paper mills can buy the pulp and manufacture it in to paper at a profit, and paper bag manufacturers can go into the market and buy the paper to make their bags, and sell the bags at a profit, we fail to see why the Catawissa Fiber Company wouldn't come in for all there profits-on their pulp, on their paper and on their bags.
To start with, about a hundred hands will be given employment, but as the business' gets into working shape and the works are developed to their full capacity the pay-roll will carry nearer two hundred. The benefit to our town and the surrounding country can hardly be estimated. All the raw material, with the exception of a few chemicals and some ground wood, which is considerably cheaper than the fiber manufactured here, will come from this vicinity, and the expense incident to its manufacture into a merchantable shape will be spread through business channels here.
In time, the flour sack machinery belonging to the company will be brought here and that branch of the trade taken up. The plant is in itself no inconsiderable affair, consisting of bag machines, six cylinder printing presses, six job presses, with a complete outfit.
The entire amount needed has not yet been inscribed, but we are informed that it is so near and the assurances for the balance such as to warrant the Company ingoing ahead with the improvements. The plant in its improved condition could not be duplicated for $150,000, so investors will have ample security for their money. Mr. Edward McCready has the matter in hand, and will take pleasure in explaining it to any who desire. If Catawissa could raise $20,000 or $25,000 to give away to a carpet factory, she should not find much difficulty in raising $15,000 to invest as above.
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"Johnathan Bachman, of Bloomsburg, was on Saturday last awarded the contract for the stone and brick work on the new buildings to be put up by the Catawissa Fiber Company. On Monday morning he started in with a force of men excavating for the foundations, and at present has about thirty men employed.
If the weather should be favorable, two weeks will see the work well under way, and by the time cold weather comes the buildings will be under roof, and then the work can be forwarded no matter what the weather.
Mr. Bachman has the contract for work only, all the materials being furnished by the Company. The contract for the carpenter work will be let on later. "
- Catawissa New Item October 24 1889
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Penn'a Paper Co. Spending Between $80,000 and $100,000 to make their Catawissa plant such.
Great boon to Catawissa.
The near future will see at the plant of the Pennsylvania Paper Mill at Catawissa the most complete, up-to-date and economical soda pulp mill in the country and between $80,000 and $100,000 in the first instance is now being extended to place it there. From one making a second grade, grab express paper the plant is being converted into one that will make the highest grade of soda pulp paper, the finest made-the grade used in the manufacture of book, writing, revenue and similar paper.
Three new buildings will be required for the enlarged plant's operation., all of which will be fire proof, being built either of brick, stone or cement, and upon the plans for which the company's architect is now working. The product of the pulp plant will be equal in every respect to that of the best book and writing paper mills in the country, thus insuring a steady demand for the product of the mill. The plant will give employment to twice the number of men that it now does and it is importance as a factor in the business interests of the county cannot be over estimated.
Great results possible.
The arrangement of the plant will be change so that labor can be reduced to a minimum and at the same time the greatest results can be secured. The appliances for washing the pulp and recovering the soda ash, the principal item of expense in the operation of the plant and therefore the most important factor, will be the most complete in every detail. The pulp will be discharged from the blow pit into large, enclosed revolving cylinder wash tanks, of which there will be two. The pulp being washed with hot water under pressure of forty pounds to the square inch, all traces of the soda ash is driven out of the pulp by this pressure which is supplied by a large air compressor, leaving the pulp, after each washing, dry and clean. The water for washing the pulp is heated by escaping steam from the digestors just previous to emptying them. Under the former arrangement only a small portion of the soda ash was saved, but under the new equipment it will be possible to use the soda ash over and over again, only losing from twelve to fifteen percent. thereby.
Another big factor in the economical operation of the plant is the rotary incinerator, one of the latest and most complete made at the present time, using very little coal, and which is so arranged that the burning of the resinous matter contained in the liquor furnishes sufficient heat to operate a 125 H.P. boiler which in turn supplies power to run the pulp machinery. The exhaust steam from the steam engine used in driving the pulp department is utilized for evaporating the liquor, making the operation one of extreme economy and efficiency. Heretofore all this was so much loss, giving one an idea of the immense saving which the new equipment will make possible.
The liquor, after leaving the causticizing tanks, is forced through a filter press, passing the liquor into the storage tanks absolutely free from dirt of any kind. The liquor and wash water is stored into enclosed tanks; in fact, the entire process is enclosed, thereby preventing dirty and specky paper. Every effort will be made by the company to secure a perfectly clean paper. The wood room is separate from the rest of the mill, and the chipped wood, before passing to the storage bins, will be dusted, thereby removing a common source of dirty pulp.
New building's equipment
The company will install a water filter with a capacity of half a million gallons of water ever twenty-four hours, free from all the impurities and as clear as crystal. The heating capacity of the plant will be increased and one more beater engine will be installed. All the machinery will be new except in the digester room. Three digesters will be added to the equipment of two which the plant now has and those will be placed in one of the new buildings soon to be erected. In this building will also be placed a blow pit and it will have a chip storage on top of it. The digester building will be remodeled and in place of the digesters will be two large wash tanks, centrifugal screen, wet machine, liquor storage and pulp storage. The old alkali building will also be completely remodeled and will contain the evaporator and the causticizing plant. The other two new buildings will be used in connection with the pulp department, one being the chipper room, in which the sticks of wood five feet long, will be cut, crushed and screened and the other the incinerator room where the soda ash is reclaimed by burning.
The entire work of remodeling will the plant so that it will be the best in the country will be under the supervision of the George W. Newhall Engineering Company, Limited of Philadelphia and New York, who are experts in the construction of soda pulp mills and sugar refineries.
In view of these marked changes the following brief description of the manufacture of soda pulp, by the use of which the product of the Pennsylvania Paper Mills will be sufficient in quality to enable the mill to use the pulp to make any grade of paper that proves the most profitable, will be of especial interest:
Various kinds of wood are barked and cut into lengths of five feet this being the most convenient size for handling the stick. The first treatment the wood receives in the mill consist in chipping it into tin slices, cut diagonally across the grain of the wood. The slices are afterwards fed into the crusher which breaks them into a revolving chip screen where all the dust and particles of bark, etc, are removed.
From the chip screen the chips fall into a conveyor which elevates them to an enclosed chip bin. From there they are packed into the digesters, or large upright boilers where the wood is cooked for about nine hours under a pressure of one hundred pounds to the square inch.
The chips are cooked in a liquor made by treating soda ash with caustic, wood burnt lime, making a solution known as caustic soda. This powerful solvent breaks down the incrustating matter surrounding the fibers of the wood, removes whatever pitch or resinous matter there may be, and the resulting product being known as cellulose, or pure fiber.
The Morning Press , July 30 1903
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Quaker Meeting Records:
Name: Benjamin Sharpless
Age: 17
Birth Date: 7 Aug 1764
Birth Date on Image: 07 Eighth 1764
Marriage Age: 37
Marriage Date: 29 Oct 1801
Marriage Date on Image: 29 Tenth 1801
Marriage Place: High St Mtg, Phila
Death Age: 92
Death Date: 28 May 1857
Death Date on Image: 28 Fifth 1857
Death Place: Catawissa, Pennsylvania
Residence Date: 20 Dec 1781
Residence Date on Image: 20 Twelfth 1781
Father: Joseph Sharpless
Mother: Mary Pyle
Spouse: Hannah Bonsall
Spouse Father: Edward Bonsall
Spouse Mother: Hannah Gleave
Event Type: Marriage
Monthly Meeting: Wrightstown Monthly Meeting
Yearly Meeting: Philadelphia Yearly Meeting
Title: Genealogical Record, 1796-1917
Meeting State: Pennsylvania
Meeting County: Bucks
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Benjamin Sharpless was the son of Joseph and Mary (Pyle) Sharpless. He was the husband of Hannah (Bonsall) Sharpless. They were married December 20, 1801. Hannah died October 6, 1831. Benjamin was one of the originators of the Catawissa Paper Company.
Historical and Biographical Annals of Columbia and Montour Counties Pennsylvania, Volume I, c1915, Pgs. 835-836
Biographical sketch of Sharpless family
The Catawissa Friends Meetinghouse, South and 3rd Streets, Catawissa, Pennsylvania - as of 1978, was eligible for the National Register of Historic Places in American History.
Michener, Ezra
A Retrospect of Early Quakerism - Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, c186O, Page 41
Shamokin
184O - Benjamin Sharpless
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