April19_2008

Botanical Glossary - Home - References Cited

Fairbanks-Morse, is a historic American (and Canadian) industrial weighing scale manufacturer. It later diversified into pumps, engines and industrial supplies. One arm is now a diesel engine manufacturer located in Beloit, Wisconsin and has specialized in the manufacture of opposed piston diesel engines for United States Naval vessels and railroad locomotives since 1932. F-M is currently owned by EnPro Industries, and now also manufactures a line of natural gas and dual-fuel powered engines and generators. Fairbanks-Morse Pump is a separate company in business in Kansas City, Kansas, while Fairbanks Scales is a separate privately owned company based in Kansas City, Missouri.

Fairbanks, Morse & Company had its beginning in 1823 when inventor Thaddeus Fairbanks began an ironworks in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, to manufacture two of his patented inventions, a cast iron plow and a heating stove. In 1829 he started in a hemp dressing business for which he built the machinery. Though unsuccessful in fabrication for fibre factories, another invention by Thaddeus, the platform scale, formed the basis for the great enterprise. That device was patented in June 1832, and a generation later, the E & T Fairbanks & Company was selling thousands of scales; first in the United States, later in Europe, South America and even Imperial China. Scales were integral to business as marine and railway shippers charged by weight. Fairbanks scales won 63 medals over the years in international competition. Fairbanks was the leading manufacturer in the US - and the best known the world over - until Henry Ford stole that crown.

Fairbanks-Morse WindmillIn Wisconsin, L. Wheeler designed a durable windmill for pumping water, the "Eclipse Windmill." Wheeler set up shop in Beloit just after the US Civil War. Soon half a million windmills dotted the landscape on farms throughout the West and as far away as Australia. At about the same time, Fairbanks & Co employee Charles Hosmer Morse opened an office of Fairbanks & Co in Chicago, from which he expanded the company's territory of operation and widened its product line. Included in this, Morse brought Wheeler, and his Eclipse Windmill pumps, into business with the Fairbanks company. As a result, Morse later became a partner and the firm subsequently was named Fairbanks-Morse & Company by the closing decades of the nineteenth century. Headquartered in Chicago, all Canadian and American cities had branch dealerships of Fairbanks-Morse. Fairbanks first came to Montreal, Canada, in 1876 and later opened a factory there.

Photos - Various donkey engines including an internal combustion engine (left), a grain grinder (center) and a Fairbanks and Morse 7 HP engine made in the USA (right).

Photos - Frame left: The picnic area over looking the Nicomekl River at the northeastern corner of the Stewart Farm overlooking the Elgin Historic Site.

Frames right and center: A horse or tractor pulled cultivator rests in the orchard outside the Pole Barn, at the eastern side of the Stewart Farmhouse.

Photos - L-R - A tidal marsh near the Nicomekl River, at the eastern end of the Stewart Farm.

Looking east toward the town of Surrey with an oyster bed and the Nicomekl River in foreground.

Thuja Plicata (Western Red Cedar) a close up of leaves and dried out cones. Called the "tree of life" by Pacific Northwest natives. All parts of this tree were useful, providing shelter, clothing, tools and transportation. Roots were stripped and used in weaving, inner bark used for clothing and baskets, while outer bark could be cured and braided into rope or used as shingles for roofs, wood for shelter and fuel (for drying fish because of the reduced smoke), canoes and tools. Cedar boughs were also used for bedding. Small, tender roots were cooked and eaten.

Click here for more photos of The Stewart Farm in Surrey for this day.