Josiah Fay was a wheelwright who invented and patented a tenoning machine in 1831. Solid information is scarce but it appears that he manufactured his machine himself—as Josiah Fay—from about 1833 until 1840, then went into business with two of his wife's brothers and, for many years, manufactured his tenoning machine as Fay, Fisher & Co. The firm of Ballard & Baird, Pittsburgh, manufactured the "Fay & Fisher" tenoning machine under license.

Josiah Fay was the older brother of Jerub Amber Fay, co-founder of J. A. Fay & Co., which became perhaps the largest woodworking machinery manufacturer in the world.

Information Sources

• 1831 single-page sheet, "Directions for Using Fay's Patent Tenoning Machine". Apparently in Issue 4040 of American broadsides and ephemera, Archive of Americana. We have not been able to view this sheet.
• February 1832 issue of the Journal of the Franklin Institute, page 133, commentary on recently issued patents.

  For Cutting Tenons by Revolving Cylinders; Josiah Fay, Hollis, Hillsborough county, New Hampshire, August 29.

  Two cylinders are made to revolve, one above the other, and are capable of being removed nearer together, or further apart. Upon their faces they carry cutters, in the form of plane irons set askew, and from their edges project small spurs, or cutters, which cut the shoulders of the tenons. The piece to be cut lies in the direction of the axes of the cylinders, upon a sliding frame prepared for the purpose.

  The machine, as drawn, appears to be unnecessarily complex; an error by no means uncommon in the first formation of of instruments of this kind. The patentee claims "the cutting of tenons by revolving cylinders," as his own invention or discovery.

  The cylinders have their bearings behind that part upon which the cutters are placed, as these ends must stand out like a chuck in the mandrel of a lathe, otherwise the piece to be tenoned could not pass between them.

• 1837 First Exhibition and Fair of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, page 5 of the section on Reports of the Judges.

  210. Fay, Fisher & Co., Lancaster. Tenoning Machine. We hardly know how to speak well enough of this little humble looking machine. It works so prettily, and does such a variety of work, too, and does it so well, that we should suppose every Carpenter, Cabinet-maker, Wheelwright, and Machine-builder in the country would have one of them in his workshop. It can be worked by hand or power; takes up but little room; is so easily adjusted, and costs so little (one hundred and fifty dollars,) that we cannot too strongly recommend it. It has been much improved since the last Exhibition. A Silver Medal.

• 1838 book by H. W. Ellsworth, Valley of the Upper Wabash, Indiana, With Hints on Its Agricultural Advantages: Dwelling, Estimates of Cultivation and Notices of Labor-Saving Machines, page 105. "Fay's Tenoning Machine.—The invention of Mr. Josiah Fay, of Baltimore, Maryland. This machine costs $100, and does the work of from ten to fifteen men, with great accuracy."
• 1849 book, History of Cosmopolite, Or, Journal of Lorenzo Dow, three pages before the title page is an advertisement for "Ballard & Baird, Machinists, Lathe & Tool Manufacturers" of Pittsburgh. "Being both practical mechanics, we are prepared to manufacture "Slide Lathes, Foot do, Hand do., Wood do.,... Fay & Fisher's Tenoning [Machines}, ..."
• 1851 Massachusetts State Directory, page 179. "Fay, Fisher & Co. (Tenoning Machines) Lancaster."
• According to the 1889 book A History of the Planing Mill by Charles R. Tompkins, Fay & Fisher were possibly the first to make a roll-fed molder. Tompkins was unable to determine exactly when this occurred, but the best guess is that it was during the early 1830s. Were the tenoning machine and the roll-fed molder actually the same machine? I don't know. The 1831 tenoner patent shows that the tenons are cut with molding heads, but it appears to be hand-fed. A roll feed could have been a later innovation.
• According to the 1898 book by Orlin P. Fay, Fay Genealogy: John Fay of Marlborough and His Descendants, Josiah Fay "was a wheelwright and lived in different parts of Vermont and New Hampshire until 1831 when he invented a machine known as Fay, Fisher & Co.'s tennoning machine. He went into company with two of his wife's brothers and carried on the manufacture of these machine for many years in Lancaster, Mass."
• 2009 book by Ross Thompson, Structures of Change in the Mechanical Age: Technological Innovation in the United States 1790-1865, page 53. "The McLane Report credits Josiah Fay with selling 50 patented tenoning machines in 1831 at an average price of $50..." The phrase "McLane Report" refers to an 1833 publication by Louis McLane for the Secretary of the Treasury, "Documents Relative to the Manufactures in the United States, Volume 1". Volume 2 is available online.
• According to a research paper from Old Sturbridge Village, Josiah Fay was in business 1832-1840. Their sources for this are listed as
  • Louis McLane, Report of the Secretary of the Treasury, 1832, I, 498-499
  • Bigelow, Statistical Tables, Exhibiting the Condition and Products of Certain Branches of Industry in Massachusetts, p. 53
  • Reports of the First Exhibition of the Worcester County Mechanics Association (Worcester, 1849), p. 10.