Matthew Moody emigrated from Ireland to Lower Canada (now Quebec), and in 1833 established a blacksmith shop in Terrebonne, about 40km North of Montreal. Matthew Moody & Sons was founded in 1845 as a maker of agricultural equipment. In the 20th century they made a small range of woodworking and metalworking machinery, including metal lathes and wood planers.

In the 1940s and '50s this firm put their names on a variety of woodworking machinery. So far most such machines have turned out to be rebadged versions of American machines, including Darra-James Corp. We have seen several planers that are similar to, but not identical, to those from Parks Woodworking Machine Co., and we suspect that these machines were manufactured by Moody under license from Parks. Moody also made a clone, possibly licensed, of a South Bend lathe.

The company was later known as Moody Industries, and manufactures material handling systems for airlines and the food and beverage industries. The company seems to have disappeared in about 2008.

Information Sources

• Report of a large tablesaw from this company. Other reports were for 12" tablesaw and 12" planer, both identified only as being from "Moody". The Moody planer is remarkably similar to the Parks 12" planer, although it has "Moody" cast into the cutter cover, and has a different system for mounting the knives in the cutterhead. The tablesaw is identical in every respect to a Darra James tablesaw. Thanks to Guy Pelchat for providing us the information on his Moody-badged Darra James saw.
• Until 2008, Moody Industries had a website. The site was not updated for at least three years after that, and then it disappeared and was taken over by web squatters. It seems safe to assume that the company went under.