In 1875 this firm was manufacturing and selling a gang lath and gang bolting machine.

The partnership traces its roots back to at least 1869, when it was known as Dix & Knox, the partners being James L. Dix and William H. Knox. In 1873, Knox and Samuel J. Brower were granted a pair of patents related to lath machinery. The partnership of Dix & Knox changed to Dix & Nesbitt sometime around 1874. In 1875, Nesbitt was replaced by Dix's son, S. B. Dix, and the firm name became (though possibly not immediately), J. L. Dix Foundry Co. So far as we can tell, the lath machine was made only briefly.

Portrait of J. L. Dix, from "History of Warren County", by H. P. Smith, 1885

From "Compiled Statement of the Lumber Trade for 1875"

Information Sources

• The 1869-70 edition of The New York State Business Directory and Gazetteer has an ad for "Dix & Knox, Furnace and Machine Shop, Glens Fall's, N. Y. Manufacturers of Mill Gearing and Machinery..."
• The Gazetteer and Business Directory of Saratoga County, N.Y. for 1870 lists "DIX & KNOX (Glens Falls,) (J. L. Dix and Wm. H. Knox,) furnace and machine shop". It lists James Nesbit of nearby Queesbury as a blacksmith; we have no direct evidence that he was the "Nesbitt" of the 1875 partnership.
• The 1874 work, Wiley's American Iron Trade Manual of the Leading Iron Industries of the United States lists Dix & Knox of Glens Falls as an iron foundry.
• An ad (see above) in Compiled Statement of the Lumber Trade for 1875.
• History of Warren County, by H. P. Smith, 1885, has this brief company history:

  The oldest manufacturing business now in Glens Falls is the foundry and machine shop of J. L. & S. B. Dix. The business was established about the year 1844 by James Wells. In 1848 Hopkins & Dix bought out Wells, and continued the business until 1854, when Henry M. Lewis came into the firm. In about a year, however, another change altered the firm name to Hopkins, Dix & Clendon. In 1856 Hopkins withdrew; in 1869 Hopkins succeeded Clendon; in 1874 S. B. Dix, son to J. L. Dix, succeeded Knox. J. L. Dix came here about 1820 with his father, Samuel Dix, a lumberman, who died in 1857.

• 1901 Directory of American Cement Industries and Hand-book for Cement Users, page 589 under the heading of "Barrel Machinery" lists "J. L. Dix Foundry Co., Glens Falls, N. Y."
• A 1903 report from the New York State comptroller's office, Annual Report of the Comptroller on the Canals
, mentions the J. L. Dix Foundry Co., for having done some contract work for them.
• The book Wadhams genealogy, 1913, has this snippet (via Google Books): "James L. Dix was educated at Easton, N. Y. He established a machine shop and foundry in Glens Falls, N. Y., where he resided."