Swingle's Patent Boring & Mortising Machine

In the late 1840s, this firm manufactured the Swingle's patent hub mortising machine. There is some spotty evidence that Hunt also manufactured other woodworking machinery products.

Information Sources

• From article in an 1849 issue of Scientific American, which describes the Swingle's patent hub mortiser. An 1848 patent for such a device was granted to Alfred Swingle of Galveston, TX.
• Eighth Annual Report of the American Institute, March 1850, including the results of the 1849 Fair: Alfred Swingle, Galveston, Texas, A. Hunt, manufacturer, Boston, Mass., for the best boring, morticing and tenoning machine. Silver medal.
• Boston Almanac for the Year 1851 lists "Leather Belting Manufactory—N. Hunt & Co. 26 Devonshire".
• An undated bulletin of the United States National Museum lists "N. Hunt, which became Hunt and Webster. Later Ladd and Webster". N. Hunt & Co., is shown as in operation 1853-54, Hunt and Webster was in operation 1854-57, and "Very late in 1858 [Hunt & Webster] became Ladd, Webster & Co. ..."
• An 1854 patent for a method of power transmission for a circular saw was partly assigned to Mr. Hunt.
• There is an 1855 patent assigned to Nehemiah Hunt of Boston, for a "machine for sawing wedges or shingles". An 1857 patent was co-assigned to an N. Hunt, probably of Boston.
• Besides the above-mentioned 1848 patent, Alfred Swingle received several others. His location, as stated in the patent specification, varied.
  • 8,914 (1852-04-27, steering-apparatus, Boston)
  • 11,507 (1854-08-08, sewing machine, Boston)
  • 12,985 (1855-05-29, hand pegging-machine, Boston)
  • 14,207 (1856-02-05, sewing machine, Boston)
  • 14,269 (1856-02-12, pegging boots and shoes, Boston)
  • 15,396 (1856-07-22, sewing machine, Boston)
  • 15,462 (1856-07-29, pegging-jack, Boston)
  • RE410 (1856-11-04, sewing machine, Boston)
  • 137,392 (1873 04 01, gun magazine, San Francisco)
  • 138,542 (1873-05-06, shears and button-hole cutter, San Francisco)
• Hunt's Merchant's Magazine and Commercial Review for January 1856 has the following, in an article about "Ames's Shovel Manufactory":

  The attention of people passing through State-street this forenoon, says a late number of the Boston Journal, was attracted by a splendid specimen of leather belting, from the establishment of Messrs. N. Hunt & Co., No. 26 Devonshire-street. This belt was 125 feet long, 28 inches wide, double, and weighed between 600 and 700 pounds. Its cost is about $675. It is one of the largest belts ever made in this country, and was pronounced by those who are judges of the article to be one of the best manufactured belts they had ever seen. This is the second belt of the same size for Messrs. O. Ames & Son, the celebrated manufacturers at North Easton, and is intended to run their eleven new trip-hammers which they are about to put into operation.

  The Report of the Eighteenth Triennial Exhibition of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association, held in October and November 1850, has this excerpt:

  Henry C. Hunt Company, 45 Arch Street, Boston.— This exhibit consisted of one double leather belt ninety-eight feet long, twenty-eight inches wide, weighing four hundred and sixty-four pounds, which was constructed by the exhibitors for the well known and long-established house of the Oliver Ames & Sons Corporation, North Easton, Mass., to replace a belt of the same dimensions made by N. Hunt & Company, Boston, in 1852, which original belt at the period it was made was considered a monster of its kind, and which has been in continuous use from December 25, 1852, to the present time. It is worthy of consideration that no manufacturer of leather belting in the world can produce an instance of similar long-continued service as the belt made by the late firm of N. Hunt & Company, mentioned above.

• Sampson, Davenport & Co.'s 1868 edition of the Boston Directory has an ad for leather belting from "A. N. Clark & Co., (Successor to N. Hunt & Co.,) 29 and 31 Devonshire Street".
• The "List of Premiums awarded by the managers of the twenty-third annual Fair of the American Institute, October, 1850", lists "N. Hunt & Co., Boston Mass., for an excellent boring and morticing machine. Diploma."