This firm traces it origins to the firm G. W. Stetson & Co. In 1900, George W. Stetson of Seattle patented a new planer design in response to the need for lumber for building flumes for the Alaska Gold Rush. Stetson's planer was known as the "Ready-Sizer". We do not understand the exact relationship between G. W. Stetson & Co. and Stetson-Ross Machine Co., but in any event Stetson and Harry Ross formed the Stetson-Ross Machine Works in 1907 to make planer-matchers.

An important history of woodworking machinery, Planers, Matches & Molders in America, was written by Chandler W. Jones, who spent his career at Stetson-Ross, and he provides quite a bit of information on the company. "Sometime between 1900 and 1903, Harry Ross [then working for Berlin Machine Works] discovered that if the knives in a head were honed or jointed in place on the cutter head at operating speed, there would be as many finishing knife cuts per minute as there were knives in the head multiplied by the RPM of the spindle." It also says, "The first Stetson-Ross planers were built in ... Seattle in 1909."

Stetson-Ross led the move to round heads with knives "safely pocketed within the head body," a change that greatly reduced the chances of knives being thrown from the head. They also introduced tapered side spindles, which provide better cutter centering, similar in concept to the Morse taper in machine tools. Like the Morse taper, the Stetson-Ross taper has become a standard in its industry.

Harry Ross changed his focus to a new lumber carrier he invented, and left to form the Ross Carrier Co. Stetson changed the Stetson-Ross name to Stetson Machine Works. After Stetson and his son died in 1921, the company name was changed to Stetson-Ross Machine Co.. At about that time, the company introduced the first planer-matcher that was designed from the ground up for direct-motor cutterhead spindles. This led to an arms race with their major competitors, Yates, Woods, and American, resulting in American selling out to Yates.

In 1928, Stetson-Ross responded to S. A. Woods's introduction of a very large matcher with their own, even larger machine, the 6-16-A1, which according to Jones, still holds the record, at 50,000 pounds. In 1949, Stetson-Ross built the first automated finger-joint line, producing a machine that contained almost all the features of a modern finger-jointer, including an automatic traveling cutoff saw and radio-frequency glue curing.

In 1962, Stetson-Ross bought the XL Moldmatcher from Smithway Machine Co., and also around that time bought the Paulson molder from the Paulson Machine Co. Both these lines were sold to Tyler Machinery Co. in 1983, along with the XL Kerfsaver band resaw.

Stetson-Ross also purchased P. B. Yates's Canadian line of planer-matchers, made in Vancouver, BC. They also purchased the Dependable molder, but only a few units were made.

After president and part-owner W. T. Pritchard died in 1952, there were a series of ownership changes, culminating in the 1985 sale of the planer line to Kimwood Corp.

Information Sources

• 1955-56 Hitchcock's Wood Workers Digest Directory shows a picture of an 1899 G. W. Stetson "Ready Sizer", a machine that planed one side and one face; it was patented in 1900.
• According to an online history of a building known as Sodo Park,

  Harry Ross and G. W. Stetson originally formed the company before Harry changed his focus to a new lumber carrier he invented and left to form the Ross Carrier Co. Shortly after, Stetson changed the name to Stetson Machine Works. After Stetson and his son died in 1921, the company name was changed back to Stetson-Ross. At about that time, the company introduced the first planer-matcher designed from the ground up for direct-motor cutterhead spindles.