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YORK LYN & YORKLIN & YORKLYN
Answer
We recently uncovered what is probably the best documentation for how the name Yorklyn came about. As early as 1905, the phrase “first draft of history” was cited in text, but it was Phil Graham, Washington Post owner and publisher, who made the phrase “The First Rough-draft of History” famous by using it in various speeches and writings. While newspapers are not always accurate in published information, they do provide a foundation upon which history can be documented and are effectively “the first rough draft of history.” The newspaper clipping shared below, from the August 11, 1873, Wilmington Daily Commercial newspaper explains how Garrett’s daughters came to suggest Yorklyn.
The “Marshall’s paper mills” referred to above, while it was a single mill, references Thomas S. Marshall’s Homestead Mill at the joining of the east and west branches of the Red Clay Creek in Kennett Township, PA. This is the original Marshall paper mill before Israel and Elwood Marshall, Thomas S.’s sons, purchased the burned-out Clark woolen mill to convert it into a modern paper mill in 1890. William T. Moore opened the U.S. Post Office at Yorklyn Station on June 13, 1873. Thus, the article above may be considered a “first rough draft of history’ in its accuracy!
The Wilmington Daily Commercial was published from October 1, 1866, until March 31, 1877. More commonly referred to as the Wilmington Commercial, it became the first daily paper published in Delaware. It was founded by Howard Jenkins and Wilmer Atkinson, who became Wilmington residents specifically to publish a daily newspaper. Selling their paper for 2 cents a copy initially, they used steam-powered presses to quickly print and distribute the latest news and gossip. Jenkins & Atkinson were among the first to sell newspapers on Delaware trains, thus expanding their circulation well beyond Wilmington’s city limits.
On January 3, 1867, Jenkins & Atkinson published a weekly edition titled Delaware Tribune. On September 4, 1871, the first issue of Every Evening was published by the Wilmington Commercial’s former city editor William T. Croasdale, who had struck out on his own to publish a competing newspaper. The two papers eventually merged to become the Every Evening and Commercial on April 2, 1877, with only the April 1, 1877, issue being named Every Evening, Wilmington Daily Commercial. Eventually, through additional mergers of Wilmington newspapers, the Evening Journal merged with Every Evening, Wilmington Daily Commercial. Over the decades the Evening Journal absorbed other Wilmington area newspapers, thus becoming Delaware’s prominent newspaper. The Evening Journal is published by Gannett Company, Inc., which, as of November 2019, is the largest newspaper publisher in the U.S.
WORKING ON THE RAILROAD
In doing some recent research, we came across the image below from 1935. While most railroads did something similar, the photo is for the New York Central Railroad. What service is the worker providing? As a hint, the location is the entry to a passenger station located in the distance.
Answer
The image above is of the work pit of a railroad “hot box” inspector! Passenger trains, as well as freight trains coming into the station complex, had to slow sufficiently for the switching ahead. They had been running at a much higher speed prior to coming to the location pictured, which meant wheel bearings had been operating at higher speeds, creating more friction. A bearing without sufficient lubrication would be smoking if not on fire, and it was the inspector’s job to spot the smoke/fire from a “hot box” and report it so that the train could be stopped and the problem dealt with.
Depicted in the image below is a typical railroad friction bearing such as was used for locomotive, freight, and passenger cars during the 1800s and into the mid-1900s before roller and ball bearings saw widespread use. The olive part is the rotating axle attached to the railroad wheel. The yellow is the mechanical bearing made of brass. Under the axle and contained within an iron casting box-like structure with a door at the end is the waste packing, which amounts to cotton and wool materials in contact with the underside of the olive axle and saturated with oil. The turning axle picks up a thin layer of oil on the axle’s cylindrical surface and carries the oil as the axle turns to the contact area between the yellow bearing material and the olive axle. That thin layer of oil molecules keeps the axle and bearing from direct contact by forming a thin oil sheet between the two. Without metal-to-metal contact between the bearing and axle, there is little heat generated, offering a low-friction interface between the turning axle and stationary bearing.
Should oil in the packing become depleted, the oil film on the axle is reduced, and metal -to-metal contact between the bearing and axle generates heat from increased friction. With sufficient heat, the oil begins to smoke, and in an extreme situation, the oil can catch fire. As the bearing assembly is within an enclosure resembling a rectangular box, the term hot box came into use when a bearing was found smoking.
$2.7 MILLION TIME PIECE
Banking records as far back as 1860 show Caleb Marshall as president of the Real Estate Bank of Delaware, which was located in Newport, DE. Caleb is the older brother of John Marshall (Kennett Bank President), and together they established an iron rolling mill on the Red Clay Creek in what is now known as Marshallton, DE. In late 1864, Franklin Q. Flinn was elected president of the bank as Caleb and his family were moving to Philadelphia to establish the Penn Treaty Iron Works for the manufacture of terne plate (early form of galvanized iron for which Caleb was issued patents). The $1 bill shown below, issued by the Real Estate Bank of Delaware, has Caleb Marshall’s signature as president. That is William Penn pictured and not Caleb Marshall.
Caleb’s brother John was president of National Bank of Kennett Square from its founding in 1881 until his death in 1885, when E.B. Darlington became president. Darlington remained president until T. Elwood Marshall (Israel’s brother) assumed the presidency in 1915 and remained until 1922. His nephew T. Clarence Marshall became president in 1923 and remained in that office for 9 years. On July 1, 1930, the bank merged with Kennett Trust Company (formed in 1889) to become National Bank & Trust Company of Kennett Square, which was acquired in 1882 by Meridian Bank. Additional banking industry consolidations saw Meridian acquired by Corestates Bank and then First Union National Bank. In 2001, Wachovia Bank acquired First Union, and today its all part of Wells Fargo Bank.Before the Civil War, many states issued their own currency. As a means to pay for the war, reduce counterfeiting, and eliminate differences in currency value, the U.S. federal government created a national currency under Abraham Lincoln. By creating a system of nationally chartered banks, the government would print denominations of $1, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100, $500 and $1,000 bills to be issued by a “National Bank.” Every bank that changed their charter to that of a National Bank (and hence why there are so many First National Bank of…, Second National Bank of…, Third National Bank…, etc.) agreed to obey the rules for national currency. A bank was required to deposit a bond with the government for the value of government printed currency they received to place into public circulation. The government would print the name of the national bank on the currency and provide currency sheets to the requesting bank. Once each bill was hand-signed by the bank’s cashier and president, they could be hand-cut from the sheets (which is why you see the irregular borders in the images below) and issued to the bank’s customers. The system was in place from 1863 until the Great Depression in 1929, when a majority of the National Banks became insolvent. As a result, the U.S. government created our present Federal Reserve notes.
Above is an image of a $10 National Bank of Kennett Square bill issued April 26, 1921, with T. E. Marshall’s handwritten signature as president. Images of $10 and $20 National Currency bills (below) with T. Clarence Marshall’s lithograph-printed signatures show the bank’s name change to National Bank and Trust Company of Kennett Square. Over the 55-year life of the national currency program, National Bank of Kennett Square issued nearly $2.7 million in 15 different types and denominations of national currency. It is estimated that due to the higher-value denominations issued in later years, when TE and TC Marshall were presidents, that more than half the dollar value of $2.7 million total issued in National Currency by Kennett Bank displays a Marshall signature!!
AUTOMOTIVE BODY DESIGNS
We recently ran across an image that called our attention to 21st-century automotive body designs. If one examines 23 current brands of automobiles offered to the American driver, and we imagine equivalent models all painted in light gray, there’s not really a lot of diversity in basic appearance, as the image to the right attests. Images of individual vehicles for the composite image were digitally “painted” light gray as the color is not offered by all manufacturers.
According to Kit Foster’s The Stanley Steamer: America’s Legendary Steam Car, in April 1898 the Stanley twins contracted Currier Cameron Company to construct the wooden bodies that were then sent to the Shields Carriage Company for lacquer application and finishing. Both businesses were located in Amesbury, Massachusetts, and shared common organizational roots. Locomobile assembled their cars in Watertown, which required the finished bodies to be shipped in boxcars by rail between the two cities.
ERRATIC BOILER WATER GAUGE
In Tom Marshall’s teachings to the Steam Team he often talked of more rare issues that can affect a Stanley’s performance. The issue of boiler foaming and priming is rare and involves only the water on board a Stanley and not the vehicle itself. This author has experienced boiler foaming involving a Wilmington & Western Railroad locomotive that had excess boiler treatment added to the water. In that case, the problem was quickly visible in the glass boiler sight gauge as instead of the glass tube 2/3rds full of water, when the engineer opened the throttle, the glass quickly turned milky white, an indication of boiler foaming. Ignored, such a problem might quickly become dangerous for continued operation of the locomotive or steam car. In the case of a condensing Stanley, the boiler gauges are of an actual gauge construction, and unless the the steam car has been retrofitted with a glass sight gauge, a foaming issue must be recognized through other clues.Tom Marshall advocated a tablespoon of Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda be added to the water tank every three or four tankfuls of water. Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda, Tom’s favorite, is pure sodium carbonate (Na2CO3). Washing soda is also known as soda ash and soda crystals and is primarily used to manufacture glass, paper, rayon, soaps, detergents, and as a water softening agent. Since the start of the 20th century, boiler operators have experimented with the addition of sodium carbonate to boiler water to provide alkalinity to the water. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, a treatment of washing soda was employed by land and marine boiler operators as the best means to prevent scaling and corrosion. Use of washing soda as boiler water treatment resulted in dramatically reducing boiler maintenance and associated costs. For Stanleys it does seem to “wash” the water system of impurities and keep the pumps, check valves, and other components free of mineral buildup.
