E.P. Armstrong

E.P. Armstrong: The Man Behind The Machinery

E.P. ARMSTRONG: THE MAN BEHIND THE MACHINERY

In the year 1865 (the year the civil war ended in the U.S.), a son was born in the village of Haydon Bridge, England (30 miles west of Newcastle). Edward Armstrong's parents, Henry and Jane Armstrong, had no inkling of the success their son would come to achieve halfway across the world.


Scenes from E.P. Armstrongs childhood in Haydon Gridge on the River Tyne, thirty miles west of New Castle, England. At Left, a street car in Haydon Bridge. At right, the bridge for which the town was named.

Edward was one of five children. When he was only four years old, his family journeyed to America and settled in Connecticut. He spent his boyhood on the family farm, where his father operated a waterpower sawmill and wagon spoke factory. His eager curiosity about the drawing and woodworking tools that surrounded Edward in this factory would become his passion over the next 75 years.

While the other children studied in the country schoolhouse, Edward practiced his reading lessons from his father's mechanical catalogues. He worked in his father's shop, gaining more and more mechanical knowledge. He spent hours making sketches with his father's drawing tools and bringing them to life in his carpenter shop. All sorts of wagons were built in the New England shop and Edward operated the lathe. Much of his time was spent rigging up lathes to make toy wagons and ships; laying out and constructing dams and raceways; and rigging up water wheels to run small circular saws.

Edward spent his youth working in his father's wagon shop in South Coventry, Connecticut. A variety of vehicles were built here and Edward and his brother William learned the rudiments of engineering and manufacturing.

While he and his brothers were quite young, they figured out how to install a set of spoke machinery. Their father gave them the job of getting these machines installed and running smoothly. The machinery consisted of a 30-inch bolting saw with 36 teeth that was fed by hand. Cutting ash, oak and hickory, feeding by hand, was hard labor and provided a strong initiative to work out a way to make the job easier. This led to their experiments with changing the speed and number of teeth in the saw to be able to cut the material to best advantage with the least possible effort. They found a noticeable improvement in the feed by slowing the saw down. A power feed mechanism was devised, making it possible to use a larger saw. Edward and his brothers cared for the saw using an upset swage and gumming out the teeth. Working out these fundamental savings principles was the beginning of Edward's life work.
Many such machines for sawing and planing were developed and the responsibility of installing and operating them was turned over to Edward and his brothers. Before Edward left home, his father's shop was equipped with 35 different machines for sawing and planing lumber, machines for making spokes and hubs for wagon wheels, and machine shop and blacksmith tools.

When still in his "teens" (before the concept of "teenager" had been invented), Edward, his brother Will and an uncle worked in a portable steam circular saw mill two miles away. It was grueling work taking lumber and slabs from behind the saw, but being near the engine, saw and other machines fascinated Edward. He took in everything - missed nothing.

E.P. gained some of his early experience as a filer at the Ed Brooks Mill at Stafford Springs, Connecticut.

They later found a job working in a water-powered "up-and-down" sawmill within walking distance of their farm. An up-and-down sawmill consisted of a single saw that reciprocates up and down (hence, the name). It is a little like a large reciprocating jig saw or a sash gang (or frame) saw, except with just one saw. The up-and-down mill cut one board at a time from the log. The feed was set up on a type of ratchet with the log advancing on the down stroke of the saw, and not advancing on the up stroke. Although these mills could be very accurate, they were extremely slow.


E.P. Armstrong left New England at age 22 to expand his knowledge of the timber industry. Taken in 1887.	Edward's older brother William (W.H.) worked with him setting up machinery and making spokes in their father's New England wagon shop. Taken in 1887.

Saws became Edward's main interest and he seized the opportunity to operate a small sawmill nearby in Stafford Springs, Connecticut. He did the sawing, millwright work, took care of the saws and kept tally on the logs and lumber being sold at the mill.

After a few months, the mill and all its equipment went up in flames. Edward, then only 21, offered to plan, rebuild and install the machinery for a new mill. The owner approved and the new mill was completed. Edward operated it until July of 1887.

He left New England to travel and gain more experience. As he got further away from New England and into other lumbering sections, he began to realize the tremendous scope of the timber industry. He found that considerable improvement was possible and recognized the need for better filing room equipment. His travels took him to many mills throughout 14 states in the U.S., where Edward observed every size and type of saw used on various types of timber. All seemed to be having trouble with their saws. The lack of understanding about saw maintenance, especially on band saws (just beginning to come into general use), presented a challenge to this eager young man.

Once again, the sawmills and the filing room became Edward's schoolhouse. He filed saws; designed and drew plans up for sawmills and filing rooms; and did millwright and blacksmith work; and logging and sawing. He designed sharpeners and saw tools for his own use, making them himself or having them made in sawmill machine shops. He forged them by hand and heat-treated them the best he could.

In 1893, while EP (Edward) was located in Michigan, he convinced a certain young lady named Fannie Mae to be his wife. Mrs. Armstrong took a keen interest in her husband's work, later becoming active in the development and management of his business.
	E.P.'s wife, Fannie Mae, standing among the tall tres at the California Redwoods.

EP traveled to Oregon in 1904 to work as the head filer at the Standard Box and Lumber Co., near the East end of the old Burnside Bridge in Portland, Oregon. His son, Harry worked at the mill alongside his father. Prompted by requests from filer friends for better tools, EP set up his drawing board in the corner of the filing room and did some office work in a spare room at his home.

The sawmill of the Standard Box and Lumber Company was located near the East end of the old Burnside Bridge. E.P. balanced his time between head filer at the mill and designing and building tools for other filers.

E.P. Armstrong (at left) in the file room at Standard Box and Lumber Company in Portland, Oregon. Note the flat belt running overhead that powered the machinery in the file room.

His growing sideline business consumed more and more of his time, so he went to the mill owner and asked if his son Harry could take over as head filer. EP assured him that he would continue to work in the saw shop and would personally inspect every saw. EP shrewdly negotiated full head filer pay for his son (and presumably EP also received some compensation, too).

The mill owner asked how old the son was. EP proudly told him that Harry was 14, fully capable of doing a man's work every day. The mill owner recognized that the Armstrong's were the best filing team he had ever had. His saws ran better and downtime was never caused by poorly maintained saws. So he agreed and EP began to devote his full attention to his growing business, while Harry shouldered a man's job at 14.

EP opened a small jobbing machine shop near the sawmill and named it Armstrong Mfg. Co. Many trips were being made between the mill and the shop. Turning out machinery in the shop required a considerable amount of engineering and design work. The demands on EP's time led him to the decision to discontinue the job shop and devote his full time to the manufacture of saw tools. Later, sharpeners, stretcher rolls, etc. added to the line.

The first factory of the Armstrong Manufacturing Company general machine works was located in downtown Portland. They proudly advertised their 5 digit phone number BR-679. All phones in Portland require 10-digit dailing today.

All tools and spare parts carried the trademarked ringed "A" guarantee, which signified that they were genuine Armstrong parts made for maximum wear, proper fit and backed by a service promise.

The business grew to the point that both EP and Harry needed to work full time making saw tools, so Harry left the Standard Box & Lumber Company, when the mill burned in 1915, to join his father in the business. They delivered swages, shapers and spare parts to filers locally on foot, walking to the 30 sawmills that lined the Willamette river just within the city limits of Portland.

In 1928, Harry moved his family from Portland, Oregon to Longview, Washington to take the head filer job at Weyerhaeuser's Mill 3, one of the most prestigious filing jobs on the West Coast. He transferred to Mill 2 in 1942 and retired in 1960, after 32 years with Weyerhaeuser. Harry died in 1982 at the age of 88. Harry's son, Don, also became active in the industry. See the Saw Engineer article featured in the history of Armstrong Mfg.


Left: E.P. busily at work at his drafting table, designing tools and parts. Right: Son Lloyd spent most of his time managing the day-to-day business of the company.

Edward's son, Lloyd, joined his father at the company in 1925. Lloyd had spent many years in the filing room, gathering the knowledge about saws that his father insisted both sons know. He became President of the company after his father passed away in 1942.

Lloyd served as President and Chairman of the corporation for many years until he retired in 1975. Lloyd moved to New Mexico where he lived until his death in 1986 at age 88.

Edward P. Armstrong will well be remembered for his dedication and influence to saw filers and the filing trade. He was always striving to improve and advance, which required a large measure of initiative, courage, and faith in himself and loyalty to his associates.

His unswerving perseverance to provide the best saw filing tools available was the foundation of Armstrong Manufacturing Company and remains central to our continuing mission.

Edward P. Armstrong (1865-1942)
Founder of Armstrong Mfg. Co.