The Scholfields, however, were not to be the first to introduce
mechanical wool carding into America. Several attempts had been made
prior to their arrival. In East Hartford, Connecticut, "about 1770
Elisha Pitkin had built a mill on the east side of Main Street near the
old meeting-house and Hockanum Bridge, which was run by water-power,
supplied by damming the Hockanum River. Here, beside grinding grain and
plaster, was set up the first wool-carding machine in the state, and, it
is believed, in the country."[6] Samual Mayall in Boston, about 1788 or
1789, set up a carding machine operated by horse power. In 1791 he moved
to Gray, Maine, where he operated a shop for wool carding and cloth
dressing.[7] Of the machines used at the Hartford Woolen Manufactory,
organized in 1788, a viewer reported he saw "two carding-engines,
working by water, of a very inferior construction." They were further
described as having "two large center cylinders in each, with two
doffers, and only two working cylinders, of the breadth of bare sixteen
inches, said to be invented by some person there."[8] But these were
isolated examples; most of the woolen mills of this period were like the
one built in 1792 by John Manning in Ipswich, Massachusetts, where all
the work of carding, spinning, and weaving was still performed by hand.
The Scholfields' knowledge of mechanical wool-processing was to find a
welcome reception in this young nation now struggling for economic
independence. The exact reason for their decision to embark for America
is unknown. However, it may well be that they, like Samuel Slater[9]
some three years earlier, had learned of the bounties being offered by
several state legislatures for the successful introduction of new
textile machines.
Both John and Arthur were experienced in the manufacture of woolens.
They were the sons of a clothier (during the 18th century, a person who
performed the several operations in finishing cloth) and had been
apprenticed to the trade. Arthur was 36 and a bachelor; John, a little
younger, was married and had six children. Arthur and John, with his
family, sailed from Liverpool in March 1793 and arrived in Boston some
two months later. Upon arrival, their immediate concern was to find a
dwelling place for John's family. Finally they were accommodated by
Jedediah Morse, well-known author of _Morse's geography and gazetteer_,
in a lodging in Charlestown, near Bunker Hill. In less than a month John
began to build a spinning jenny and a hand loom, and soon the
Scholfields started to produce woolen cloth. The two brothers were
joined in the venture by John Shaw, a spinner and weaver who had
migrated from England with them. Morse, being much impressed with some
of the broadcloth they produced, was especially interested to find that
John and Arthur understood the actual construction of the textile
machines. Morse immediately recommended the Scholfields to some wealthy
persons of Newburyport (see fig. 7), who were interested in sponsoring a
new textile mill.
[Illustration: Figure 8.--CROSS-SECTION OF A SCHOLFIELD WOOL-CARDING
MACHINE. The wool was fed into the machine from a moving apron, locked
in by a pair of rollers, and passed from the taker-in roller to the
angle stripper. This latter roller transferred the wool on to the main
cylinder and acted as a stripper for the first worker roller. After
passing through two more workers and strippers, the wool was prepared
for leaving the main cylinder by the fancy, a roller with longer wire
teeth set to reach into the card clothing of the large cylinder. Then
the doffer roller picked up the carded fibers from the main cylinder in
4-inch widths the length of the roller. These sections were freed by the
comb plate, passed between the fluted wooden cylinder and an under
board, where they were converted into slivers, and deposited into a
small wooden trough.]