ume 



III 



JANUARY 1911 



Number 9 







m OUTDOOR WORLD 



History of the Roxbury Wire Mills 



By JAMES B. DAVENPORT, Stamford, Connecticut 



Explanatory Note. — The "wire mills" and the picturesque sur- 

 roundings are the Mecca for students and lovers of nature in Stam- 

 ford, Greenwich and vicinity. Here for many years have come fine 

 equipages, automobiles, pedestrians, bicyclists, camerists, geologists, 

 botanists — and many lovers who were students of each other, at least 

 for the time, and not students of nature. Guide-boards scattered for 

 many miles in every point of the compass tell direction and distance 

 to the wayfarer. Every camerist shows you his collection of "wire 

 mills" souvenirs; and every chauffeur turns his car in that direction 

 when left to choose "any of the beautiful country roads in the 

 northern part of Stamford." 



Because the interest is so widespread, we publish this valuable 

 historical article by Mr. Davenport, who is probably the most com- 

 petent person in this locality to write its history. — Editor. 



HEODORE DAVENPORT 



was the son of Major John, 

 a charter member of the 

 TSUI'S Society of the Cincinnati, 

 — 5»§tS anc ^ grandson of Colonel 

 Abraham of "Dark Day" 

 fame. Mr. Davenport, 

 then a young man of thirty-three, asso- 

 ciated himself with William Lacon. an 

 Englishman, and in 1825 purchased 

 about seventy acres of land at what was 

 then called North Stamford, containing 

 a gristmill and a sawmill. There they 

 built one of the first rolling mills in the 

 country. The partnership of Davenport 

 and Lacon on account of some disagree- 



ment continued only a short time, when 

 the property was ordered sold by the 

 Superior Court and was bought in by 

 Mr. Davenport. 



At the rolling mill and foundry where 

 the Diamond Ice Company now stands, 

 there was a voting man of twenty who 

 had begun there as an apprentice, by 

 name Jonathan D. Weeks. Mr. Daven- 

 port believed that young Weeks would 

 prove to be a man of great ability, and 

 offered him a partnership. The firm be- 

 came Davenport & Weeks, Rolling and 

 Wire Mills, for the manufacture of mer- 

 chant iron and wire. Mr. Weeks be- 

 came one of the best known and shrewd- 



Copyright 1911 by The Agassiz Association, Arcadia: Sound Beach, Conn. 



