HARDWOOD RECORD 



17 



'Builders of Lumber History. 



Elihu A. Beckley. 



iScc portrait siippleviciit.) 

 Elihu A. Beckley, whose portrait the 

 Hardwood Eecoed is proud to present as 

 supplement to this issue, was born at Orange, 

 Conn., May 20, 1845, of parents descended 

 from some of the earliest English settlers 

 of that state. He attended various public 

 and private schools in New Haven, and 

 finished his education with a complete busi- 

 ness college course. 



Mr. Beckley made his entry into the lumber 

 business at the early age of twenty, when he 

 was taken into the employ of his older 

 brother, the late William A. Beckley, who 

 had started a retail lumber yard in New 

 Haven about 1860. After a year or two the 

 younger man was admitted to partnership, 

 and this arrangement continued until 1889 ; 



NUMBEB XLTI. 



also his excellent judgment in selecting the 

 younger men associated with him in the 

 management of his vast business enterprises. 

 The Crosby & Beckley Company still main- 

 tains its head office at New Haven, and has 

 a western office and distributing yard at 

 Columbus, O., with a New York branch at 

 No. 1 Madison avenue. Its officers are E. A. 

 Beckley, presideiit; W. E. Douglass, vice 

 president; R. L. Walkley, treasurer, and O. 

 E. Beckley, secretary. The company also 

 operates several sawmills in West Virginia, 

 cutting poplar, oak, chestnut and other hard- 

 woods; it is a large owner of timber proper- 

 ties in that state, and conducts a hardwood 

 yard at Evansville, Ind., doing a general 

 wholesale business. Affiliated with the same 

 interests the Douglass & Walkley Company 

 owns stumpage and operates a band mill at 

 Drew, Miss., with W. E. Douglass as presi- 

 dent; also the Holly Lumber Company, of 

 which E. L. Walkley is president, owns 



FOLIAGE AND FRUIT OP WHITE CEDAR. 



by constant and conscientious attention to 

 his duties, and by dint of energy and am- 

 bition, he helped develop the business from 

 a very small beginning to one of the largest 

 in its line in Connecticut. 



Feeling eventually that there was a 

 broader field in the wholesale line and hav- 

 ing in the meantime formed an intimate 

 friendship with the late F. E. Crosby of 

 Eome, O., a pioneer in the hardwood lumber 

 business, Mr. Beckley decided to accept an 

 offer from Mr. Crosby to become his partner 

 and handle the selling end of his trade in 

 the East. Such an arrangement was effected 

 and The Crosb}' & Beckley Company was 

 incorporated, with its principal office at New 

 Haven under the management of Mr. Beck- 

 ley. Since the death of Mr. Crosby, which 

 occurred in 1893, Mr. Beckley has been the 

 head of tliis great company, and the business 

 has grown and flourished to such an extent 

 that it stands today among the most prom- 

 inent hardwood concerns of the United States. 

 This prosperity indicates not only the ability 

 of its prime mover as an executive and his 

 remarkable grasp on commercial affairs, but 



large timber boundaries and a band saw 

 mill at Pickens, W. Va., both companies 

 operating their own logging railroads with 

 complete up to date equipment. 



Mr. Beckley is interested and active in 

 association affairs, and is at present a mem- 

 ber of the Board of Arbitration of the 

 National Wholesale Lumber Dealers' Asso- 

 ciation and a loyal supporter of the National 

 Hardwood Lumber Association. He has 

 never been particularly active in politics, 

 but has always been a staunch Eepubliean. 

 He is a member of the Chamber of Com- 

 merce of New Haven, of the Independent 

 Order of Odd Fellows, the Congregational 

 Church, and is also identified with several 

 clubs of the quieter sort. 



In 1866 Mr. Beckley was married to Eliza- 

 beth J. Bartlett of Dorset, Vt. ; they have 

 three sons and one daughter. Mr. Beckley is 

 a man of quiet tastes and domestic habits, 

 finding his greatest enjoyment and recreation 

 in his home, which is a beautiful structure on 

 one of New Haven's fine avenues, and in 

 the society of his little family and a circle 

 of close friends. 



Hardwood Carpets. 



Hardwood carpets differ from hardwood 

 floors in that the floor has rafters, flooring 

 boards, joints and finishes to be considered. 

 The hardwood floor is permanent, while the 

 carpet is not a fixture; it is not a part of 

 the building, but is separate from it and 

 can be moved from place to place, unless the 

 joints are of such nature that the sections 

 are too large for practicable transportation. 

 The hardwood floor is used in all countries, 

 whereas the hardwood carpet is not very 

 conspicuous except in certain lands. This 

 sort of carpet may be seen in daily service 

 very often in tropical countries, where con- 

 ditions are such that fabrics are not sani- 

 tary. Hardwood mats and carpets prevail 

 to considerable extent in Cuba, the Philip- 

 pines and China. Probably the most crude 

 type of covering is obtained by the use of 

 blocks or cubes cut out for purposes of lay- 

 ing, like bricks. Often these blocks are 

 stained. Then they are inlaid and dove- 

 tailed and frequently set with ornaments or 

 engraved, until one wonders what one is 

 walking upon. 



The accompanying cuts show some of the 

 processes of manufacturing hardwood floor 

 coverings. The first work involved consists 

 in preparing the stock. Some of the car- 

 pets are made by intersecting small pieces 

 of wood, shaped to fit neatly and uniformly. 

 Others are constructed by forming parallel 

 sections of different kinds of pieces. Cubes 

 and oblongs are worked in, and angles de- 

 scribed; ovals and circles are not over- 

 looked, nor is engraving and work in which 

 pieces of colored glass and sea shell are 

 employed for purposes of ornamentation, or 

 to set off some showy figure. Birds, horses, 

 fish and even the human figure are often 



outlined by the- use of differently finished 

 or colored pieces of wood. 



Figure 1 shows one of the bolts in readi- 

 ness for trimming down to the prescribed 

 size of block or pad for carpets. The block 

 is turned if for round work, and sawed if 

 for flat work. This gives the block the 

 form shown in Fig. 2; the cross as in Pig. 3; 

 the hollowed block as in Fig. 4; the open 

 disk as in Fig. 5, or the long block as in 

 Fig. 6. Any manner of style may be chosen 

 and the original blocks reduced accordingly. 

 Often there is a great amount of handwork 

 necessary to get them into shape for adjust- 

 ing in a certain design. Usually very small 

 pieces are made and fitted, one at a time, 

 into the design, where they are cemented or 

 glued. 



There are carpets which are constructed 

 with split hardwood stock on the order 

 shown in Fig. 9. The operation involves the 

 stripping of a number of pieces of wood. 

 These pieces are made about one-quarter of 

 an inch in thickness and about one inch in 

 width. The weaving process is simple. The 

 pieces are properly arranged and the ' ' fill- 

 ing" strips are alternately laid into the 

 ' ' warp ' ' strips, so that the combination re- 

 sults as pictured in the diagram. Some- 

 times very much smaller pieces are employed 

 and the design works out as in Fig. 8. In 

 Fig. 9 are shown various shapes of the small 

 pieces of carpet stock, used in making up 

 combination designs. Fig. 10 shows an- 

 other cluster. One may find all kinds of 

 figures and shapes. 



The work of inlaying, matching and fit- 

 ting falls to nimble fingered persons, who 

 often create the design as they work. Oth- 

 ers work according to a given pattern. The 



