426 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



[May 1, 1914. 



at the factory of the Boston Belting Co., of which he was for 

 years the superintendent. 



* • » 



Thomas A. Forsyth, of the Boston Belling Co., has been of- 

 fered the office of Overseer of the Poor of the City of Boston, 

 by Mayor Curley. Mr. Forsyth is a man of l\een business ability, 

 and his charitable disposition is evinced by the building of the 

 great dental infirmary, mentioned above. I have not yet heard 

 that Mr. Forsyth has accepted this important office, but its tender 

 to him cannot but be considered an honor to him and an excel- 

 lent choice by the Mayor. 



* * * 



If the price of scrap rubber declines on account of an over- 

 supply, the girls of Wellesley College may be blamed for it. 

 This w-orld-renovvncd college sustained a tremendous loss when 

 its principal dormitory and recitation building was totally de- 

 stroyed by fire last month. Extraordinary efforts are being made 

 to raise money for a series of buildings to replace College Hall, 

 and one of the schemes, started by Miss Mary Knapp, of Pitts- 

 burgh, Pa., is the collection of scrap rubber. Every girl in the 

 college has been asked to save her cast-ofF rubbers, and to have 

 her eyes open to the state of her friends' overshoes. It is expected 

 that the girls will appeal to the students of the men's colleges 

 to aid them in this campaign, and thus will be gathered a large 

 amount of scrap rubber. The girls will also examine the tires 

 of all automobiles in which they are invited to ride, and will also 

 be on the lookout for all the leaky hose which may be discov- 

 ered when the spring gardening season starts. The result is 

 expected to be a large collection of scrap rubber which, even at 

 present low market rates, will add a goodly sum to the building 

 fund of the college. 



* * * 



Boston is likely to have a new rubber footwear centre if the 

 present development continues. Boston is somewhat notional as 

 regards its business section, and to say that a firm has moved to 

 South Boston means to a citizen that it has gone into the sub- 

 urbs. This, however, is not necessarily the case, for the three 

 houses which have recently moved from Congress street and 

 from .-Xtlantic avenue are certainly no farther, and possibly not 

 as far, from the big South Terminal Station as they were before. 

 The three concerns are all in the same block, two in adjoining 

 stores and the other but a few doors from them. 



The Pilgrim Shoe and Rubber Co., which is a jobbing outlet 

 for the Hood Rubber Co.'s goods in parts of New England, is 

 to occupy the store, 274 and 276 Summer street, or, as it is some- 

 times called. Summer Street Extension. It is a five-story build- 

 ing, with elevators and specially convenient shipping facilities. 



At 278 Summer street a similar building is being furnished 

 and equipped for the occupancy of the Congress Shoe and Rub- 

 ber Co., which sells at wholesale the Shawmut rubbers, also 

 made by the Hood Rubber Co., and whose territory includes all 

 of New England and part of New York for this line. The two 

 houses naturally are closely connected, though one caters more 

 to the city trade and the other to the smaller dealers. They 

 cannot be considered competitors, and, in fact, the offices, which 

 adjoin each other, are connected by doors leading from one to 

 the other. However, the two organizations have separate offi- 

 cers, Julius Weber being president and treasurer, and W. S. 

 Cruickshank general manager of the Pilgrim Shoe and Rubber 

 Co. ; and Marshall Cutting being treasurer and general manager 

 of the Congress Shoe and Rubber Co. William A. Moody, until 

 recently president of the latter company, has resigned, and at 

 present writing his successor has not been appointed. 



W. F. Mayo & Co., wholesalers in rubber footwear, are at 

 286-290 Summer street, where they occupy the big six-story and 

 basement building, which is exceptionally well fitted for their 

 extensive business. For more than a quarter century they were 



on Congress street, and the change to a new modern, mill-con- 

 struction building is a great improvement in the comfort of all 

 the officers and workmen, and tends greatly to added efficiency 

 in the conduct of the business. 



* * * 



William H. Porter, who has been chosen president, treasurer 

 and general manager of the Enterprise Rubber Co., assumed 

 these positions the first of last month, and Mr. Proctor, his 

 predecessor, has gone to New York, where he assumes important 

 duties with the United States Rubber Co. Mr. Porter comes 

 here from Pittsburgh, where for four years he had managed the 

 Pittsburgh Rubber Co. business ; but he is an old Bostonian, hav- 

 ing been for fifteen years previous with the old firm of Edmands 

 & Mayo and its successors, W. F. Mayo & Co., with whom he 

 occupied various positions in the store and on the road. He is 

 pleased to get back to Boston, and his old friends and neighbors 



are glad to welcome him licre. 



* * * 



The steamer which took the Boston Opera company to Europe 

 also carried as passengers Mr. Clarence L. Weaver, president 

 and manager of the Banigan Rubber Co., of this city, and Mrs. 

 Weaver, who are now on a vacation tour of Great Britain and 

 the Continent. 



Tliat was quite a shipment of tires which arrived last month 

 from the B. F. Goodrich Co., of Akron, for its New England 

 agency. Twenty-five carloads means a good many tires, but 

 Manager F. T. Moore believes the stock is none too large to 

 satisfy the demands of automobilists served from this Boston 



branch of the house. 



* * * 



The Stoughton Rubber Co., at whose plant in Stoughton, Mas- 

 sachusetts, about 500 persons are employed, is erecting another 

 addition, two small buildings having been moved to make room 

 for the new structure, which will be 50 feet in length and three 

 stories high. The completion of this addition will make it pos- 

 sible for the work of production to proceed from start to finish 

 without covering any of the ground twice. 



E. H. Hicks, vice-president of this company, will sail on the 

 12th of May for a trip through the British Isles and Germany 

 (with perhaps a few days in "Gay Paree") on business con- 

 nected with the company. 



* * * 



M. A. Turner, of the Monatiquot Rubber Works Co., of South 

 Braintree. has just returned from a fishing trip in Maine. He 

 reports that there are still enough fish remaining to supply all the 

 other members of the rubber trade. 



THE RUBBER TRADE IN CHICAGO. 



By Our Regular Correspondent. 

 "T^HE arrival of spring has, of course, materially stimulated 

 ■^ the sale of garden hose, and dealers in this particular 

 article are at present quite cheerful. The footwear dealers 

 are much less inclined to complain than during the fall and 

 early winter. The snows of February and March and the 

 rains of April have made a notable decrease in the stock of 

 rubber boots and shoes carried on their shelves. 



The belting people are also comfortably busy, especially 

 those supplying the elevators in the northwest. Clothing 

 dealers are as a rule not altogether cheerful, their business 

 hardly being up to normal. 



* * * 



George F. Hawkinson, of the Peerless Rubber Manufac- 

 turing Co., gave your correspondent some interesting in- 

 formation regarding a feature recently introduced by his 

 company for the increase of the efficiency of the selling stafif. 

 He said: 



"Through your columns I should like to call tlie attention 



