22. Cardington 



Locomotive Works 



The first shop building at Cardington was 

 erected probably in 1829, about the time of the 

 dissolution of the Sellers and Pennock fire engine 

 partnership. On the extensive Sellers property 

 in Upper Darby Township, Delaware County, 

 just west of the present Philadelphia city limits, 

 the shop was located at the site of the old Marshall 

 Saw Mill, where the Marshall Road crossed 

 Cobbs Creek. 



The shops were built to provide facilities for 

 the construction of textile card machinery de- 

 signed by John Brandt, of Lancaster. Brandt, 

 who had devised a machine that set card teeth 

 in the leather backing more firmly than could be 

 done by hand, was induced by Coleman Sellers, 

 George Escol's father, to come to Philadelphia to 

 manufacture the card machines. Presumably the 

 name Cardington came from the product of the 

 shops. 



Brandt remained in Philadelphia for only about 

 a year. Coleman Sellers continued the card 

 machine business, however, and enlarged the 



shops in order to build paper machinery. The 

 foundry and large machine tools required for 

 paper machinery were used as well for general 

 machine work. After Coleman's death in 1834, 

 the Cardington shops were run by George Escol 

 and his elder brother Charles. 



Meanwhile, Brandt had accepted a position 

 with the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad, 

 and at his suggestion the railroad contracted with 

 the Sellers brothers to build two locomotives. 

 The successful completion of the locomotives led 

 to the building of steam engines and other ma- 

 chinery for the U.S. Mint. The Cardington shops 

 prospered for a time, but the Sellers brothers 

 were unable to weather the depression following 

 the general financial panic of 1837. Within little 

 more than a decade after their commencement, 

 the Cardington shops were sold by the sheriff. 

 According to George Escol Sellers, the property 

 was bought by John Wiltbank, a Philadelphia 

 brass founder. 200 



In the year 1834, the foundry and machine shops 

 then carried on by my brother and myself, were 

 mostly engaged on work for iron furnaces, rolling- 

 mills, flour-mills and machinery for paper making. 

 To turn the drying cylinders for the latter, we had 

 constructed what at that time was considered a 

 mammoth engine lathe that would turn 9 feet in 

 length and 4 feet 10 inches diameter; also for finishing 

 the housings for paper-press rolls and calenders, we 

 had built and put in operation the first iron planing 

 machine in the State of Pennsvlvania. If I recollect 



200 Memoirs, book 1, pp. 14-15, 34, and book 4, pp. 66-67. 



160 



right, there were then only two others in the United 

 States, one in West Point, N.Y., shops, and the 

 other in Dr. Nott's Novelty Works. 201 This primitive 

 machine had a capacity for 8 feet length by 4 feet 

 wide and 3 feet high. The bedplate was driven by 



201 The West Point Foundry of Gouverneur Kemble had 

 shops in New York City at the foot of Beach Street, from 18 17 

 until 1838 when all operations were consolidated at Cold 

 Spring, near West Point, New York (Kemble, cited in note 71 

 above). The Novelty Works, named for the steamboat 

 designed by Dr. Nott, president of Union College in Schenec- 

 tady, was operated by James Stillman, who was joined in 1842 

 by Horatio Allen (see note 100 above). 



