24 



experience of three generations in the business in the same fam- 

 ily,'^ and whose names, in connection with the straw business in 

 this County, are too Avell known to need more particular mention. 



" In 1853 these gentlemen projected the manufactory since 

 known as the Union Straw Works, so called, because several 

 firms doing business separately, here united in one. In 1856 

 these works were incorporated. The manufactory, which is the 

 most extensive of the kind either in this country or Europe, con- 

 sists of a main building five stories high, built upon four sides of 

 a square, with a court in the centre, and, together with a bleach- 

 ery and engine-house, occupies about one acre of land. Here the 

 Messrs. Carpenter have brought to their aid the appliances of 

 steam power and improved machinery to an extent hitherto un- 

 known, and altogether too varied in character and purposes, and 

 in many instances of too complicated construction, to justify an 

 attempt at description in this communication. Every thing in re- 

 gard to the manufacture of goods has been systematized ; sub- 

 divisions of labor, forming various distinct departments, have been 

 estabhshed ; thorough systems of accounts adopted, so that not 

 only the final cost of any lot or class of goods can be determined, 

 but, so minute is the system, the cost of each individual hat or 

 bonnet can at once be ascertained to the fraction of a cent, in any 

 department where it may be found. 



" In full operation these works give employment to about six 

 hundred persons here, and at the branch establishments at Med- 

 field and Nantucket, four hundred more. Besides these, work for 

 sewino; and other forms of labor is distributed in Foxboro' and the 

 neighboring towns, to about two thousand persons more in the 

 aggregate. These latter, of course, in a majority of cases, only 

 devote to this business the spare hours left from household duties. 

 The value of the goods produced varies from one and a fourth to 

 one and a half millions of dollars annually, the sales being corres- 

 pondingly large. The amount paid out annually for labor is about 

 $300,000. 



" The straw business here, it will be readily comprehended, 

 constitutes the foundation of the prosperity of the town. The 

 wages paid for labor have always been liberal, paid monthly, and 

 never subject to indirect discount by being paid in orders on 

 company stores or village trades." 



The Committee were much pleased with the numerous indica- 

 tions they saw of the benefits which the straw manufacture has 

 conferred on the people of Foxboro'. The village in which the 

 Union Straw Works are located is one of the pleasantest in the 

 State. Its improvement within the last thirty years is striking 



