This collection of business records for Porter Machines Works, starting in 1882, renamed the Porter & McLeod Machine Shop, took a long time and a lot of saviors to get where it is today — inventoried, rehoused into acid-free folders and boxes, and ready to be studied by a scholar of local precision manufacturing (if our Mass Humanities grant is approved!) To get an idea of what that involved, including the nitty-gritty behind-the-scenes work and the three grants* that made it possible, check out this link:

http://hatfieldhistory.weebly.com/blog/for-every-mouse-you-see-there-are-usually-more

*Three grants: Research Inventory Grant from Mass Humanities, Supplies Regrant from the Mass. State Historical Records Advisory Board (SHRAB) and a Town of Hatfield CPA grant.

Due to our pending grant project, this collection will not be available to the general public until 2018, but please explore the inventory (link below) and if we can easily answer your questions, we will!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1O-Tw4mIFQEVTm8SwLuXuhNfbw0RYQcNd880t5R-rXk0/edit?usp=sharing

Jonathan E. Porter founded Porter Machine Works in 1882. Its initial location was on one floor of the mill building on the north side of the river, which housed the Shattuck Gun Shop, rebuilt by C.S. Shattuck after the 1881 fire.  Porter then relocated directly across the river (at the falls), and built the shop that still stands today. In 1898, Porter’s shop foreman and son-in-law Hugh McLeod purchased the business for $10,000. Sometime after the business was renamed the Porter & McLeod Machine Shop. The shop did business across the country and abroad, and closed its doors in 1970. How did this modest machine shop, tucked away in a small farming town, manage to attract skilled machinists and produce such a thriving business with an international reach for so many years (nearly 90)? That’s what our Scholar in Residence grant aims to answer. Stay tuned!