The Romance of Norwalk

The progress of the hatting industry here during the last century, might be summarized briefly as follows: 1803 — Fashionable hats were six inches deep with two inch brims; 1812 — Machine was invented for blowing fur. It consisted of a wire drum in which fur was placed, the machine being cranked by hand; 1818 — Machine for bowing hats was in¬ vented. It was of wood, dish shaped and somewhat after the pattern of an old fashioned fanning mill and it took in enough for two “bats” at a time. This invention did not prove very satisfactory; 1821, or a little before, — a ma¬ chine for forming wool hat bodies with a vibrating and re¬ volving cone, was placed on the market; 1822 — New man¬ ner of coloring hats is recorded. Up to this time it had been customary to place the hats, two or three dozen at a time in a great kettle from which they were taken by hand every half hour until the operation was completed, about 20 hours. The new method in 1822 invented by Joel Taylor of Danbury, called for the placing of six dozen hats on a large wheel with pins and turned by a crank. The dye stuff was contained in a copper kettle shaped like a half moon, underneath. The hats on one half the wheel were in the liquor receiving color while those on the other half were out cooling. When the colorman wished to reverse this he had only to turn the crank; 1830 — A Chinaman gave birth to the idea of a high silk hat. It so happened that M. Botta, scholar and traveler, while living in Canton, China during the year 1830, discovered that his European beaver hat had become very shabby. He 274 ROMANCE OF NORWALK applied to a Chinese hatter, giving him all sorts of direc¬ tions for the making of a new one. In a few days the Chinese hatter brought a hat of the required shape not of beaver but of some soft, glossy stuff. M. Botta, on his return to France, preserved the hat. Wishing to have it repaired, he gave it to a French hatter. The latter ex¬ amined the fabrication with the greatest of interest and very shortly, in came the fashion for silk hats. Alvin Hurd of Danbury learned the art of silk hat making from two Englishmen in New York city and in 1835 introduced its manufacture into Danbury. Financial panic, 1837, which sadly affected the hat indus¬ try took place, closing numerous factories and throwing hun¬ dreds out of employment; 1841, wool hatting was firmly es¬ tablished in Danbury following the going out of fashion of napped hats; 1843 an^ 1845, machines for forming fur hat bodies were invented; 1846 and 1847 were hard times for the hatters. Many were thrown out of employment and hired themselves out to the farmers. Baron Kossuth, 1849, introduced the soft felt hat into America and it shortly became very popular; 1850, by this time new inventions had so increased production that a hat could be turned out every minute. In the early days, three hats a day was the quota. Hats were now bell crowned, about nine inches deep with one and one half inch brims. The cash system was introduced in 1850, into the hat¬ ting business. Up to this time all business had been carried on with a trade basis; 1853, James Taylor of Danbury patented machines for felting and sizing hats; 1858, Crofut and Knapp Co. came into being in Norwalk. CROFUT AND KNAPP CO. The foundation of the Crofut and Knapp industry was laid by James IT. Knapp in 1858. Mr. Knapp had formerly been associated with Gillam, French and Knapp and also Knapp and French. When he started in his new business Early Crofut and Knapp Factory The great hat industry of the Crofut and Knapp Co. was housed in this little building in the “Hollow,” North Main and Webster streets, sixty years ago. First Oyster Steamboat To Norwalk goes credit for the introduction of steam in the oyster industry. Captain Peter Decker of this city having set the world an example in 1874 in his boat the “Early Bird” pictured above. HATTING 275 in 1858, he needed an expert hat stiffener and so chose Andrew J. Crofut as partner. Though one would expect the firm name to be Knapp and Crofut, Mr. Knapp was of a retiring nature and so put his own name last. In the lat¬ ter part of the year i860, the C. and K. made and put on the market the first derby hat made in America. Early in the year, J. H. Knapp had recognized the value and im¬ portance of the “hard hats” made in England and the first samples to be sent to this country were dispatched to him. In 1908, straw hats were added to the list of C. and K. manufactures. In 1913, the Cavanagh Edge came into being, invented by John Cavanagh, now president of the Crofut and Knapp and Cavanagh-Dobbs, and one of the most beloved citizens in Norwalk. Mr. Cavanagh started in the hat business as a boy under James H. Knapp and worked his way to the top of his pro¬ fession, mastering every phase of the business from begin¬ ning to end. He invented and perfected his new process of that manufacturing, now known as the Cavanagh Edge process in the year 1913. To explain the process, we quote from the C. and K. publication of 1924: “Even though the felted edge which is the characteristic mark of the process, were covered with a binding, which is frequently done, or the edge cut off entirely, the benefit of the process of manu¬ facturing remains.” The advantage is said to lie in the increased tightness of the felt and “the inimitable hand-made character of the product.” It is also said that the process doubles the life of the hat. Another advance in hat manufacture was made a little later by P. N. Knapp who invented the reverse lap brim in straw hats, for yachting. Silk hats were added to the list of C. and K. products in 1917. Caps and cloth hats became part of the manufacturing list in 1919. At this time a new department for the making of sport and tailored hats for women, was inaugurated. In 1923, the new Crofut and Knapp Co. factory on Van Zant st. was opened. This ROMANCE OF NORWALK 276 new building, four stories high with a five story “L” in rear, in 1924 turned out 1,500,000 hats a year or nearly 10 hats every working moment, the work of 1,000 skilled hands. Today, with about 1,500 people employed, the com¬ pany turns out nearly double that number of hats or close to 3,000,000, averaging a value of more than $10,000,000 a year. Soft hats, derbies, straw hats, cloth hats, caps, silk hats for men, sport hats, tailored hats, straw hats and silk hats for women are made at the C. and K. plant. MAKING THE HAT Perhaps the most fascinating work in the factory is the making of felt hats, and those who have had the good fortune to witness the transformation of “a double handful of light, fluffy fur which a breath might blow away, to the tightly felted fabric that successfully resists the efforts of a strong man to tear apart,” cannot help but wonder at the “magic” of the industry. “The generally accepted idea is that a hat is made from felt which comes in rolls from which a piece is cut and in some mysterious way pressed or ironed into shape, somewhat as a shoe is made from flat leather, or clothing manufactured from cloth,” to quote from the C. and K. organ. “It will surprise many to know that the felting is only an incidental process of hat manufacture and furthermore, that hat making is one of the rare industries in which absolutely raw material is transformed under one roof into an entirely different article having no resemblance to the stuff from which it originates. “Nearly 40 distinct and separate operations are required to produce a C. and K. hat. The basic material is the fur of such animals as the rabbit or Coney, as it is called in Europe, the hare, the beaver, the nutria and to a lesser extent the otter and the muskrat. Every fur bearing animal is provided with a protective outer coating of coarse hair which is useless in hat manufacturing and which must be removed by plucking it from the pelt, leaving the fine soft HATTING 277 fur that is next to the skin. Dame Nature, in her wise care for her little creatures, provides them with an oily substance that repels water and thus keeps their fur coats dry and warm. This oil is exuded through a microscopic scale on each fibre of the fur and it is this scale which makes hat manufacturing possible, because the process of felting is simply bringing the fibres closer together where the scales will tangle or lock so tightly that a closely knit fabric is formed. “The first thing that is done after the hair is plucked out is to treat the fur to a bath of mercury dissolved in nitric acid, which opens the scales of the fur fibres and makes them effective in felting. This process is called ‘carroting.’ After the solution has been thoroughly removed and the skin dried, it is laid pelt side down in a fur cutting machine where the skin is cut away from the fur by whirling knives that cut the pelt off in fine strips that somewhat resemble shredded wheat. . . . The fur is then packed in five pound bags and is ready for actual hat making. Fur, as well as the hat bodies that are made from it, is rarely used in the manu¬ facture of C. and K. hats until it is at least six months old.” After the particular mixture of fur which is to be used, has been selected, it is thoroughly mixed in a ‘devil’ or picker and then run through a blowing machine where it is properly cleaned. “The quantity of fur required to make one hat varies according to the shape, weight and dimensions of the finished article and averages about three ounces. An amount suf¬ ficient only to make one hat is fed into the forming machine where the magical transformation from a bunch of fluffy fur to the first semblance of a hat takes place. The curious minded will be interested in a description of this forming machine. The modern forming machine takes enough fur to make one hat and by expertly controlled currents of air forms it into a cone shaped bag about 36 inches high and 32 inches wide at the bottom, terminating in a rounded point ROMANCE OF NORWALK 278