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Weekly News December 30, 2013Description
Clarence Marshall’s New Shop, 1937: Always wanting to tinker or build something, my father had various places on the Auburn Heights property that served as his shop. Some woodwork was done in the basement of the big house, there was one large piece of woodworking equipment in the unfinished section of the carriage house’s second floor, his 15” South Bend lathe was in the garage where the refrigerator is presently located, and the main workbench and storage cabinets were also in the garage along the wall where the shop would be built in 1937. He must have longed for a real shop many years before it was actually built.
Clarence’s second cousin, Paul Hannum, was a respected builder in Kennett Square, and he got the job to construct a 1½-story 24 x 30 foot addition on the southwest end of the Carriage House. There was to be no second floor, but the contour of the ground allowed for a basement that would be ground level at the rear of the building toward the mill race. A hen house where I had kept white rabbits for a brief time was demolished (it had stood where the present railroad turntable now exists), but a minimum of grading was required. The old quarry in the woods off Route 82 that had furnished granite for Auburn Heights in 1897 and the Carriage House in 1902 was opened up and used, so the stone would match the other buildings.
A front door, wide and high enough to accommodate cars of that time supplemented seven windows on the main floor and four more plus a walk-in door in the basement. A pit was designed in the wood floor to work on the underside of cars from below. The main workbench ran the entire length (nearly 30 feet) across the far end, with a row of drawers and cabinets underneath and “cubby holes” and small drawers mounted on the wall above it. On the opposite wall toward the old garage were three large closets, floor to ceiling, the steps going to the basement, and a water closet and washing sink. A door had been cut through the old wall from the garage, replacing a tiny window. Two steam radiators heated the new shop, steam being supplied from the paper mill.
What fun it must have been to plan this new addition! During the summer, this 13-year-old watched some of the inside furnishings being installed, often perched in the closet that was later to have the sink installed just below it. Sharp Thompson did the inside rough-coat plastering, upstairs and down, in one day. Joe Stabler ran the wires and installed the many electrical outlets and the incandescent lighting. Hannum and his head carpenter Sam Massey did almost everything else, the only painting being exterior around the windows and the ends of the roof rafters. Each cupboard door and drawer was equipped with locking hardware (seldom used). Clarence himself did the plumbing and heating. By fall, the new addition was ready to be occupied.
The big lathe was moved into place, and a vertical wooden post, about 8” x 8,” was put in the basement under it to support the extra weight. A new South Bend 9” bench lathe was installed (this was replaced about 10 years later with a 10”), along with a drill press and a shaper. A power hack saw, a band saw, and a grindstone were located in the new basement with its concrete floor. All hand tools, some new and some well-used, were moved into their new locations in the shop. What would happen next?
The first project was to refine a gas-saving device for automobiles, on which my father had obtained several patents. Then came the invention of a new clay target trap, which was “sold” to the Western Cartridge Company in exchange for 10 new traps for the Yorklyn Gun Club. In testing this trap, the big door was opened, and the targets were thrown over the rose arbor onto the lawn below, where most of them were recovered and used again. In 1940, the Stanley Model 76 arrived, and in the winter of 1941-1942, a 1940 Packard 180 was converted to steam (this car is presently owned by Bill Rule). In addition to Stanley acquisitions and mechanical restorations, the first model steam locomotive, a ¾”-scale 4-8-4 now in the museum, was built during World War II. A second “story” someday may tell of shop activities after 1950.
