history of the dennison manufacturing company, part 2

The New Dunlap Block, Brunswick, Me.

A Model of the First Box
Machine.

       By 1856 Mr. Dennison had a salesroom and a small-sized factory on the second floor of 163 Milk Street, Boston. This was the successor to two previous salesrooms in Boston, the first opened at 203 Washington Street in 1850, six years after the business started, and a subsequent one at 151 Washington Street. As can be seen from the sign over his warerooms, he was then a "tag manufacturer" in addition to being a "box maker." So out of the old Boston sign, " E. W. Dennison, Tag Manufacturer," became the well-known "Dennison Manufacturing Co., The Tag Makers."

       In the days when Mr. Dennison was in the Milk Street salesrooms he was making small jewelry tags from parchment, stringing them with silk strings. In addition he was manufacturing small cards of white cardboard on which the jewelers displayed brooches, stick pins, cuff buttons and the like. He also sold twine and cotton to the jewelers. This period marks the beginning of the "stepping-out" process, which has always been a Dennison attribute and to which is due the large Dennison line of 1920. It was this desire to add to his line of wares which led Mr. Dennison to the development of his best-known and most useful invention, the shipping tag.

E. W. Dennison's Boston
 Store at 163 Milk Street.

      When E. W. Dennison opened his first Boston salesroom at 203 Washington Street he shared it with H. M. Richards, an Attleboro jeweler. Working for Mr. Richards was a young man named Albert Metcalf, who was a few years Mr. Dennison's junior. Young Metcalf was interested in the growing Dennison line and often helped Mr. Dennison by selling boxes to callers and entering the sales on the " Scratch Book." The acquaintance between the two young men became a warm friendship, and soon a partnership was formed which only death dissolved.

       Mr. Metcalf was active in the affairs of the business up to the time of his death January 2, 1912. He was Mr. Dennison's first partner in 1855 in Dennison &. Co.; was elected treasurer of the Dennison Manufacturing Co., incorporated in 1878, and was one of the incorporators of the new Dennison Manufacturing Co. the industrial partnership in 191 1.

      No other man, with the exception of Mr. E. W. Dennison, has been so closely associated with the company. It was Albert Metcalf's clear thinking and command of detail, coupled with Mr. Dennison's genius and unbounded optimism, which brought the early success.

Above‚ The Boston Store When It Was at Milk and Hawley Streets

Below, The Present Boston Store, 26 Franklin Street

Mr. Dennison's First Partner.

Above, The original New York Office. Below, the store at 5th Ave and 26th St. 1919.

      One morning in the early seventies when the Dennison store in Boston was at the corner of Milk and Hawley streets the truck man who carted the goods in from the Roxbury factory reported that all of his horses were sick. An epidemic had seized thousands of horses in the city and none could be had elsewhere. Finally H. B. Dennison (son of the founder) asked for men to volunteer to pull a truck to Roxbury and back. Twenty-five husky young fellows volunteered and pulled a truckload of tags, labels and boxes from the factory. In the old days they had the same get-together spirit that is so noticeable in the business to-day.

This Machine Turned Out
the First Jewelers' Tags.

      When with the growth of the business Mr. Dennison decided that there should be a headquarters in New York, it was natural that he should look for a location in the jewelry district of Maiden Lane. It was in 1855 that he opened a small office on the second floor of No. 17 Maiden Lane and put in charge of it Mr. Henry Hawkes, who soon afterward became a partner in the concern. Later the New York store was moved to 198 Broadway, and this was the Dennison site until fire destroyed the building in 1901. Then the company built a store at 15 John Street and in 1908 opened an uptown branch at 15 West 27th Street. In 1912 the New York headquarters at 220 Fifth Avenue were established and in 1915 the John Street store was closed.

      W. Dennison started out to sell jewelers' boxes, but his active mind did not permit him to stop there. He saw that the jewelry trade was in need of better tags to mark the rings, bracelets, etc., in their stores, and in 1854 he began to import jewelers' tags. They were an inferior product, however, and Mr. Dennison soon decided to make his own tags. Thus the tag business started in the little Washington Street store, and the tag machine shown on the opposite page was the first one used to die them out.

      Previous to the manufacture of tags for the jeweler Mr. Dennison had started to make the small cards which were used to hold jewelry, at first importing the stock for them and later, as the business increased, buying the stock from the mill of E. Lamson Perkins in Roxbury. These two ventures had an important influence on the development of the business.

      At the same time Mr. Dennison began the manufacture of jewelers' cotton and other findings.

Old Marking Tags and New Ones. 

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 5