Talk:Merrow Sewing Machine Company

Is it J. Makens Merrow or J. Makins Merrow? It is spelled both ways under the TIMELINE section.

Alanasings (talk) 13:10, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure. Genealogical documents I've seen for Joseph Makens Merrow, his mother (Lucy Makens), and his daughter (Lucy Makens Merrow) spell it variously as Makens, Makins, and Maken. I hope to get it sorted out, eventually. But this was back in the late 1700s / early 1800s, so we may never know exactly which spellings were merely clerical errors on documents.

An edit by Elvincoolidge on 19 October 2008 specifically changed the spelling of the 1838 Timeline entry (but did NOT change the adjacent 1822 entry!) FROM: "Makens" TO: "Makins". I have no idea what document convinced Elvincoolidge to make that spelling change.

(Note: I assume that Elvincoolidge was an employee of the Merrow® Sewing Machine Company, and made the change as a work assignment. He made changes, same day, to the articles "Joseph M. Merrow", "Charlie Merrow", and "Merrow (disambiguation)".)

Artpitkin (talk) 09:02, 4 February 2015 (UTC)

Original Company Name (at founding, in 1837 or 1838)
The first sentence of the article states the company was "established in 1838 as the Merrow Company by J. Makens Merrow". But I question whether that was the company-name at that time, because of the following.

1) One item listed under "Historical documents about Merrow Sewing Machine Company" ("The Merrow Machine Company - A Connecticut History and Tradition", from 1982 or later) states "The Merrow's built the first American knitting mill on the original site of the old powder mill in 1838 under the name J.M. Merrow & Son."

2) And another of those items listed under "Historical documents about Merrow Sewing Machine Company" ("UPDATE from the Merrow Machine Company", November 1988, pg. 2) also mentions that "Initially, J.M. Merrow did it all:", but does not state specifically that that was the the company's name originally. But the exact same spelling is used, including the lack of a space between the "J." and the "M." in "J.M. Merrow".

3) Finally, an item listed under "External links" ("Merrow family papers and records, 1800-1948") clearly states the following. "Joseph Makens' son, Joseph Battell Merrow, joined his father in 1838. Their partnership was called Joseph M. Merrow & Sons."

Artpitkin (talk) 05:52, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

The OVERVIEW paragraph (first paragraph of article)
The OVERVIEW paragraph (the first paragraph of the article) needs work. Contains half-truths. Specifically, it is NOT true (as stated) that "Originally a gunpowder manufacturer, in 1837 the company built a knitting mill". The gunpowder manufacturing plant was a prior company that was purchased in 1822 by Joseph Makens Merrow. After the gunpowder mill blew up, in 1837, Joseph Makens Merrow established the knitting mill on the same site. He established the knitting mill together with his son, Joseph Battell Merrow, under the name of either "Joseph M. Merrow & Sons" or "J.M. Merrow & Son". Possibly the son, who was about 19 at the time, was put in charge of the knitting mill, while the father (who was about 54) went on to found a separate business to manufacture bottles.

The knitting-mill company was NOT "originally a gunpowder manufacturer". It could be stated that Joseph Makens Merrow (the person) was "originally a gunpowder manufacturer", but in that case the rest should not say that in 1837 "the company" built a knitting mill.

The paragraph needs to be "tightened up".

Artpitkin (talk) 07:18, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Reverted vandalism
Some months ago the article was gutted with spurious justifications by the now-retired malicious user HappyValleyEditor, who did not comment on the talk page. (He also deleted the CEO's page.) The edits could not be reverted directly, perhaps due to use of an administrative tool, "TW". The only improvement since then was adding a category, which I added back. I checked the links and fixed the one that was broken. As the comments on the talk page indicate there are problems with accuracy, principally the original name of the company and mistakenly saying it started as a gunpowder mill. I will fix that. Deleting content that is not inaccurate is vandalism. The sources listed are almost all secondary sources: descriptions of primary source archives and summaries of historical information written long after the events described. I remind editors that primary sources are not forbidden in WP, particularly ones that are easily accessible and understood, but they should be only supplementary if secondary sources are available.Enon (talk) 11:30, 28 February 2017 (UTC)