A look back: Manufacturing

 

Very few mechanics settled in Comstock in it’s early days.

The first machine in Comstock Charter Township was a thresher called an “English Beater.” The English Beater used wooden crossbars to separate grain from wheat sheaves. Without the English Beater, famers would have to drive their oxen over wheat sheaves on flat ground, use a sickle and cradle, or flails to get their grain; processes that have been around for 1,000’s of years.

In 1831, Judge Caleb Eldred built the first sawmill. In 1832, Horace Comstock, Samuel Percival, and Caleb Eldred build the Grist Mill. Frank Clark built the first sawmill around Galesburg, the first one in the area to be powered by steam.

Perry Pond and his family emigrated from England in the early 1870’s and opened Comstock Novelty Works, which employed 8 people.

For more information on Comstock’s Manufacturing, check out the Comstock Bicentennial Commemorative Book, published in 1976.