The next lecturer, Bruce Cortis, with his book and the ‘family tree’ of whip companies behind him. (Photo by Peter Currier)
WESTFIELD- The Westfield 350 Historical Lecture Series will continue Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. at the Scanlon Banquet Hall with a talk by author and local historian Bruce Cortis about the history of the whip industry in Westfield.
Cortis’ lecture will follow the whip industry in Westfield from the 18th century to the mid-20th century. He will discuss the earliest companies, inventions, and labor issues that accompanied the industry and will also talk about how many Westfield natives left the city to bring their whip making skills elsewhere.
“There were a lot of men who left Westfield to go to other cities to staff their factories,” said Cortis, “Men left Westfield to go to Rochester and Windsor, New York. People also came from other towns into Westfield just to work in the industry.”
Cortis added that Westfield had already made a name for itself as the place where all the patents for whips were being produced by the 1840s. He said that Westfield was in control of about 60 percent of all patents for whips and whip components. These patents included those of the machines and parts that helped make the whips. The machines had been sold to other companies and other cities, to the point where, by the 1870s, Westfield manufactured whip making machines and practices had dominated the industry across the US.
Cortis also wrote a book on the matter, titled Whips of Westfield: The Rise and Decline of an American Industry. He had begun writing the book about three years ago, and it will be available for purchase at his lecture on Wednesday. It had just published in early December of last year. He said the book may eventually be available in the Whip Museum as well.
At one point, another larger building existed on Elm Street that was a hub within the hub of whip companies. According to Cortis, the now demolished Power Building housed many different whip companies throughout its life.
“A lot of smaller whip companies were only three to five people and they only used three or four rooms,” said Cortis, “So they didn’t require an entire huge factory. That huge brick building on Elm Street held a lot of smaller companies.”
Part of Cortis’ research on the industry included a family tree of sorts of each company, their mergers, their splits, and the eventual large consolidation of many of them.
“This is part of what makes it so challenging to trace these different companies,” said Cortis, “Some of them were never really recognized in print or any formal directory.”
Cortis of course will also speak about what factors lead to the decay of the whip industry in Westfield and the world. In a nutshell, he said that the automobile was the primary nail in the proverbial coffin of the height of the Whip City.
As always, Bruce Cortis’ lecture is free for all to attend.
