Still newsworthy

In the Sunday edition of The Philadelphia Inquirer on August 29, 2010, a journalist wrote an article on the anniversary of women's suffrage. Lucretia Coffin Mott (1793-1880) is mentioned in the article as her work pertained to the women's suffrage movement. I notice that she must still be considered revelant as I'll see her mentioned in today's magazines and textbooks. Wikipedia.com is a good starting place if you want to learn more about this amazing woman.

I see Lucretia Mott as a person who was way ahead of her time. I've read articles about her and one biography and I wonder how many other women during her lifetime gave speeches and traveled as much as she did? She also had the support of her husband which would have been critical at the time.

I think Mrs. Mott must have been something of an enigma in the 1800's. Several years ago, I looked up her details in the 1860 U.S. Census and noted that the space next to her name listing occupation was blank. Many women at the time of that census were "keeping house" and men were farm laborers, merchants, or bricklayers. I've wondered if the census taker had no idea what to write and so he didn't write anything. On the other hand, it's not like there was enough space to write abolitionist, social reformer and women's suffragist.

Due to her life's work she is recognized in having a village named after her (La Mott) and marker honoring her memory here in Pennsylvania.

Ellwood Ivins Tube Works Company

In the 1920 U.S. Census, I noted that several people in La Mott, including members of the Fields family, worked at a place called the "Tube Works." A couple of years before his death, I spoke with Mr. Fields about this business as I thought he would be able to give me some insight as to what this company was all about. The complete name of the company was the Ellwood Ivins Tube Works. It was built in 1993 and first put in operation in 1894 according to the Directory of Iron Steel Works of the United States (1939).

Mr. Fields recalled how the company was located at the corner of Valley Road and Coventry Avenue in Melrose Park. After doing a bit of research at the Old York Road Historical Society, the local libraries and some archival work for the Cheltenham Twinning Committee, I found additional information about the company to support what I learned in that informal interview with Mr. Fields.

According to an ad by the Ivins Company, appearing in an anniversary book about Cheltenham Township, three inch tubes were made and stretched and then were used to make helicopters, instruments, aeroplanes, refrigeration equipment, fishing rods and more. Mr. Fields' father worked at the furnaces (there were three) and Mr. Fields, himself, worked the soap tubs. All employess had to find new jobs when the Ivins Company filed for bankruptcy and closed in 1962.