Warner & Swasey Company

The Warner & Swasey Company was an American manufacturer of high-quality machine tools, instruments, and special machinery. Originally founded as a partnership in 1880 by Worcester Reed Warner (1846-1929) and Ambrose Swasey (1846-1937), the company was best known for two general types of products: astronomical telescopes and turret lathes. It also did a large amount of instrument work, such as equipment for astronomical observatories and military instruments (rangefinders, optical gunsights, etc.). [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|pp=34-35.] The themes that united these various lines of business were the crafts of toolmaking and instrument-making, which have often overlapped technologically.

Historical timeline

Early career of the founders

In 1866, Swasey and Warner met as fellow apprentices at the Exeter Machine Works in Exeter, New Hampshire. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|pp=9,11.] Within a few years they went together to Pratt & Whitney in Hartford, Connecticut, which was one of the leading machine tool builders of the era. There they both rose through the ranks, with Warner rising to be in charge of an assembly floor and Swasey rising to be foreman of the gear-cutting department. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=10.] There Swasey invented the epicycloidal milling machine for cutting true theoretical curves for the milling cutters used for cutting gears. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=10.]

Partnership period (1880-1900)

In 1880, Swasey and Warner resigned from Pratt & Whitney in order to start a machine-tool-building business together. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=10.] They investigated Chicago as a place to build their works, but they perceived the Chicago of 1880 as too far west and lacking a sufficient labor pool of skilled machinists. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=13.] So they went to Cleveland, Ohio, where their company would stay for the next century. They worked together for 20 years without a formal corporate agreement, during which time their partnership's principal products were various models of lathes and milling machines. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|pp=1,14.] From the beginning, the partners built both machine tools and telescopes, which reflected their interests in toolmaking, instrument-making, and astronomy.

Reorganization into The Warner & Swasey Company (1900)

After nearly 20 years of successful growth, the partners realized that their business was growing enough that it should be given a formal corporate structure, so in 1900 they reorganized it under the official name of The Warner & Swasey Company. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=15.]

Peak decades: 1900-1970

During this era, the company was well known in American industry. Its products, both turret lathes and instruments, played very prominent roles in the war efforts for both world wars.

Acquisition

Warner & Swasey took part in the transition to NC and CNC machine tools during the 1950s through 1970s, but like many machine tool builders during those decades, it ultimately was affected by the prevailing winds of merger and acquisition in the industry. It was acquired by Bendix Corporation in 1980.

Products

Telescopes

The first Warner & Swasey telescope, built in 1881, [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=14,31.] was sold to Beloit College for its new Smith Observatory and had a 9.5-inch lens made by Alvan Clark & Sons. Among the notable instruments the company built were the telescopes for Lick Observatory (1888, 36-inch, refracting); the United States Naval Observatory (1893); Yerkes Observatory (according to the 50th-anniversary book, [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|pp=31-33.] this was a 40-inch refracting telescope completed in time for display at the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893, although its installation at Yerkes was apparently in 1897); and Canada's Dominion Astrophysical Observatory (1916, 72-inch, reflecting). In 1919, the company's founders donated their private observatory in East Cleveland, Ohio to Case Western Reserve University. Today's Warner and Swasey Observatory grew from that facility.

The company's 50th-anniversary book [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930.] describes the firm's giant-telescope-building work as unprofitable overall but a labor of technological love.

List of observatories with Warner & Swasey telescopes

*Ritter Observitory, University of Toledo, Ohio 40 inch c.1964
*Crane Observatory, Washburn University, USA
*Chabot Space & Science Center, Oakland, California, USA
*Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, NRC, Canada
*Hildene Astronomy Club (Robert Todd Lincoln Telescope), Manchester, Vermont, USA
*Kirkwood Observatory, Indiana University, USA
*Lee Observatory, American University of Beirut, Lebanon
*Lick Observatory, University of California, USA
*McDonald Observatory (Otto Struve Telescope), University of Texas at Austin, USA
*Painter Hall Observatory, University of Texas at Austin, USA
*Perkins Telescope, Lowell Observatory, USA
*McKim Observatory, DePauw University, USA
*Mueller Observatory, Cleveland Museum of Natural History, USA
*Spacewatch 0.9-meter Telescope, Kitt Peak, University of Arizona, USA
*Swasey Observatory, Denison University, USA
*United States Naval Observatory (USNO), United States Navy, USA
*University of Washington Observatory, University of Washington, USA
*Warner and Swasey Observatory, Case Western Reserve University, USA
*Yerkes Observatory, University of Chicago, USA

Turret lathes

Warner & Swasey was one of the premier brands in heavy turret lathes between the 1910s and 1960s.

Military instruments

Military instrument contracts were an important line of work for the company. [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=34.] The U.S. government referred many problems concerning such instruments to the company during the Spanish-American War (1898). [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=34.] Instruments produced included "range finders of several types, gun-sight telescopes, battery commanders' telescopes, telescopic musket sights, and prism binoculars". [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=35.] During World War I, three important kinds of instrument were produced: "musket sights, naval gun sights, and panoramic sights". [Harvnb|Warner & Swasey Company|1930|p=35.]

ee also

James Hartness, president of competitor Jones & Lamson Machine Company, a contemporary of Worcester Reed Warner and Ambrose Swasey who shared their avocations of developing better telescopes and better turret lathes

References

Bibliography

* citation
last = Warner & Swasey Company
authorlink = Warner & Swasey Company
year = 1920
title = The Warner & Swasey Company, 1880-1920
publisher = Warner & Swasey Company
location = Cleveland, Ohio, USA
url = http://books.google.com/books?id=mz5tAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover#PPA2,M1.
* citation
last = Warner & Swasey Company
authorlink = Warner & Swasey Company
year = 1930
title = The Warner & Swasey Company, 1880-1930
publisher = Warner & Swasey Company
location = Cleveland, Ohio, USA.

Further reading

* cite book
last = Baracskay
first = Daniel
coauthors = Rebar, Peter D.
year = 2003
title = The rise and destruction of the Warner & Swasey Company: a concise case study and analysis
publisher = BookMasters, Inc
location = Mansfield, Ohio
pages =
url =
doi =
id = ISBN 9780972719681 OCLC|52803685

External links

* [http://libserv.aip.org:81/ipac20/ipac.jsp?uri=full=3100001~!1740~!0&profile=newcustom-icos#focus International Catalog of Sources: Warner & Swasey Company records to 1919]
** [http://libserv.aip.org:81/ipac20/ipac.jsp?uri=full=3100001~!3687~!0&profile=newcustom-icos#focus 1900-1985]
** [http://libserv.aip.org:81/ipac20/ipac.jsp?uri=full=3100001~!6134~!0&profile=newcustom-icos#focus The story of Warner & Swasey telescopes by Ernest N. Jennison]
* [http://www.phys-astro.sonoma.edu/people/faculty/tenn/asphistory/2000long.html "The Beautiful Early Telescopes of Warner & Swasey, Including the J.A. Brashear and C.S. Hastings Optical Collaboration", abstract of lecture by John W. Briggs, Yerkes Observatory, at the 112th annual meeting of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Pasadena, CA, July 15, 2000]
* [http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO26in.shtml The 26-inch USNO Refracting Telescope]
* [http://www.beloit.edu/~physics/observatory/inside/smith.html Smith Observatory History]