|
|
|
The founder of the Perkins windmill enterprise was Palmer C. Perkins. He was born at Bolton in Warren County, New York, in 1824. There he learned black smithing and ax making from S.L. Judd, a local craftsman. In 1846 he moved to Cohoes, New York, where he worked in an ax factory. He then moved to Waterford, New York; Rochester, New York, Clayton, Michigan, and finally Mishawaka, Indiana. In each place he engaged in the manufacture of axes. It was in Mishawaka that Palmer C. Perkins first started experimenting with windmills, inventing and patenting his Perkins mill in 1869. From that time on his future lay with wind power. Initially he made both windmills and axes. Soon the windmill became such an important part of his business that the axes were forgotten. Palmer C. Perkins first made his Perkins Solid Wheel wooden windmills under his own name, but in 1872 his twin brother, Pardon J. Perkins, joined him at Mishawaka as his partner. In 1873, the two men formed a stock company under the name of the Perkins Windmill & Ax Company. This entity lasted until about 1891, by which time the manufacture of axes was abandoned and the firm became the Perkins Windmill Company. The enterprise continued to operated under this name until about 1915, when it became the Perkins Windmill & Engine Company. It then changed to become the Perkins Corporation about 1920, moving from Mishawaka to South Bend about 1925, after which time its windmill production ceased. Palmer C. Perkins, the founder of the company, in his later years became almost as well known as a raiser of blooded horses as he was a windmill maker. It was after a business trip to Texas and a visit to his large horse ranch in Kansas that he died from a heart attack at his home in Mishawaka in 1896. The Perkins wooden mill has a number of interesting characteristics. Woodwork on the mill is very striking in both design and ornamentation. The wheel and vane were painted with three coats of white paint at the factory, while the arms were painted blue. Then the tips of the blades were trimmed in red, while the vane was decorated with red, black, and yellow, as the maker noted, "giving it a handsome and striking appearance." In the early 1890's, Perkins Solid Wheel mills were made in 10', 12', 14', 18', 20', 22', and 24' sizes. By 1900, the 24' size had been deleted from the line, and by 1910, the 22' mill had disappeared from the market. By the end of the Perkins mill production in 1915, only the 10', 12', 14', 16', and 18' diameters were available. Governing on the Perkins wooden windmill is quite interesting. The wheel is placed slightly to one side so that in increasing wind it tends to turn away from the wind. As the wheel inclines away from the wind, the end of the vane assembly pivots upward through the action of the governor linkage. When the wind subsides the weight of the vane causes the wheel again to face the wind. A plunger brake on the outer extremity of the wheel hub engages whenever the mill governs out of the wind or when it is turned off from the ground. The brake ring on the wheel hub constitutes prominent identifying characteristic of the mill. The Perkins Solid Wheel windmills were the most attractive of all American mills. It was their reliability combined with this beauty which made the Perkins the mill selected in the 1890's to provide water both at the Forest Hill summer home near Columbus, Ohio, and the Tarrytown-on-Hudson estate belonging to John D. Rockefeller. At the former location a 14' Perkins Solid Wheel mill was mounted atop an 80' decorative wooden tank tower pumping water to a thirty thousand gallon tank that supplied water to the estate. Today the exceedingly handsome Perkins mills are no longer such a common sight as they once were, but they remain to be seen in smaller numbers, both restored and unrestored. The Midwest provided probably the best hunting grounds for them. |