M. Heminway & Sons Silk Co. Records

M. Heminway and Sons Silk Co. was established in Watertown around 1846 by General Merit Heminway (1800-1886), who is credited as the first businessman to make sewing silk on spools. With the success of spooled silks, Heminway expanded initially with the Waterbury factory c.1895-1900, followed by another factory in Watertown in 1913. With the third facility, Heminway was projected to employ a total of 600 employees, approximately 200 of which worked in Waterbury.

Heminway was purchased in 1917 by Hammon Knowlton and Co. of Putnam, CT, and subsequently known as HKH Co. It appears that the Waterbury factory was sold with the change in ownership. New occupants in 1917 included the Caprin Manufacturing Works and Tracey Brothers Co., a building contractor. Tracey Brothers bid on a variety of projects, including an addition to the Excelsior Needle Co., on Field Street in Torrington in 1914 which it did not win, three additions to the Waterbury Rolling Mills awarded in 1917, and the Waterbury Rolling Mills administration building awarded in 1919. In 1918, the firm held a $965,000 contract to build worker housing in Waterbury (project nbr. 380) for the United States Housing Corp. It was also the general contractor for construction of the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church at 74 West Main Street, Waterbury, dedicated in 1928. By 1922, a hardware manufacturer, Worcester Metal Goods Co., occupied the site; the company held a patent for a levered fastener.