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Dodge Manufacturing Co.

The embryo of the firm in June of 1878 was a little sawmill property. The "Magic" wagon jack was patented in 1878; half a million were sold, at 12$ a dozen. A natural extension of the business required the addition of a turning lathe, and other simple tools, to make such wooden hardware as: window screens, door stops, tool handles, saw frames, bench clamps, vise handles, mallets, and other such items.

Clamps were apparently made only briefly. The list of wooden hardware in 1878 does not include clamps or hand screws. However the list of tools is enough to make them. However, fortunes changed in 1881, with a fire, and the new products completely displaced the old, and definitely did not include clamps.

When I found the name, I was surprised to find that the firm has continued to the present; it now manufactures and sells equipment for the transmission and control of mechanical power, as part of Rockwell. There is no connection to the car maker.



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