Disston Saw Works

Disston Saw Works of Philadelphia was one of the better known and highly regarded manufacturers of handsaws in the United States. During the Machine Age, as Henry Disston & Sons, Inc., it was a supplier of industrial saw blades. A successor corporation, still active in Philadelphia, is called Disston Precision.

The story of handsaws in the United States mirrors the technical and political development of steel. Sheffield, England, was the center of handsaw production during the 18th century and through most of the 19th century because of its fine steel and skilled craftsmen. But England's political and economic lock on steel making in the colonies held American sawmakers at bay until well after the Revolutionary War. American steel producers could not compete until import tariffs leveled the playing field in 1861.

This was the environment in which young Henry Disston (1819–1878) began his career as an American sawmaker in Philadelphia. He had immigrated from England in 1833 and started making saws and squares in 1840. In 1850, he founded the company that would become the largest sawmaker in the world: the Keystone Saw Works.

Some five years later, Disston built a furnace—perhaps the first melting plant for steel in America—and began producing the first crucible saw steel ever made in the United States. While his competitors were buying good steel from Britain, he was making his own, to his own specification, for his own needs. Disston subsequently constructed a special rolling mill exclusively for saw blades.

Over the following decade, the Disston company continued to grow, even while dedicating itself to the Union Army's war effort. In 1865, when his son Hamilton Disston rejoined the business after serving in the Civil War, Disston changed the company's name to Henry Disston & Son. Henry Disston and his sons set the standards for American sawmakers, both in terms of producing high-quality saws and developing innovative manufacturing techniques. Disston also started making files in 1865.

In September 1872, Henry Disston and two other men dug part of the foundation for what was to become the largest saw manufacturing facility in the world: Disston Saw Works. This was in the Tacony section of Philadelphia. Having previously moved his expanding business from near Second and Market Streets to Front and Laurel Streets, Disston sought to establish his business away from this cramped area. It took over 25 years to move the entire facility to Tacony. This Philadelphia neighborhood seems to have been the only company town in the United States established within an existing city.

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