TALMADGE EDWARDS

1747 (age 74)

England

During the Revolution he sided with the colonists, serving in the 6th Regiment of militia of his county. After the war, in 1783, he moved with his family to the more virgin portion of New York in the vicinity of Johnstown, Fulton County, where trading-posts had been established and Indians as well as early settlers brought in skins and furs for trade. Here he started a tannery of his own. In 1784 he bought land within the present city limits of Johnstown, continuing to ply his trade and also opening a general store. Some years earlier, a group of glove-makers, members of the glove guild of Scotland, had settled at Kingsboro, a short distance north of Johnstown. They lived a hand-to-mouth existence, making gloves and mittens for the surrounding settlers. Their process of dressing leather was unsatisfactory, however, and in 1809, having heard of Edwards’s success with the “ring-tail” process, William Mills and James Burr induced him to go to Kingsboro to teach his method of leather-tanning to the glove-makers. Edwards, who was in reduced circumstances, thus became directly interested in glove manufacture. The first sales of gloves in “wholesale lots” occurred in 1810 when Edwards took a few dozen pairs with him on a horseback trip to Albany to purchase a new stock of merchandise for his store, which he was still operating. On the way, and after he had reached Albany, he sold his pack in dozen and portion-of-dozen lots.

TALMADGE EDWARDS

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glove manufacturer

Background

Talmadge Edwards was born of English ancestry in England near the Scottish border.

Education

He was educated and learned the trade of leather dresser while still in his teens. A younger son, and therefore ineligible, by English law, to inherit the family estate, he emigrated to America about 1770, going first to Rhode Island but later to Beekman’s Precinct in Dutchess County, New York, where he found employment at his trade.

Career

During the Revolution he sided with the colonists, serving in the 6th Regiment of militia of his county.

After the war, in 1783, he moved with his family to the more virgin portion of New York in the vicinity of Johnstown, Fulton County, where trading-posts had been established and Indians as well as early settlers brought in skins and furs for trade.

Here he started a tannery of his own.

In 1784 he bought land within the present city limits of Johnstown, continuing to ply his trade and also opening a general store.

Some years earlier, a group of glove-makers, members of the glove guild of Scotland, had settled at Kingsboro, a short distance north of Johnstown.

They lived a hand-to-mouth existence, making gloves and mittens for the surrounding settlers.

Their process of dressing leather was unsatisfactory, however, and in 1809, having heard of Edwards’s success with the “ring-tail” process, William Mills and James Burr induced him to go to Kingsboro to teach his method of leather-tanning to the glove-makers.

Edwards, who was in reduced circumstances, thus became directly interested in glove manufacture.

The first sales of gloves in “wholesale lots” occurred in 1810 when Edwards took a few dozen pairs with him on a horseback trip to Albany to purchase a new stock of merchandise for his store, which he was still operating.

On the way, and after he had reached Albany, he sold his pack in dozen and portion-of-dozen lots.

Achievements

Being able to dress leather in quantities and feeling that there should be a larger market for gloves and mittens than existed locally at the time, Edwards secured country girls to come to his tannery in Johnstown to cut out gloves, which were then sent to the farmers’ wives to be sewed together. This marked the beginning of the glove and mitten industry in the United States. In addition to his innovation in organizing the manufacture of gloves, he improved the process of tanning glove leather. He originated the “oil-tan” method for preparing buckskin, a process still in use.

Connections

About 1780 he had married Mary, daughter of Ezekiel and Mary (Knowles) Sherman, of Exeter, R. I. They had eight children, the eldest of whom, John, represented the 15th Congressional District of New York in the Twenty-fifth Congress, 1837-39.

Wife:: Mary Sherman
Son:: John

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