The growth and magnitude of the petroleum business of Cleveland can be seen by the reports of receipts and shipments during the past four years:
Date. Crude Received Refined Forwarded
1865 220,000 bbls. 145,000 bbls.
1866 613,247 " 402,430 "
1867 693,100 " 496,600 "
1868 956,479 " 776,356 "
Between three and four millions of dollars of capital are invested in this business in Cleveland, and the annual product will not fall short of ten or twelve millions of dollars. The rapid increase of the business created an urgent demand for barrels. The receipts of staves in 1868, mainly to supply this demand, were nearly three times in excess of the previous year. Some 3,000 tons of hoop iron were required for barrels.
It is impossible to give, in the absence of any recent exact census, full and correct statistics of the number and classification of the manufactories of Cleveland, the capital invested, and the value of the product. It has, however, been estimated from the best data that could be procured, that the grand total value of all the manufactories of the city in 1868, was not less than sixty millions of dollars, and it is daily increasing.
William B. Castle.
William B. Castle was born in Essex, Crittenden county, Vermont, November 30, 1814. Immediately on the conclusion of the war, his father removed to Toronto, where he had been engaged, as an architect, to superintend the construction of the first Parliament buildings there. In 1827, he removed with his family to Cleveland, William B. Castle being then thirteen years old. His father had taken a farm about thirteen miles from the city, and there the lad spent most of his time until 1832, when, in company with his father and Mr. Charles M. Giddings, he established the first lumber-yard in Cleveland. The business was carried on for a couple of years, when Mr. Castle, Sen., died, and the son removed to Canada, engaging in merchandizing and in manufacturing lumber for the yard in Cleveland. In 1839, he abandoned the Canada branch of the business, and in the following year the partnership with Mr. Giddings was dissolved.
A new partnership was formed with a brother-in-law, under the name of Castle & Field, for carrying on the hardware, in connection with jewelry and watch making, business, on the west side of the river, then known as Ohio City. In 1843, he left the business and entered the Cuyahoga Steam Furnace Company, with which he has ever since been connected. So thoroughly identified has Mr. Castle been with the history of that establishment during the past quarter of a century, that this is a fitting place for a brief sketch of the nature and history of the pioneer iron company of Cleveland.
In 1830, Mr. Charles Hoyt projected the works which were erected and put in operation under the firm name of Hoyt, Railey & Co. In 1834, the firm was changed to an incorporated company under the name of the Cuyahoga Steam Furnace Company, with a capital of one hundred thousand dollars, of which three-fourths were paid in. The principal stockholders at the time of the incorporation were Josiah Barber, Richard Lord, John W. Allen, and Charles Hoyt. The managing officer was Charles Hoyt. Soon after the incorporation the works were burned to the ground, but the company were energetic, and soon a substantial brick structure, two hundred and thirty-five feet front, with a wing of ninety feet deep, was erected on the site of the destroyed building. The pig metal for the use of the works was obtained at the company's blast furnace at Dover, twelve miles west, and was considered equal in quality to the best Scotch pig. In 1840, Mr. Hoyt was succeeded in the management by D. Cushing, who had been secretary of the company. In 1843, Mr. Cushing gave place to Elisha T. Sterling, who remained the head of the concern until his untimely death, in 1859.
[Illustration: Yours Truly, W. B. Castle]
From the advent of Mr. Sterling and the consequent re-organization of the staff of officers of the works, dates the connection of Mr. Castle with the establishment. Mr. Castle took the position of secretary, and held that post until the death of Mr. Sterling, when he was appointed to fill the position of manager. At the time when the sole charge of the works devolved upon him the company was in a deplorable financial condition. The prospect was sufficient to daunt a less resolute and hopeful spirit, but Mr. Castle at once set about the Herculean task of bringing the concern through its difficulties and establishing it on a firm financial basis. The struggle was long continued, and more than once the advance gained seemed suddenly to be again lost, but eventually it was pulled through without having compromised a single debt, and without having but a single case of litigation under his management. This case was not properly chargable to the administration of the works, as it arose from the supplying of a defective beam strap, which, there being then no forges in Cleveland, had been ordered from Pittsburgh. This unusual exemption from litigation was, doubtless, owing to the invariable rule adopted by Mr. Castle, to reduce all contracts to careful writing and to live strictly up to the letter as well as spirit of the contract.