The Bristol Brass Company was founded as the Bristol Brass and Clock Company in 1850, the creation of sixteen industrialists from Bristol clock and Waterbury brass interests who hoped to profit in the booming clock industry of Bristol, CT. Although the company never manufactured clocks, only the brass mechanisms for the timepieces, it was many years before it changed its name to Bristol Brass Company. It was the largest employer in Bristol, with 375 employees by 1880. Its mainstay was the production of brass for automobiles. The company thrived during the years of World Wars I and II, making shell cases for the military. The post-war economy brought a change in the company's fortunes. The amount of brass used in automobiles declined swiftly, and foreign competition eroded the company's clientele. Bristol Brass closed its doors in December 1982, after 132 years as a major part of the Bristol economy.
The Bristol Company Records document the founding of the Bristol Company and the various products produced by the company. Bristol produced industrial instruments: instruments to measure and record temperature, electricity, pressure, motion, time, flow, and humidity. Documents include Product Data Sheets, Catalogs, Photographs, Meeting Minutes, Newspaper Clippings. The museum also has a small collection of Bristol Instruments.
Correspondence, financial records, diaries, scrapbooks, account books and memorabilia of the Bristol family of New Haven and New London, Connecticut. The major figures in the collection are the descendants of Simeon Bristol (1739-1805); his son, William Bristol, and his grandsons, William Brooks Bristol, and Louis Bristol, all prominent lawyers, judges and members of the state legislature in Connecticut.Nearly a third of the papers is made up of land deeds for New Haven and New London counties (1765-1854). The voluminous correspondence (2,569 letters) extends over several generations from 1798 to 1879. Of particular interest are the fifty-one letters by Louis Bristol written from Paris to family members and to Timothy Dwight Edwards describing the Revolution of 1830. Between 1829 and 1857 William Brooks Bristol wrote 581 letters to his brother Louis, chiefly on the question of buying and selling railroad stocks. Additional papers of the brothers include records of their law practice, account books and business corrspondence. Also a diary (1834-1844) kept by Louis Bristol recording his life as a student at Yale College, his surveying experience and his courtship, together with twenty-nine compositions written while at Yale. Eugene Stuart Bristol, son of William Brooks Bristol, is represented by letter books and extensive financial records (1869-1873) documenting his mining operations at Bingham Canyon, Utah.
A collection of manuscript deeds, wills, leases, letters, and other legal and financial documents concerning eighteenth- and nineteenth-century estates and plantations on islands in the British West Indies.
Reports of agents of the East India Company in Mahi Kantha in Gujarat (western India) and dispatches from East India officials in Bombay sent to London. The reports provide a history of the Mahi Kantha before 1821 and describe political events there through 1839. The documents are all copies.
Collection of materials documenting British fascist, anti-fascist, and anti-Semitic political movements in the mid-twentieth century. Includes pamphlets, leaflets, and serially published newspapers and magazines produced by organizations such as the British Empire Union, British League, British Union of Fascists, Jewish People's Council Against Fascism and Anti-Semitism, and Trades Advisory Council. Also includes a small group of rare Muslim anti-fascist leaflets.
Collection consists of mounted black and white and color reproductions of British paintings. Content varies from original photographic prints to reproductions from magazines and other published sources. Some sections have accompanying clippings folders.
British Theatrical and Literary Prints is a collection of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century engravings and etchings depicting scenes and characters from 267 plays and stories by 112 authors that were published in England and Ireland during those two centuries. The prints are generally small in format—octavo or quarto in size—and most were extracted from publications.
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