Green Capitalist by Vader / rommelortega@gmail.com
American Industrial Management
This piece of writing is more of a history and management during the Industrial Revolution of the United States. I want the readers to imagine what was happening to the topicked industry and the policies of the US Army for Springfield Armory to become successful until its dissolution in 1968. Feedbacks are welcome. Email me at rommelortega@gmail.com.
Springfield Armory (SA) in Massachusetts (1777 (1795) – 1968) was a gun manufacturing business for the United States Army which employed at least 250 workers in a single location, antebellum. It was the largest metal working business in the US at that time. In WWII it produced the famous Garand M1 which was designed by French-Canadian John Garand (1888 – 1974). The rifle had no match during World War Two, among its competitors in its category. But it was not John Garand who improved the administration or management of America’s manufacturing powerhouse.
Colonel Roswell Walter Lee (1810 – 1873) was the one who institutionalized many management processes in Springfield Armory. We could also trace some semblance of quality management in his “standardizations”. Lee, a capable Superintendent or manager, pioneered accountability, maybe even quality management, on products being released from the factory. The operation of the plant was centralized with powers belonging to “managers”. Two things were firmly established: 1) The accounting of activities and their outputs; and 2) The bookkeeping in the shop. The books and activities could be traced and accountability established. It was the most circuitous management system before the 1840s. Data were intelligently used by Colonel Lee at that time.
In the 1880s, the advanced scientific factory management was coined and Springfield Armory improved and perfected the system started by Lee. Prior to that, in 1819, Thomas Blanchard made a special lathe that proved to be very good in producing standardized rifles. This standardization made Springfield Armory a powerful contributor to the American Industrial Revolution. The demand of the US Army for quality products was a pressure for SA to improve and deliver the desired outputs or results.
Choosing the place
SA in 1794 was not a likely candidate for an industrial powerhouse for rifles. But since it was inland, yet near Connecticut River, the possible naval assault could already be avoided and that there were some gunsmiths (labor force) in the area that made it a suitable candidate for armory and gunpowder storehouse. A better place, west of the river, did not become an industrial base simply because of the opposition of farmers who thought that the unruly workers could disturb the tranquility of their farming life.
Management, Economics and Mathematics
There was a notable name too to consider in the division of labor in SA: Benjamin Prescott (in charge November 1805 – August 1813). He established separate shops for separate outputs. These arrangements started the outputs to be standardized. When French artillery officers (who fought for America) became aware of manufacturing capabilities of the SA, they introduced more standardized models that could easily be repaired in the battlefield and easily manufactured (1815 – 1830). Their infectious enthusiasm made the US Congress support funding for more armories.
It took them 35 years though of continuous improvements, borrowing knowledge and sometimes buying them from others so that in 1849; they greatly improved the manufacturing process and design to the satisfaction of their mechanics for an output of uniform muskets. These improvements in management and designs made the costs lower. The economical costs created the business more viable since SA was heavily dependent on subsidy and government contracts. Also, by the 1840s, a larger market began to emerge paving them to produce more, with the Economy of Scale leading the management mathematics of the factory.
Prior to the 1840s, 1815 – 1833, Roswell W. Lee was able to lay the groundwork in accounting, combining technology with cost cutting and human resources rules in the factory. Lee was a capable Superintendent and he also started to mechanize the production process paving the way to more economical measures. For example, the price of raw materials was heavily controlled making sure that the prices of outputs mirrored that of the inputs. He made sure that wastes were addressed too and internal supply was also monitored through administration and detailed accounting. He was so enamored of records that every part of production can be traced to its maker on the shop floor.
Despite the lower costs, the Ordnance Department of the United States concerned itself much not with the economy of production but with reliability of the rifles and the capability of the plant to expand production as needs arose. Frequent changing of designs was not a priority as the US Army concentrated in quality, uniformity and volume production. SA carried out the policies of the Ordnance Department as it was its biggest client if not the only client in the 1840s.
On the labor aspects, Lee had difficulty getting skilled workers thus he had to look into the salary from time to time through remunerations review. According to records of the plant, he combined hourly rates with piece rates thus taking advantage of a gradient wage system. He most likely used the prevailing regional wage rate and took advantage of daily wage rate ceilings to keep costs down and made the workers satisfied with a sense of fairness. These human resources policies on wages kept trouble away from SA and they almost had no labor disputes on a large scale that necessitated labor’s mass actions. This could also be explained further by a sense of patriotism and the understanding of the vicissitudes of intermittent war and peace.
By 1830, Lee’s leadership proved to be effective; the division of labor and other management techniques produced a more than 60 percent increase in production compared to 1812’s. Technical advances were always sought and when coupled with management improvements, the production increased even more. The Ordnance Department’s demands on quality, reliability and expansion of production were more than enough for SA to constantly innovate; and management was the prime mover of such innovations. The management reaped more benefits of cumulative designs and advances in technology in the 1840s. Not all advances in designs were positive though, unlike today; their disruptions in production routines were substantial to the skilled workers thus sometimes stunting the production growth.
When Lee was succeeded by Major James W. Ripley (1841 – 1854 in the SA), a stricter military type of management and administration were imposed. Despite some resistance and dissatisfactions of suppliers, workers and other stakeholders, Ripley proved unaffected by such pressures. In 1844, Ripley added steam power to the (Hill) shop and prior to that; they also retooled and redesigned the shop floors to accommodate production improvements. By 1850, the musket outputs reached 200,000 for the first time.
Forty-five years of managerial innovations, constant redesigns, factory expansion and technological improvements made Springfield Armory the best managed production organization in the United States immediately before their Civil War.
In conclusion, personal observation based on my readings, the US Army’s indifference to costs made Springfield Armory successful during its time. This tradition or principle was exemplified in making sure that a thing, process or improvements worked first; therefore effective, then mathematical computations for efficiency followed. This effectiveness-first was again evident during America’s development of the nuclear (technologies) weapons to which its counterpart, Germany, was not able to achieve because of cost considerations. (In Germany, they were concerned about the lack of water (to cool the reactor), of this (uranium) and that (whatever it was). In fact, the idea (1938) of a nuclear bomb was first conceived in Germany through the so-called fission reactor. But because of persecution of their scientists, excellent minds left their country only to learn that the United States, a freer country, beat them to the invention of the nuclear weapon).
SA was a management standard during the American Industrial Revolution. They were copied to other industrial interests of the United States. What made it a success was truly its management thinkers and doers who imposed if not implemented the improvements factory wide. Thus, I truly believe in the division of labor: mental and manual. Or, in Taosim’s parlance, the yin (prayer) and the yang (action). In my book TRADE WARS & Devolved Capitalism (published in the EU by Omniscriptum), I explained the distinction of the two and I took some knowledge from the Bible and the Catholics’ understanding of them. In management, we can call them controller (yin) and marketer (yang). For me, it was so obvious that Accountants (inside the office) should be prayerful that they petition the Power that Be that the Marketers’ actions bear fruit. In the Catholic Faith, we call them Mary (prayerful) and Martha (the action oriented).
***I would like to make a campaign here that we not only consider Pope Francis’s Laudato Si but let us join together to better our Common Home – the Earth.
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