George Joseph Capewell (June 26, 1843 – November 6, 1919) was an inventor and businessman who developed an automated process for the production of horse shoe nails and founded the

Capewell Horse Nail Company The Capewell Horse Nail Company is a historic brick industrial complex located in the Hartford, Connecticut neighborhood of Neighborhoods of Hartford, Connecticut#Sheldon/Charter Oak, Sheldon/Charter Oak. It was built in 1903 by industrialist Geor ...

Biography

Capewell was born in Birmingham, England and came to the United States in 1845. He was educated in Woodbury, Connecticut and went to work at fifteen for the Scoville Manufacturing Company in Waterbury, Connecticut. At twenty he was Mechanical Superintendent of Cheshire Manufacturing Company. In 1870 he founded a business manufacturing metal devices of his own invention. The most well known was the Capewell Giant Nail Puller. In 1876, he began the invention of an automated process to produce horse nails. After years of frustration, failure, and the loss of thousands of dollars, a perfected machine was exhibited to investors in

Hartford, Connecticut Hartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It was the seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960. It is the core city in the Greater Hartford metropolitan area. Census estimates since the ...

in the fall of 1880. In 1881, Capewell formed the

in Hartford, making it the horshoe nail capital of the world. In 1887, he established two companies in England; the Capewell Horse Shoe Nail Company (Limited) and the Capewell Continental Patent Company (Limited). He worked as director in both of the companies. He had to rebuild his factory after fire destroyed the building in 1902. Capewell was among the passengers who attended the maiden voyage of the ''

RMS Lusitania RMS ''Lusitania'' (named after the Roman province in Western Europe corresponding to modern Portugal) was a British ocean liner that was launched by the Cunard Line in 1906 and that held the Blue Riband appellation for the fastest Atlanti ...

'' in September 1907. Due to worker shortages during World War I, Capewell began hiring female workers. He opened a free daycare at the factory so that mothers could work without leaving their children at home. Capewell was the holder of over 100

patents A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...

including the Capewell Giant Nail puller (patented 1872); the Capewell self-fastening cone-button (patented 1866); electric trucks; anti-friction roller bearings, revolving wheel-fender for carriages; a machine for forming glass buttons and ornaments; and a machine for driving and pulling tacks and nails. He died on November 6, 1919 and was interred at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Hartford. The company continued to manufacture nails in

Bloomfield, Connecticut Bloomfield is a suburb of Hartford in Hartford County, Connecticut, United States. The town's population was 21,535 at the 2020 census. Bloomfield is best known as the headquarters of healthcare services company Cigna. History Originally land ...

on machines designed by Capewell until it closed in 2012.

References

External links

* 1843 births 1919 deaths 19th-century American businesspeople 20th-century American businesspeople 19th-century American inventors 20th-century American inventors American company founders American patent holders Burials at Cedar Hill Cemetery (Hartford, Connecticut) British emigrants to the United States Businesspeople from Hartford, Connecticut People from Birmingham, West Midlands People from Woodbury, Connecticut {{US-inventor-stub