National Keg and Box Factory - Orange MA

(Adapted from “Picturesque Franklin” , Wade, Warner & Co. , Northampton MA 1891
This publication was a “snap shot” of Franklin County businesses and industries as of 1891. This original article will not include the history which occurred afterwards, unless noted by the museum editor.)

The engraving of the large, handsome, well lighted building on this page shows an edifice now being built and nearly completed, by that enterprising Orange citizen, John W. Wheeler, for the National Keg and Box Co. of New York. The building is two stories high, 200 x 60, and will be vised by the company named, which has leased it of Mr. Wheeler, for the manufacture of dovetailed wooden boxes of all kinds. In addition to the main building there is a store house 168 feet long and 55 feet wide, with a dry house 17×58. Two boilers of 75 horse power each will furnish the power for the 100 h. p. engine built by C. H. Brown & Co. of Fitchburg.

Side tracks on the Fitchburg road will give facilities for the receipt and shipment of freight and soon a lively village may be expected to grow up about the works, as one hundred hands are expected to be employed and the place being quite a distance (about a mile) from the business center of Orange, it is likely the new village of “Wheeler,” already laid out, will be a popular one among the workingmen of Orange, as it will be ” spick and span new ” and all the tenements built to order.