Wilhelm: Fremont once know for cutlery and bustles

Roy Wilhelm
·3 min read

Many readers are well aware Fremont was once known as the cutlery capital of the world with a reported 50 cutlery businesses — large and small — located here.

And, the local successes in ketchup, batteries and tools also are well known.

But, how much do we know about the fact we once claimed to have the world’s largest bustle factory?

I’ve written about A. H. Jackson before. He was a self-made man who started out selling notions and expanded his wares as he traveled the country in his “business wagon.”

After settling down in Fremont, he was highly successful, manufacturing suspenders, undergarments and cutlery with factories in downtown Fremont and branches in Sandusky, Tiffin, Clyde and Bellevue.

'Where bustles bloom'

For a brief time, it was the bustle that gained him fame while also helping him expand into new products as the times changed.

The Fremont Journal of Oct. 16, 1888, explained his success under the heading “Where bustles bloom” and pointed out the Fremont “bustle works” was the largest in the world.

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Henkel Clauss was a cutlery facotry on East State Street, Fremont.
Henkel Clauss was a cutlery facotry on East State Street, Fremont.

After discussing the history of the “quizzical and straight jacket costume” designed to gain the smiles “of the sterner sex as they passed by,” the Journal had this high praise:

“It remained for a citizen of Fremont, O, Mr. A. H. Jackson, to give to the multitude of Eves throughout the broad land, in August 1887, a bustle … under the name ‘Pansy’ … (that) has been adopted by all classes of society.”

“No longer are dresses ribbed and steeled, for despite these and other feminine devices, without the bustle the most fashionable garment hangs limp and award, while at every movement the soft folds of the dress cling to the heels as bathing suit to a Coney Islander after a seaside frolic.”

Really, folks, that’s what it said.

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'Greater part of humanity admires the poise'

“While some opponents to the bustle who probably do not wear them, not being built that way, characterize them as disgusting, et,,. the greater part of humanity admires the poise and movements of a pretty promenade.”

I’m not making it up.

“Women, as a whole, are heartedly for the bustle in moderation … but for the shapely Pansy which folds and unfolds at one’s wish. They say that they care more for the fit and hang of the dress behind, than in front, the latter coming under their ever-present observation, while the former must be kept in place by an artificial help.”

There’s more.

“Your society lady pride herself on her dressy appearance as she moves swan-like cross the drawing room.”

Despite the rave notices of the Journal and impressive sales in the early years, the Jackson Bustle Works in downtown Fremont was eventually turned in another direction by Jackson, who was clearly a man who knew what the people wanted and it’s no surprise today that the bustle wasn’t wanted.

Roy Wilhelm started a 40-year career at The News-Messenger in 1965 as a reporter. Now retired, he writes a column for both The News-Messenger and News Herald.

This article originally appeared on Fremont News-Messenger: Wilhelm: The man drove a notion and a 'business wagon' into success