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Brewster Carriage Company
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Business New Haven
2/26/2001
By:
Priscilla Searles
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James Brewster was introduced to New Haven when his stagecoach broke down in 1809. A year later he opened his first carriage shop in a one-story building at Elm and High Streets. A direct descent of William Brewster who had arrived in Plymouth aboard the Mayflower, James Brewster had a limited formal education. In 1804 he was apprenticed to learn the carriage-making trade When his apprenticeship was completed he decided to go into business for himself.
Starting with the manufacture of improved wagons, Brewster turned his talents to the construction of fine vehicles of various styles, the type normally credited to English manufacturers. The Brewster line included buggies, phaetons (a light, open, four-wheeled carriage), victoria (a low, four-wheeled vehicle for two with a folding top) and other equipment .
The Brewster Carriage Company relocated several times, first to Elm and High Streets, to Orange Street, then to the foot of Wooster Street, helping to create a entire new neighborhood called Brewsterville. Known for his production method of dividing the work of the factory into different departments, Brewster paid his employees cash rather than with orders for goods, as was popular at the time. And although most factories permitted liquor in the shops, Brewster barred intoxicating drinks. A religious man, he also encouraged his employees to read the bible.
The reputation of the Brewster firm spread and famous customers' names, such as President Andrew Jackson, began to appear on sales slips. According to the New Haven Register in November, 1832, "the Hon. Martin Van Buren, Vice President, elect, just ordered a carriage from the manufactory of our enterprising fellow citizen, Mr. James Brewster". The South was the major market for Brewster carriages.
The Young Mechanics' Institute was another Brewster creation, located in a rented room in the Glebe Building at Church and Chapel streets. He also financed the renovation of the Morse Hotel at Church and Crown streets for use by the Franklin Institute.
Brewster opened a New York City branch with John Lawrence as a partner, maintained a warehouse and repair shop, later to become the Brewster Carriage Company of New York, under the direction of Brewster's two sons. When the Brewsterville plant burned, Brewster sold his interest in the company in 1836 and established a new carriage company with his son, James, two years later. The carriage business was an important part of New Haven's economy from 1830 to 1861, but came to an abrupt halt when manufacturers were unable to collect their accounts receivable from the Confederate states as the Civil War unfolded.
Brewster expanded into other fields, obtaining a charter with others for the construction of the railroad between New Haven and Hartford (and serving as its first president), helping to found the New Haven Savings Bank in 1838, and encouraging New Haven to purchase its first horse-drawn steam fire engine in 1860. Brewster died in 1866. He had given American carriages a style of its own and had helped New Haven enter the Industrial Age.
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