Concord Coach among the rare and unusual horse-drawn wagons on display

By Tom Eastman and Bill Haynes

Rare and Unusual is the theme of the horse-drawn wagon display that begins its fifth year at this year's Fryeburg Fair.Highlighting the exhibition of century-old wagons is the 1888 Silsby Steam Pumper No. 911, which will feature a large sign with a reminder to never forget the Sept. 11, 2001 attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Center. The display is made possible by Margaret and Sut Marshall of Conway, owners of the international collection of more than 175 vehicles. Assisting the Marshalls is Kenneth Wheeling of North Ferrisburg, Vt., a director of the Carriage Association of America. The retired English teacher is an internationally renowned expert on carriages and horses. He is affectionately referred to as The Professor. Wheeling also announces the three-day draft horse and pony show in front of the main grandstand.The Marshalls only started collecting carriages and wagons about 16 years ago. Last year, a book The Marshall Collection was published by Heart Prairie Press in Whitewater, Wisc.Marshall said it has taken years of painstaking searching and sifting through many wagons to come up with this years collection. Commercial horse-drawn vehicles are rare in themselves and were never really plentiful, Wheeling said, explaining that many were discarded or abandoned when motorized vehicles came into use. There are only one or two examples of several of the vehicles we will have on display this year.One of those is the Clarence, named after the Duke of Clarence, which was used in the June 1953 Coronation procession of Elizabeth II when the Prime Minister of South Africa rode in it. Others include a Leisey Brewery Dray, a heavy overland stage wagon, the always popular bow-top Gypsy Vardo, a Conestoga wagon, a Rackham Butcher Wagon and several fire pumpers.The display in the 150-by 36-foot show barn built in 2004 began with Towns and Villages and was followed by Going to the Fair, People Movers and English Trade Vehicles.Expected to be a popular wagon is the brewery dray, which holds eight large barrels, 13 medium barrels and a dozen small barrels. Isaac Liesey bought the old Haltnorth Brewery in Cleveland in 1873 along with his brothers August and Henry. By 1890, 75 men were producing 90,000 barrels of beer a year and 350,000 by 1917. It took four heavy draft horses to pull the dray.Established in 1845, the Silsby Manufacturing Co. made agricultural implements but ventured into steam fire pumpers in 1856 and built more than 1,000 of them. Number 911 was built in 1888 and renovated in 1905 for the Tyrone, Pa., Fire Company.One of the more curious vehicles is the surveyors wagon, which houses a large, double set of tambour map racks, benches along both sides with a hanging map between them. A metal cook stove slides out from underneath the body.The U.S. mail sleigh featured this year has a mail wagon with its wheels removed and mounted on three-knee sled gear. The simple but effective design allowed mail carriers to glide over snow-rolled country roads, although spring mud presented problems for runners and wheels alike.The butchers van of the D. S. Rackham & Son family butchers is reminiscent of the metal body vehicles that became popular as the automobile began to emerge. The vans were used as milk wagons as well as meat and bakery vans in urban centers. In England, where petrol became scarce during World War II, many companies turned to using the metal-sided horse-drawn vans.Marshall, who owns Abbotts Ice Cream, distributors of Ben and Jerrys Ice Cream, supervised the moving of the vehicles from Conway to the fairgrounds the week before the fair. Some of my employees arent too happy with me because I make sure they dont drive over 25 miles per hour transporting the bigger wagons or its back to freezer duty where its winter minus 15 degrees Fahrenheit year round, he quipped. One of the more noteworthy pieces on display at the Fryeburg Fair as part of the Marshall Collection is No. 428, a Concord Coach built in 1874 by the Abbot-Downing Company. The last of the company configurations before it ceased building vehicles, Marshall says it was built by F. E. Gerald and J. G. Chesley, two blacksmiths, who had both worked for a long time for one or the other of the companies run by Lewis Downing and J. Stephens Abbot.Sut Marshall explained that the serial number is stamped on the four-axle spindles and underneath the three sections of the middle seat.It is complete. The company's name is beautifully lettered in a cartouche on the inside of each of the varnished door boards. Henry Knox of Epsom, N.H., originally ordered the coach and ran it between Epsom and Northwood, said Marshall, noting that S. C. Davis later used the coach to haul mail between Bridgton and Harrison, Maine. (Both route names are discernible on the transom rail of the coach.)The upper door panels were painted with a landscape scene, probably the work of John Burgum, an Englishman responsible for most of the painted door panels on the Abbot-Downing coaches. "U. S. M." painted beneath the driver's seat signified that the stage line operator held a coveted contract from the Post Office Department to carry U. S. mail, lifeblood of the industry.Made by the Abbot-Downing company for more than 100 years (1813-1928), Concord Coaches (and other quality vehicles) were ordered from as far away as Australia and Kimberly, South Africa. During the period of their manufacture Concord Coaches were made by not one but four different companies.Lewis Downing, was born in Lexington, Mass., in 1792 and came to Concord in 1813 where he set up as a wheelwright, a trade he had learned in Massachusetts as his fathers apprentice.Downing realized that Concord was becoming the states transportation capital and that there might be business opportunities for a young fellow. so, as well as making repairs to small horse-drawn vehicles, which is what wheelwrights did, he began building some.Downings expertise was in undercarriage work, but with large bodies to build he needed someone experienced in that line, so he brought in J. Stephens Abbot, a younger man by 12 years.Together they built their first stagecoach in 1827, and in 1828 named the business Downing & Abbot. After that they worked together for about 20 years. They then separated and formed two different companies, just down the road from each other Downings company was renamed Lewis Downing & Sons and by 1850 was situated directly opposite the Phenix Hotel, two blocks south of the State House; Abbots business was renamed J.S. & E.A. Abbot and was located on South Main Street, where some of the old factory buildings still stand.After the Civil War the two families merged back together again on July 1, 1865. The company then became known as Abbot-Downing & Company and moved back to its original location where it covered about six acres of land. That period marked the biggest expansion era for the company, as the two were no longer competing with each other.Records show that by 1880 the company had opened branches, including one in New York City on South Fifth Avenue at the corner of Prince Street. However, all coaches continued to be manufactured in New Hampshire where, at this time, approximately 40 different styles of vehicles were being made, including omnibuses, Yellowstone Park touring surreys, American Express delivery wagons, Standard Oil tank trucks, street sweepers, etc.In its heyday, the company may have employed more workers than any other business in Concord, with the possible exception of the railroad. In any case, its economic impact was beneficial to the city which gave the coaches their name.By 1920, however, Abbot-Downing & Company were no longer making coaches. The companys decline began as soon as railroads started transporting people and delivering cargo faster than coaches and wagons could. In the 1880s to 1890s, the number of orders began dropping off until the last coach was made in 1902. What made a Concord Coach so special?First, they were distinctly more passenger-friendly as their suspension system featured eight layers of leather on which the coach body rested. Where other coaches with steel springs tended to produce a more jolting ride, Concord Coaches rocked like cradles.They were also noted for the superior quality of their painting, their lettering and fancy scroll work. Since all were custom-made to individual specifications, customers could order vehicles in any color they wanted with any lettering, device or images they chose.Coaches came in six-, nine- and 12-passenger models, every one an individual product, with individual specifications taking shape in the companys body, blacksmith, leather and other shops. The fact of each coach being custom-made further enhanced their good reputation.Many orders for coaches were placed by hotels that used them as taxicabs and shuttles are used today, to transport guests from train station to hotel and take them on day trips around the countryside. (During the gilded era of White Mountain grand hotels, they figured prominently in local coaching parades.)The wait for each Concord Coach was usually of about four months from start to finish, and the cost averaged between $1,000 and $1,500 much like the price of a luxury car today. Assisting with the research for this article were Bill Haynes, publicist for the Fryeburg Fair; Lloyd Jones of The Conway Daily Sun; Gabrielle Griswold formerly of The Mountain Ear newspaper of Conway; and William Copeley, New Hampshire Historical Society librarian at the Tuck Library in Concord.For more information about the Sut Marshall display at the Fryeburg Fair, call (207) 935-3268.