Justin Helfrich, Madison Courier Staff Writer
"Madison has many manufacturing institutions of magnitude, filled with machinery of the most intricate and costly kind, and sending out their products to the uttermost parts of the earth, but she has none of more importance, or that is doing more to build up our city than Tower Manufacturing Company, known throughout the city as 'The Tack Factory.' And few that have not visited the interior of this mammoth concern have any idea of the immensity of the establishment and noted the fine, intricate and costly machinery in operation and the immense amount of product turned out each day."
-The Madison Daily Democrat, Souvenir Edition, printed in 1900.
The blackened factory floors have been studded with thousands of nails and tacks beaten into the floor by workers' feet. The German-made nail machines are loaded with a few last strands of nail wire, and the smell of oil and steel shavings permeates the air. The last shipments are on pallets and wrapped up in plastic, waiting for the truck.
But Tower Manufacturing Co., after over 111 years of business in Madison, is gone.
"When the music stopped we wanted to make sure we had a chair," said Bob Cooke, Tower Manufacturing Co.'s owner. "We just didn't know that it would be an electric chair."
Cooke's company stopped serious production in September. It had made nails, tacks, brads, pins, rivets, cotter pins, electric fence wire, guy wire, hooks, picture hangers and plate hangers.
Cooke had worked for Tower since 1974, serving as president. He bought the company with his wife, Barbara, in 2001 from the Robertson family, which had owned it for three generations.
He said the factory's closing was a gradual process over the last two years. Although some employees were laid off and had to apply for unemployment, most were able to take other positions before their jobs were cut, Cooke said. He estimated that he put the facility up for sale in May or June but did not put up signs until production ended.
The decision to close came last fall.
Cooke said Tower employed 50 to 60 people when he bought the company. At the end of its production, the company employed only about 20 people, Cooke said.
"A lot of families in Madison have worked here," he said. "We're Madison's oldest continuous manufacturer. Even during the Depression they worked three days a week. During World War Two, the company was in production despite shortages of raw supplies."
But Tower Manufacturing Co. could not survive foreign competition, mainly from China.
"That's what killed this company," Cooke said. "So much of what we were doing could be imported cheaper than we could make it."
When Cooke purchased the company, there were five other companies in the U.S. producing similar products. But according to Cooke, there is now only one company left that actually produces nails and tacks, D. B. Gurney in Massachusetts, which predates Tower by several generations. Cooke said many companies in the U.S. still sell nails and tacks, but they import their products.
"One thing about this company is that we outlasted all the other tack and nail producers," he said.
Tower is liquidating its assets, including its extruding, coiling and braiding equipment. Great Northern, a company in Louisville, Ky., bought a portion of the company. Also, some of Tower's equipment will go to the Rehabilitation Center of Sheboygan, a nonprofit group. Cooke said Tower's packaging machinery was especially good, and speculated that it could possibly end up in China, where most of the packaging is still done by hand.
Cooke said Tower Manufacturing will conduct an auction around Thanksgiving to sell all of its remaining equipment. The building is for sale. Cooke said that because of the age of the facility, it's good for production but not a warehouse. Cooke said it could be used for storage, shopping, or living spaces.
Cooke said the factory, 1001 W. Second St., was built in 1884 by F. C. Johnson, the same company that constructed the Meese building. Johnson Yarn and Cordage operated there until Tower Manufacturing Co. was founded by Henry Tower in 1896. Tower Co.'s growth necessitated further additions over the years, and the building now has 60,000 square feet. The factory was damaged by fire in 1916 and was rebuilt.
In the basement, a dark line three-quarters of the way up the walls marks the high point of the water from the 1937 flood.
"You won't see buildings like this anymore," Cooke said. "You couldn't afford to build a building like this."
Although production has ceased, Cook said Tower Manufacturing Co. will exist as a shell company, and he hopes the name will continue. Cooke said Chinese companies have asked him if the name is for sale.
"Tower's name in the market is still good, and people recognize that," he said. "The reason (foreign companies) want the name is because it is of a well-known, old American company."
"Now will this be a Phoenix? I think not," Cook said. "I think we've already got our ninth life. It's sad."