Blair County PA Archives Biographies.....Green, M. A. July 16, 1852 - ???? ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Judy Banja http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00004.html#0000757 December 12, 2024, 1:43 pm Source: Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Blair Co, PA: Philadelphia, 1892. Author: Samuel T. Wiley M. A. GREEN, one of the most successful business men of the Keystone State, and the president of the Altoona Manufacturing Company, whose great industrial establishment is next in size to the wonderful and immense car shops of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, was born July 16, 1852. He is also a mechanical engineer, and a member of the American Association of Mechanical Engineers. He became one of the organizers of the Altoona Car Company, limited of which he served as superintendent for seven years. The company was then organized under the name of the Altoona Manufacturing Company, and Mr. Green was elected president, which position he has very successfully filled ever since. Next to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company's shops, the second great industrial establishment in the Mountain City is the works of the Altoona Manufacturing Company, located on a five-acre tract of land on the western border of the city, just within its corporate limits, at Broad and Twenty-sixth streets. The first works built upon the site of the present extensive buildings was in the year 1868. These were burned down on May 23, 1879, but the work of reconstruction was at once begun, and from time to time since additional buildings and other improvements have been added. The Altoona Manufacturing Company is a joint stock organization. The company's plant, valued at about one hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, is not only conveniently but also pleasantly situated. To Mr. Green himself, more than to any other man, is due the prosperity of the company and the general excellence of the work turned out by the establishment. Devoting his personal attention to every department of the works, and being perfectly acquainted with the details of the labor performed, he has accomplished results where others would have failed. The Altoona Manufacturing Company, in its earlier stages of existence, was mainly devoted to the building of cars. Now it is otherwise. Cars are still turned out, orders of this nature receiving constant attention, but this branch of manufacture is no longer the distinctive feature of the works. The construction of engines is now one of the main points in which the company competes for the general trade, and for the making of automatic high speed engines, for electric lighting, electric railways, and for all uses in which rapidity of action and close regulation are prime requisites, the company is proving very successful. The company manufactures automatic, and double and single hoisting and hauling engines, coal and coke breaking machinery, boilers, castings, regenerative gas furnaces, freight, stock, mine, and street cars and tank machinery. For these purposes the works are supplied with all the latest and most improved machinery. There are nine different departments in the works, employing in allover two hundred persons. Coming to the works by the way of Broad street, the first building reached is the office, a brick structure, 50 x 50 feet. Directly beside the business department is the draughting room, where three draughtsmen are employed. Above the business offices is the pattern shop, where six persons are employed. The machine shop building is of brick, two hundred feet long and fifty feet wide, with an L annex, also of brick, 40 x 50 feet. It employs sixty skilled workmen. The boiler and engine room is built of brick 40 x 50 feet, where an eighty horse power engine, supplied by a one hundred horse power boiler, furnishes the motive power for the works. Besides the boiler in use, one of eighty horse power is kept in reserve. An engineer and fireman are employed. The blacksmith shop is constructed of brick, in dimensions 50 x 75 feet, and requires a constant force of thirteen men. A few yards distance from the machine shop stands the foundry, built of brick like the others, and extending in length two hundred feet, while its width is fifty feet, and ninety-five men are employed. In a building of brick, 60 x 100 feet, is the boiler department, where twenty-eight men work. Near by the boiler department is the car shop and planning mill, a frame building, 75 x 100 feet, requiring twenty-five men. Finally, two two-story frame buildings, for the storage of patterns, have been recently constructed. These buildings are each 28 x 40 feet. These different departments are always busy, and for some time past the receipt of orders has been so great that night work was necessary in order to make headway against the demand. The total value of the manufactures during the last year was two hundred and fifty thousand dollars-figures which will certainly be increased during the year 1892. The Altoona Manufacturing Company is daily increasing its facilities for work, and the quality of the articles it gives to its customers, who are to be found all over the country, is building up for it a standard reputation in its line of business. In 1887 Mr. Green invented and patented the well known M. A. Green automatic high speed engine. In politics he is a republican. He is a member of Logan lodge, No. 490, Free and Accepted Masons; Mountain Chapter, No. 189, Royal Arch Mason; Mountain Commandery, No. 10, Knights Templar; and Syria Temple of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine. M. A. Green is a man of high standing and repute in commercial circles, and the immense business of the company is largely the outgrowth of his energetic efforts and excellent management. Additional Comments: Originally submitted 2001. Transcribed by Ruth Curfman rcurfman@home.com This file has been created by a form at http://www.usgwarchives.net/pafiles/ File size: 6.1 Kb