Historical information

William A Ives worked in New Haven, Connecticut, and surrounding towns of Wallingford and Hamden from 1868 to 1917 and was a prolific inventor of braces and other wood boring tools between 1868 and 1884, when he received a dozen patents for these devices.
William A. Ives lived in the New Haven CT area, and his first auger-making activity took place in the town of Hamden. At first in association with the Churchill family who had been manufacturing tools in the area at least as early as 1863. That firm's works had created "Augerville" in Hamden, starting earlier, possibly as early as 1830. Ives became active as part of the Hamden Manufacturing Co. until 1875 (it is thought he may also have started his own business in the interim), and the William A. Ives & amp; Co. was established by 1877. This continued, until William's death in 1888, when The Hamden Mfg. Company became its successor. Ives also registered the name "Mephisto" trademark name with the US patent office that was to be used in connection with augers, auger bits, machine bits as of June 1st, 1909, appearing on items up until at least 1922. It also appears that the trademark was licensed by the Mephisto Tool Co of Hudson New York who continued to manufacture tools under this trademark.

Significance

Item is significant because its maker was the inventor of the wood auger boring bit and his patent has been used ever since on many different types of bits with little change to the original design.

Physical description

Auger wood screw bit W A Ives Patent

Inscriptions & markings

None