This is the story about our 75hp Marinette gas engine residing at CPM. A catalog picture of our engine is shown. There’s a long and interesting tale about this engine and its makers, and it’ll unfold before us now. So let’s travel back in time to discover its beginnings.
Where is Marinette?
Our time travel takes us to the shore of Lake Michigan in the early 1800s. Wow! This is really a big wilderness; but wait a bit–there are already a few French Canadian fur traders here. The first European settler was one of those a fur traders. The area prospered from the fur trade but it was short-lived. Lumber became prominent then and lasted many years.
The town was named for Marie Antoinette Chevalier, (1793-1865). Her father was French-Canadian and her mother was Menominee. Marie became a very astute and fair business-person and opened a trading post at the mouth of the Menominee River. She was so successful that she was called Queen Marinette. She married another trader, John Jacobs, and they had three children. The oldest, John Jr., continued with the family business and finally mapped out the town of Marinette. And so our stage is set!
Marinette, Wisconsin, has continued to prosper during the ensuing years and has had a relatively stable economy. It’s a very pleasant Midwestern town, which is the county seat of Marinette County. The city now has a population of about 11,000.
The Iron Works
Our time travel has brought us to a very early and primitive part of Marinette’s history. So let’s move up a few years and see what industry they now have. Wow! In 1867, a gent named DeWitt Clinton Prescott, along with R. H. Trumbell and Austin Cruver, established a shop on Joe Bart Island to repair sawmills. It burned down in 1870, but they were already building a big shop on Main Street of Marinette. In 1872, Prescott bought out his partners and formed the Marinette Iron Works. They could build a large variety of equipment, including steam engines
and locomotives.
Several years later, the Walrath engine would be added. This is the beginning of the Marinette engine.
In 1898, Prescott moved to Chicago where he set up his business headquarters. He built a plant in Chicago Heights to manufacture the Marinette Gas Engine, as they’d outgrown the Marinette Iron Works. It was a huge facility, but the demand for the engines was great. This was advertised as the largest factory in the country devoted solely to gas engine manufacture, and was named the Marinette Gas Engine Co. When Prescott passed away in 1918, his company soon evaporated. It was the end of an era for the Marinette engine.
Foos Engine Company of Springfield, Ohio, bought Marinette in about 1907 and continued making the engines for many more years. With a few changes, they were very successful.
Jesse Walrath
We return in our time travel to 1838 and visit the village of Chittenango, New York. On November 7, 1838, Jesse Walrath was born. He was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Daniel Walrath. His father was well-known for his expertise in manufacturing and farming. Jesse was educated at local schools and colleges and became an expert machinist and mechanical engineer. His career quickly blossomed.
Upon graduation, Jesse was recruited to work for the Corliss Steam Engine Works in Providence, Rhode Island, by George Corliss himself. He was soon promoted to General Superintendent.
Here, he had the opportunity to work with Edwin Reynolds, (1831-1909). This would be a wonderful experience for him. Reynolds was a prodigious engineer and worked for Corliss from 1861 to 1877. Reynolds was then asked by Edward P. Allis to move to Milwaukee to be his general superintendent. His Reynolds-Corliss steam engine was most successful. Reynolds was a prime mover to develop Allis-Chalmers in 1901. He designed much machinery and many products for them.
Jesse remained there until 1880 and then moved to Racine, Wisconsin, to become the general superintendent of J. I. Case. He was there until 1896 and made many improvements for them. Also, during these years, his interest in gas engines was sparked, and he did very significant work that eventually became the Marinette engine. In 1903, he retired to private life and became a consulting engineer. He passed away on April 30, 1909. He is buried in Oakwood Cemetery in his hometown
of Chittenango.
Raymond or Walrath?
These two very gifted engineers had ideas that were very similar and their paths finally crossed. We have just learned of Jesse Walrath’s life and career, and know he was General Superintendent of J. I. Case and overseeing all of their products.
So now let us see what John Raymond is doing. About 1891, he was in San Francisco designing a vertical engine with rotary valves. A very handsome design with odd flywheels.
It had a vertical shaft between the cylinders that had a gear that drove the two rotary valve gears and the governor head. Note the oilers on top for the rotary valves. Walrath had a very similar design in 1895, but the central vertical shaft drove poppet valves. During this time, both were in the employ of Case!
Is there a connection in the work of these two engineers? They worked together at Case for three years and must’ve had some interaction. Were they friends or adversaries? We’ll never know!
This is the only known Raymond in existence. Note that it was built by Hicks in Chicago, and not by J. I. Case. Interesting, but that’s another long story. It’s now in a private collection.
Walrath patents
Jesse was a very prolific designer and–considering his employment with Corliss, Reynolds, and Case–he had the opportunity to expand his imagination. And that he did! He also included several other topics for at least 33 patents. His earliest patent is in 1868 for a brick making machine.
1. First gas engine patent found: July 10, 1894. 522,811.
Jesse’s first gas engine patent. Appears to be a reasonable horizontal twin cylinder engine. It also appears to be very complicated. There’s no evidence that it was ever built. But this was his first venture into gas engines, marking a big step for his career.
2. Second gas engine patent: March 2, 1897. 577,898.
This is a very interesting patent. It represents an engine very similar to the Raymond engine.
However, Jesse used poppet valves instead of Raymond’s rotary valves. The vertical shaft drove a large gear in the center of the head, which had a face cam to actuate the poppet valve. Note the igniter was also rotary.
3. Third gas engine patent: March 9, 1897. 578,377
A week after Jesse got his second patent, he was awarded this one. He was still using the Raymond rotary valve. A very odd engine that never saw production. But note that he’s now dealing with verticals.
4. Fourth gas engine patent: Sept. 12, 1899. 632,859.
Jesse is now thinking multiple cylinder, vertical in-line engines. This looks like a new design for him, but the large crankcase breather reverts back to the Raymond. Definitely, Jesse is designing a new engine.
5. Fifth gas engine patent: March 5, 1901. 669,272.
This patent illustrates that the engine frame design is completed, and shows that the idler timing gear is used to take up wear in the shaft bearings. It was used on the Marinette engines. Ingenious and successful.
6. Sixth gas engine patent: October 26, 1900. 676,642.
Of the six patents that I selected, I think these are the most significant to show the development of the Walrath engine. His air start mechanism shown here was unique, and necessary for the large engines.
Jesse had many more patents that detailed various items on his engine. These included the mixer, the igniters, and the governor. He covered every aspect of his new engine in detail to produce very successful machines.
Dr. Paul Harvey is the founder of Coolspring Power Museum and a regular contributor to Gas Engine Magazine. Email him at engdoc8@gmail.com
Coolspring Power Museum is located in Coolspring, Pennsylvania, and was founded in 1985. The museum collection includes hundreds of stationary engines housed in more than 35 buildings and outdoor displays. Their mission is to collect, preserve, and interpret historically significant and mechanically interesting early stationary internal combustion engines for the education and enjoyment of everyone. To learn more visit coolspringpowermuseum.org
Part 1 of this series on the Marinette Engine. Join us next issue for part 2!
