[The following note describes a series of company records and has no images attached to it. To view the images in the records described here, use the "Which Series Notes?" button to enter the Series Notes or use the "Next Text" button to move to the first item in the series.]
The New Jersey and Pennsylvania Concentrating Works (NJPCW) was the largest and most expensive of Edison's iron ore ventures. Organized on December 27, 1888, the company began operations in January 1889. Its general offices were initially located in New York City and were moved to the West Orange laboratory in 1894. Edison supplied more than four-fifths of the company's capital and served as its president from 1889 until 1908. Numerous associates, including Charles Batchelor, Samuel Insull, Walter S. Mallory, and John F. Randolph, also served as officers. In the early 1890s the company constructed a plant at Ogden (later named Edison), near present-day Ogdensburg, New Jersey, to engage in the large-scale separation of magnetic iron ore from low-grade ore found in abundance throughout the region. Despite Edison's constant attention, the Ogden works never ran satisfactorily. Equipment failures, along with engineering and other technical problems, prompted Edison to develop costly new machines for crushing, conveying, screening, separating, and drying the iron ore. By the end of the 1890s, iron ore prices had fallen sharply with the arrival of low-cost, high-grade ore from the Mesabi range in Minnesota, and NJPCW found itself unable to sell its product at a profit, despite significantly lowering the unit cost of its separated ore. Operations were shut down permanently in 1900, despite Edison's promise to rebuild the works. The technology, including the crushing machinery, was later used at other enterprises, including the Edison Portland Cement Co. at Stewartsville, New Jersey, and the New Jersey Zinc Co. of Franklin, New Jersey.
The records are arranged into nine series: (1) Administrative and Financial Records; (2) Shipping Records [not selected]; (3) Employee Records [not selected]; (4) Legal Records; (5) Plant Operations Records; (6) Minutes; (7) Letterbooks; (8) Mine Survey and Property Records [not selected]; and (9) Sand Sales Records. A finding aid is available at the Edison National Historical Park. Related records can be found in the Alexander Elliott, Jr., Papers and the Walter S. Mallory Papers (Special Collections Series)