To Slip the Surly Bonds

Stubbs and Goddard General Manufacturers

Roxbury, Massachusetts

March, 1883

Nahum, Elias and Horace fell into line behind Hub as he walked toward the door at the far end of the engine house. He pulled it open and the four of them went through. As soon as Nahum went through the boiler house door, he felt as though he had walked into a wall. It was almost intolerably hot. Nahum felt beads of perspiration gather on his forehead as he walked through the door. The air was thick with the smell of coal dust. A loud rhythmic clanging echoed off the walls, from the regular opening and closing of a metal door as the two stokers steadily fed shovelfuls of coal in the gaping maw of the boiler.

Two large boilers occupied one end of the boiler house. They were tall, cylindrical and about ten feet in diameter. The air was filled with the hum of fans as they drew smoke from the coal fire up and out of the boiler, into the smoke box and out of the factory’s smokestack. A pair of pipes ran from the top of the two boilers to a condenser, where the steam generated by the interaction of water in the boiler tubes and the heat of the coal fires combined to make steam.

The steam was then injected into the two steam engines, which turned a system of belts that powered all of the factory’s machinery. A large door stood open to the outside at the opposite end of the boiler house from where the two boilers stood under shimmering waves of heat. A chilly wind gusted into the space, freezing the sweat on Nahum’s forehead and he shivered involuntarily. A large pile of coal sat just beyond the open door under a large metal awning. Nahum estimated that that it stood about twenty feet high.

Several men with wheelbarrows were going back and forth between the boilers and the coal pile. They tipped the wheelbarrows full of coal into a heap on the floor just in front of the boilers. The two stokers feeding the boilers shovelled the coal in, while the two rakers thrust a pair of long-handled iron takes into the boiler’s open mouth, evening out the bed of glowing coals so that they burned more evenly.

One of the rakers looked up amid the clatter of shovels and rakes, the boiler doors’s steady clanging and the tramp of footsteps. He turned to his partner and nudged him in the ribs. “Hey” he said, as he eyed, Nahum, Elias and Horace. They looked conspicuously out of place in their fastidiously neat suits amid the heat and noise of the boiler house, particularly next to Hub Hoxy, in his greasy blue coveralls.

The man and his partner looked up as he felt the elbow in his ribs. “We don’t see them down here very often,” the first man said. “I wonder what’s up.”

Nahum, Elias, Horace and Hub stopped in front of the stokers and rakers steadily feeding the boiler. One of the stokers stood up straight and leaned casually on his shovel. He was a broad shouldered muscular man. His face was so thick with coal dust that it was impossible to tell what colour he was. His hands were covered in callouses. His eyes flicked from Nahum, Elias and Horace to Hub, and back again as if Hub had allowed interlopers into their personal kingdom.

“Something I can help you with Mr. Hoxy?” The second man asked.

Hub nodded. “I’m looking for the shift foreman.”

The man nodded. “Sure,” he casually jerked a big thumb over to a shabby looking door in the far corner of the boiler house. “Mr. Magnusson was in his office, last I knew.”

Far away from the heat-thought Nahum-thank God.

Hub nodded. “Thanks.” He turned away from the oppressive waves of rippling heat radiating from the single lit boiler and Nahum was glad to follow him. If it was this hot in March with only one boiler lit, he couldn’t help but wonder how the stokers managed when both boilers were lit simultaneously.

They found Arnold Magnusson’s office behind a shabby looking door in a corner behind a cluster of pipes. Elias knocked and a gruff voice with a distinct Norwegian accent said, “Come in.”

Elias pushed the door open and the four piled into a cramped office. A thin film of coal dust had settled over everything. The four of them plus Magnusson only barely fit in the room, which was more like a glorified broom closet.

Arnold looked up as the four men piled through the door. “Something I can help you with?” he asked as Nahum, Elias, Horace and Hub pressed themselves into Arnold’s office. The room was very tiny. Most of the interior space was occupied by a very battered-looking desk. The desk’s surface was occupied by a leather blotter, an ink well and a ceramic cup holding a collection of fountain pens. An old filing cabinet was wedged into one corner. Wedged into one corner of the already too small office was a battered looking filing cabinet. A single overhead gas lamp lit the room.

“Mr. Magnusson,” said Elias.

“Mr. Prendergast,” replied Arnold coolly.

From the way the two men spoke to each other, Nahum sensed that there was some sort of pre-existing feud between them. Precisely what it was, Nahum had not the slightest idea, he had never met Arnold before today.

For half a second, Arnold looked as if he was about to ask them to have a seat, before suddenly remembering that he was sitting in the only chair. “How can I help you?” he asked, crossing his arms across his broad chest.

Nahum nodded. “Yes. We think we have a boiler problem,” and he quickly outlined the situation with the stamping machines.

Arnold listened impassively until Nahum finished talking. He shook his head as soon as Nahum was finished. “No,” he said in his thick Norwegian accent, “absolutely not. There is nothing wrong with my boilers.”

“And yet, we don’t have the steam pressure we should have to run the stamping machines at the rate we need to fill our orders,” replied Elias evenly. He eyed Arnold as he spoke. “What do you think would happen if we can’t fill our orders.”

Arnold was silent for a long time, as if considering Elias’ words. On the one hand, Arnold Magnusson was a man who saw the boiler house as his own personal fiefdom. He would surely resent intrusion from outsiders, even from Hub. He also hated even the slightest insinuation that his boilers, and they were his boilers, were in nothing less than perfect working order, and yet he hated the suggestion that they weren’t. The very idea was insulting. The idea that his boilers might have a problem that he didn’t know about and had gone unresolved was something that he must have found to be unbearable.

He seemed to be considering throwing the lot of them out of his office for a second or two. Instead, Arnold heaved himself to his feet with a sigh. He seemed to take up even more of the tiny office than when he was sitting behind his desk. The others piled out of the room and back into the waves of rippling heat as Arnold stumped out of his office and into the boiler house.

“GREEN! BENNET!” He shouted above the clamour of the shovels, rakes and wheelbarrows. His voice cut like a knife through the din and everything stopped at once. The two men dropped their shovels, which fell to the floor with a clatter. They hurried over to where Arnold stood with a sour look on his face.

“Yes, boss?” asked Green in a thick Brooklyn accent.

Arnold jerked his head toward a door next to his office, labelled “Tool Room.”

“Get the hand pump, the hose and the big monkey wrench.”

Green and Bennett nodded and walked over the tool room. A minute later, they returned, staggering under the weight of a heavy looking pump made of a single piece of cast iron. They dropped it and it fell to the floor with a dull metallic clang that echoed loudly off the walls. Green turned and waved to two of the men trudging back and forth between the coal pile and the boilers. “Hey!” he said, shouting above the clamour. “Walters, Thompson, come over here a minute.”

Walters and Thompson parked their wheelbarrows which were piled high with coal. “What do you need?” asked Walters.

Bennett gestured to the heavy hand pump, which required two people to operate. “Boss has something in mind,” he said. “Not sure what, but he wants the pump, the hose and the big monkey wrench.”

“Just stay here by the pump and wait for instructions,” interjected Green.

Walters and Thompson nodded together in understanding. They maneuvered their wheelbarrows off to one side and waited while Bennett and Green went back to the tool room. They returned a minute or two later, their arms ladened with a pair of coiled hoses, extra gaskets and a heavy-duty looking monkey wrench. They deposited the collection of tools and spare parts on top of the hand pump and set about unwinding the hose. Green took one end of one the hoses and the monkey wrench in his hands and walked over to a pipe in the corner. He turned a valve and shut off the water flow from the main. He then took the money wrench and set about removing an end cap just above the valve he had closed. The aperture had a circular locking mechanism and Green inserted the end of the hose and twisted it, locking it securely in place. At the other end of the hose, Bennett was affixing the other end to the hand pump.

After a second or two, he took the other hose and connected the hand pump to the boiler. He whistled across the boiler house floor and Green, Walters, Thompson and Arnold turned at the high-pitched sound. Bennet waved and gave the others a thumbs-up to indicate that everything was connected.

Arnold nodded, turned to where Green was still standing next to the water main shut-off valve and gestured. Green, who had been waiting for the signal, nodded in return. He turned back to the shut-off valve and gave it a quarter of a turn. He could hear the water gurgling faintly in the pipe. The hose, lying flaccid on the boiler house floor, suddenly became stiff and rigid as the water coursed through it. It writhed back and forth like a snake as the water filled all of the hose’s folds and crevices until itreached its maximum extent. Walters and Thompson took hold of the hand pump’s long handles and began pumping the water through the hose connected to the unlit boiler. Like the other hose, it became increasingly rigid as it filled with water, but it moved much more sluggishly as the water coursing through it was doing so at a much slower rate. Arnold watched as the hose twisted lazily across the floor. He followed its gyrations, walking from the pump to the boiler, where Bennett had his ear pressed to its curved flank. He was listening for the sound of water in the boiler tubes. He was also listening for the steady drip-drip-drip of a leak.

Hub and Elias joined Arnold. They each produced a small stethoscope, which they pressed against the curved side of the boiler. Each man listened carefully. The steady gurgle of water in the boiler tubes echoed loudly. Elias frowned slightly to himself, Arnold was smirking slightly, believing he had been vindicated and that there was nothing wrong with his boilers. Elias stood up, ignoring Arnold’s triumphant look. Nahum joined him.

“What is it?” asked Nahum.

Elias didn’t answer right away. His eyes were fixed on the tangle of piping coming from of the top of the two boilers. “There’s definitely a problem,” he said, “but I don’t think it’s with the boiler.”

Nahum began to follow him, also training his eyes on the maze of overhead pipes. Both men were watching and listening for the steady drip of a steam leak. After a short time, Nahum heard it. Themrhythmic plunk of a drop of water falling into a puddle. Elias must have heard it too, because he turned at almost the same time Nahum did.

He gestured toward a cluster of pipes and gages in a corner. Nahum walked cautiously towards it, still trying to ascertain exactly where the dripping noise was coming from. Something on the floor caught his eye. A thin trickle of water flowed from under the tangled cluster of pipes. He turned and nudged Elias, who had been studying a T-junction near the ceiling.

He turned as he felt Nahum’s elbow in his ribs. “What is it?”

Nahum pointed. “I think the leak is coming from over in that corner.”

Elias turned and looked at where Nahum was pointing. He paused for a moment, listening. Then he heard the steady plunk-plunk-plunk of dripping water, as if from a leaky pipe. A second or two after that he caught sight of the thin stream of water flowing across the floor. Nahum and Elias followed the small rivulet of water to the cluster of pipes in the corner. They crouched down, heedless of the thin film of soot on the floor. Nahum dipped his fingers into the water. It was still slightly warm. Elias began to run his hands over the pipes and gages, searching for moisture. He found it on the far side of an elbow bend right in the back corner.

Elias turned to Nahum. “Do you feel it?”

Nahum nodded. “Yes. It’s still warm too.”

Elias frowned thoughtfully. “The leak must becoming from the lit boiler.”

“We need to check the other boiler,” said Nahum.