Emerson-Brantingham’s near-miss with success

The history of farm machinery is sown with a pantheon of manufacturers who had near misses with the greatness that was experienced by such companies as John Deere, International Harvester, and J.I. Case. In its heyday of the early 1900s, Emerson-Brantingham certainly seemed destined to join the ranks of leading manufacturers of the times.

The highly inventive soul of Emerson-Brantingham traces its roots back to John H. Manny, an Illinois farm boy with a passion for tinkering. As he matured, Manny grew into a wunderkind inventor who would go on to file dozens of successful patents such as a foot-lift riding plow that proved to be one of the greatest inventions of its day. This innovation would be applied to aline of Foot-Lift implements.

So advanced were Manny’s inventive skills, that in 1852, he fashioned a horse-drawn reaper that successfully vied with Cyrus McCormick’s implement.

That same year, he launched J.H. Manny & Company and took to building a wide variety of implements. Recognizing he’d need partners in order to expand his business, Manny brought on Ralph Emerson as an investor and co-owner in 1854.

Manny’s success with a reaper was not lost on McCormick, who sued Manny & Company for patent infringement. Manny successfully defended his design aided by legal assistance provided by none other than Abraham Lincoln and his partner, Edwin Stanton. Legend has it that Lincoln used the fee Manny paid him to finance the famous Lincoln-Douglas debates.

Manny continued to expand with a growing line of implements. But in 1856, he passed away, and his company was taken over by Ralph Emerson and a second partner, Waite Talcott. Renamed Talcott, Emerson and Company, the firm continued to build on the nearly 30 patents Manny had left with his death.

Under the leadership of Emerson, the firm continued to expand its line of tillage and threshing equipment while spreading its sales territory across North America and then into South America, Australia, and Africa.

Brantingham enters

Emerson, who was eager to continue this expansion, sought out business associates to help in that effort.

One of his employees, Charles Brantingham, rapidly climbed the ladder in the Emerson organization and was eventually named president in 1909 of a newly reorganized firm, Emerson Brantingham Company (E-B).

Brantingham’s vision for the company was to grow it into the leading manufacturer of farm machinery in the country. The atmosphere of agriculture at this time encouraged Brantingham’s desires. Farms were increasingly being mechanized while their crop yields grew during this prosperous era. Mechanized horsepower to replace draft animals had taken root and was suddenly expanding since farmers had the money to invest in tractors.

Rather than innovate new products within the firm to fuel the expansion, Brantingham cast his eye over the sea of small and medium manufacturers available for acquisition.

Rapid expansion

To fund his purchases, Brantingham first increased the firm’s capital stock to $50 million and then set out on a furious spending spree.

In one year alone, 1912, he purchased eight companies that included the following:

• La Crosse Hay Tool Company (which manufactured forage mowers, rakes, loaders, and manure spreaders)
• Pontiac Buggy Company (buggies)
• Reeves and Company (threshers, sawmills, stationary engines, steam engines, and the Reeves 40 tractor)
• Geiser Manufacturing Co. (threshers, sawmills, forage equipment, Peerless steam stationary and traction engines, and a tractor)
• Rockford Gas Engine Works (stationary engines)
• Gas Traction Company (Big Four tractors)
• Newton Wagon Co. (wagons)
• American Drill Co. (grain drills and row planters)

The final acquisition by Brantingham was in 1918 with the OsborneCompany, which built a wide variety of mowers and reapers. Brantingham generally continued to sell these companies’ products under their previous names to cash in on their existing markets.

During 1912, Brantingham also brought 10 branch sales offices, which had been operating independently of E-B, under complete control of the company.

Expanding into tractors

Not all of Brantingham’s expansion plans were by acquisition, however. He commissioned his engineers to develop a lightweight tractor, recognizing that the era of huge prairie-busting machines like the Reeves and Big Four was drawing to a close.

To their credit, E-B’s engineers came up with an innovative design in the 1916 model L. Operating with a four-cylinder engine, the L turned out 20 belt and 12 drawbar horsepower operating with a single, rear drive wheel.

The next year saw the introduction of more conventional four-wheel tractors in the model 9-16 and model Q 12-20. Four additional tractor models would be introduced in subsequent years, including a motor cultivator that enjoyed brief popularity.

E-B had grown into a substantial business. Yet, it would face ominous market changes.

Steam traction engine and large tractor sales plummeted as small tractors became popular. Then the post-World War I Depression, which had affected so many machinery builders at this time, sunk its talons into E-B. Try as he might to minimize losses due to plummeting sales, Brantingham faced the inevitable and sold the firm to J.I. Case in 1928.