Thaddeus Fairbanks

Thaddeus Fairbanks (January 17, 1796 – April 12, 1886) was an American businessman, mechanic, and engineer. He invented furnaces, cooking stoves, cast iron steel plows, and other metal items related to farming. He invented and manufactured the first platform scale, the Fairbanks scale, that allowed the accurate weighing of large objects. His scales revolutionized farming and manufacturing and were sold worldwide, and he received numerous honors and awards for his development of the technology. Fairbanks was also a philanthropist, and was a co-founder of the St. Johnsbury Academy.

Early life Fairbanks was born in the town of Brimfield, Massachusetts, on January 16, 1796, the second of three sons of Joseph Fairbanks and Phebe (née Paddock) Fairbanks. He was educated in the schools of Brimfield while working on the family farm in his spare time, and showed a natural inclination toward mechanics. Thaddeus Fairbanks was the mechanical technician behind the company's inventions while Erastus was the businessman who marketed the products. In 1826, Fairbanks was granted a patent for a refrigerator and a cast iron plow.

Career In 1830, Fairbanks patented a hemp-and-flax-dressing device called a Haynes machine and became the general manager of the Saint Johnsbury Hemp Company. This enterprise included mechanical scales that suspended heavy objects from log beams to weigh the large loads of hemp straw brought in by farmers; these scales which were not accurate, making it difficult to determine how much to pay sellers for their product.

After experimenting with designs for a more accurate weighing method, Fairbanks devised a platform scale, which revolutionized the farming and business worlds by making it easy to weigh large containers. By allowing a wagon or railroad car to be placed on the scale, to be weighed while full and empty, the Fairbanks scale enabled accurate weighing of products and payment to the sellers. Fairbanks received a patent on the platform scale, which his brothers advised him to produce and sell. In 1834, Fairbanks and his brothers Erastus and Joseph formed E. & T. Fairbanks Company to make and market the Fairbanks platform scale.

Fairbanks scales were displayed at ten international expositions including London, Paris, Vienna, Philadelphia, Chicago, Buffalo and St. Louis, where they were awarded gold and silver medals for technological advancement. Other factories were established in Asian and African countries, including Russia, Holland, Cuba, Siam, and Japan. They had five children, two of whom lived to adulthood.

In addition to his brother Erastus, Fairbanks' relatives included uncle Ephraim Paddock and nephews Franklin Fairbanks and Horace Fairbanks.

Philanthropy

Fairbanks was involved in numerous charitable and civic endeavors, including the 1842 founding of the St. Johnsbury Academy. He originally paid $50,000 for the construction of a red brick building of Norman-Gothic Tudor style. The academy later added South Hall at a cost to Fairbanks of $36,000 . In 1872 Fairbanks erected larger modern brick structures at a cost of $200,000 . In 1873 the academy was reincorporated as a school of grades 9-12 for all boys and girls.

Other philanthropic and civic endeavors in which Fairbanks took part included serving on the board of trustees of Middlebury College and donating to the missionary and educational activities of the Congregational church.

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