Editing Danbury, Connecticut (section)

===Hatmaking in Danbury===

In 1780, what is traditionally considered to be the first hat shop in Danbury was established by [[Zadoc Benedict]]. ([[Hatmaking]] had existed in Danbury before the Revolution.) The Benedict shop had three employees, and they made 18 hats weekly.<ref name=Pirro>{{cite news |last1=Pirro |first1=John |title=The rise—and fall—of hatting in Danbury |url=http://www.newstimes.com/local/article/The-rise-and-fall-of-hatting-in-Danbury-990165.php |access-date=September 15, 2015 |publisher=Danbury News-Times |date=February 1, 2011 |archive-date=September 25, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150925105601/http://www.newstimes.com/local/article/The-rise-and-fall-of-hatting-in-Danbury-990165.php |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="unisci.com">{{cite web |last1=Varekamp |first1=Johan |title='Mad Hatters' Long Gone, But The Mercury Lingers On |url=http://unisci.com/stories/20022/0625026.htm |website=Daily University Science News |access-date=September 15, 2015 |archive-date=January 1, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160101123655/http://www.unisci.com/stories/20022/0625026.htm |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="Devlin 1984">{{cite book |last1=Devlin |first1=William E. |title=We Crown Them All |date=1984 |publisher=Windsor Publications, Inc. |isbn=0-89781-092-9 |edition=First}}</ref>{{rp|47–48}} By 1800, Danbury was producing 20,000 hats annually, more than any other city in the U.S.<ref name=NRHP>{{cite web |url=https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/NRHP/82000998_text |title=National Register of Historic Places Inventory--Nomination Form: P. Robinson Fur Cutting Company |date=October 15, 1982 |id=Submitted to the National Park Service by the Connecticut Historical Commission |access-date=March 10, 2016 |archive-date=May 4, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210504204424/https://npgallery.nps.gov/NRHP/GetAsset/NRHP/82000998_text |url-status=live }}</ref> Due to the fur felt hat coming back into style for men and increasing mechanization in the 1850s, by 1859 hat production in Danbury had risen to 1.5&nbsp;million annually. By 1887, thirty factories were producing 5&nbsp;million hats per year.<ref name="Devlin 1984"/>{{rp|52}} Around this time, fur processing was separated from hat manufacturing when the [[P. Robinson Fur Cutting Company]] (1884) on Oil Mill Road and the White Brothers' factory began operation.<ref name="NRHP"/>

By 1880, workers had unionized, beginning decades of labor unrest. They struggled to achieve conditions that were more fair, going on strike; with management reacting with lockouts. Because of the scale of the industry, labor unrest and struggles over wages affected the economy of the entire town. In 1893, nineteen manufacturers locked out 4000 union hatters. In 1902, the [[American Federation of Labor]] union called for a nationwide boycott of Dietrich Loewe, a Danbury non-union hat manufacturer. The manufacturer sued the union under the [[Sherman Antitrust Act]] for unlawfully restraining trade. In the 1908 [[Danbury Hatters' Case]] the [[U.S. Supreme Court]] ruled that the union was liable for damages. In the 1930s and 1940s, there were a number of violent incidents during several strikes, mostly involving scab workers brought in as strikebreakers.<ref name="Devlin 1984"/>{{rp|58–61}}

Beginning in 1892, the industry was revolutionized when the large hat factories began to shift to manufacturing unfinished hat bodies only, and supplying them to smaller hat shops for finishing. While Danbury produced 24% of America's hats in 1904, the city supplied the industry with 75% of its hat bodies.<ref name="Devlin 1984"/>{{rp|57}} The turn of the century was the heyday of the hatting industry in Danbury, when it became known as the "Hat City" and the "Hatting Capitol of the World". Its motto was "Danbury Crowns Them All".

==== Mercury poisoning ====

The use of [[Mercury(II) nitrate|mercuric nitrate]] in the felting process poisoned many workers in the hat factories, creating a condition called [[erethism]], also called "mad hatter disease."<ref name=Buckell1946>{{cite journal |last1=Buckell |first1=M |last2=Hunter|first2=D|last3=Milton|first3=R|last4=Perry|first4=KM |title=Chronic mercury poisoning |journal=British Journal of Industrial Medicine |date=February 1993 |orig-year=1946 |volume=50 |issue=2 |pages=97–106 |pmid=8435354 |doi=10.1136/oem.50.2.97-a|pmc=1061245}}</ref> The condition, known locally as the "Danbury shakes", was characterized by slurred speech, tremors, stumbling, and, in extreme cases, hallucinations.<ref>{{cite web |title=Mercury Workshop |url=https://www.epa.ohio.gov/Portals/41/training/Introduction%20to%20mercury%20issues.pdf?ver=2014-07-08-103928-983 |page=23 |publisher=Ohio Indoor Air Quality Coalition |date=2008 |quote=In the late 1800s hat makers, or hatters, used to use mercury nitrate when working with beaver fur to make felt. Over time, the hatters started exhibiting apparent changes in personality and also experienced tremors or shaking. Mercury poisoning attacks the nervous system, causing drooling, hair loss, uncontrollable muscle twitching, a lurching gait, and difficulties in talking and thinking clearly. Stumbling about in a confused state with slurred speech and trembling hands, affected hatters were sometimes mistaken for drunks. The ailment became known as 'The Danbury Shakes' in the community of Danbury where hat making was a major industry. In very severe cases, they experienced hallucinations. The term '[[mad as a hatter]]' may be a product of mercury toxicity. |access-date=August 18, 2020 |archive-date=September 22, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210922085451/https://www.epa.ohio.gov/Portals/41/training/Introduction%20to%20mercury%20issues.pdf?ver=2014-07-08-103928-983 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=McDowell |first1=Lee |title=Mineral Nutrition History: The Early Years |date=2017 |publisher=Design Pub. |isbn=978-1-5069-0459-7 |page=658 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Z4otDwAAQBAJ&dq=ailment%20became%20known%20as%20%27The%20Danbury%20Shakes%27&pg=PA658 |language=en |access-date=March 19, 2023 |archive-date=September 22, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230922005453/https://books.google.com/books?id=Z4otDwAAQBAJ&dq=ailment%20became%20known%20as%20%27The%20Danbury%20Shakes%27&pg=PA658 |url-status=live }}</ref> The effect of mercury on the workers' health was first noted in the late 19th century. While workers in the Danbury factories lobbied for controls on mercury in the early 20th century, a government study on the health effects of mercury was not conducted until 1937. The State of Connecticut announced a ban on mercury in hatmaking in 1941.<ref name="Wajda">{{cite web |url=https://connecticuthistory.org/ending-the-danbury-shakes-a-story-of-workers-rights-and-corporate-responsibility/ |title=Ending the Danbury Shakes: A Story of Workers' Rights and Corporate Responsibility |last=Wajda |first=Shirley T. |date=December 12, 2019 |publisher=Connecticut History |access-date=October 21, 2018 |archive-date=October 22, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181022033504/https://connecticuthistory.org/ending-the-danbury-shakes-a-story-of-workers-rights-and-corporate-responsibility/ |url-status=live }}</ref>

While Danbury hat factories stopped using mercury in the 1940s, the mercury waste has remained in the [[Still River (Housatonic River tributary)|Still River]] and adjacent soils, and has been detected at high levels in the 21st century.<ref name="unisci.com"/><ref name="Bronsther">{{cite report |last1=Bronsther |first1=Rachel |last2=Welsh |first2=Patrick |title=Mercury in Soils and Sediments |publisher=Wesleyan University |url=http://jvarekamp.web.wesleyan.edu/199%20ppt/Mercury66%20in%20Soils%20and%20Sediments.ppt |access-date=September 30, 2015 |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304002425/http://jvarekamp.web.wesleyan.edu/199%20ppt/Mercury66%20in%20Soils%20and%20Sediments.ppt |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name=Lerman>{{cite thesis |last1=Lerman-Sinkoff |first1=Sarah Tziporah |date=April 2014 |title=Transport and Fate of Historic Mercury Pollution from Danbury, CT through the Still and Housatonic Rivers |type=BA thesis |publisher=Wesleyan University |location=Middletown, CT |url=https://digitalcollections.wesleyan.edu/object/ir-639 |access-date=April 6, 2023 |doi=10.14418/wes01.1.1052 |doi-access=free |archive-date=September 8, 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200908233037/https://digitalcollections.wesleyan.edu/object/ir-639 |url-status=live }}</ref>{{better source needed|date=April 2023}}

==== Industry decline ====

By the 1920s, the hat industry was in decline. By 1923, only six manufacturers were left in Danbury, which increased the pressure on workers. After World War II, returning GIs went hatless, a trend that accelerated through the 1950s, dooming the city's hat industry.<ref name="Devlin 1984"/>{{rp|64–65}} The city's last major hat factory, owned by [[Stetson]], closed in 1964.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Devlin |first1=William E. |last2=Janick |first2=Herbert F. |title=Danbury's Third Century: From Urban Status to Tri-Centennial |date=April 2013 |publisher=Western Connecticut State University |location=Danbury, CT |isbn=978-0-9889243-1-4 |pages=190–191 |edition=First}}</ref> The last hat was made in Danbury in 1987 when a small factory owned by Stetson closed.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Serra |first1=Janet |title=Magnificent Millinery: Three Centuries of Women's Hats in Danbury CT |url=https://janetserra.com/2011/06/02/580/ |date=June 2, 2011 |website=Connecticut Travel |publisher=Western Connecticut Convention and Visitors Bureau |access-date=January 14, 2017 |archive-date=January 16, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170116161613/https://janetserra.com/2011/06/02/580/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Libov |first1=Charlotte |title=Mecca for the Bargain Hunter |date=March 20, 1988 |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/20/nyregion/mecca-for-the-bargain-hunter.html?pagewanted=all |work=The New York Times |access-date=February 15, 2017 |archive-date=January 16, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170116182320/http://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/20/nyregion/mecca-for-the-bargain-hunter.html?pagewanted=all |url-status=live }}</ref>