In 1864, the Woonsocket Rubber Company was incorporated by Simeon S. Cook, Lyman Cook and Joseph Banigan. The Cooks were important local industrialists who had interests in the Woonsocket Machine and Press Company and the Bailey Wringer Company. Banigan was an Irish immigrant who learned the rubber business at the Goodyear India Rubber Company in Boston.
Together, the men purchased a three story rubble-stone building on this site that had been constructed ten years earlier as a steam powered sash manufacturing mill.
Originally founded to manufacture rubber rollers for the Bailey Wringer Company, the operation soon expanded to include shoes, boots and rubberized cloth. By 1869, the business employed 150 people, used 250,000 pounds of rubber and 500,000 yards of fabric per year. The growing product lines led to growth to the the mill complex, with addtional buildings constructed in 1875, 1880, and 1900.
Woonsocket Rubber also opened two additional sites in 1882 (Millville) and 1889 (Alice Mill). Their success also led to the incorporation of supporting companies, such as the Glenark Knitting Company, which produced knit liner cloth.
Much of this expansion was due to the expertise of Banigan, who built machines and developed a process that allowed the Woonsocket Rubber Company to produce the finest rubber shoes and boots in the world. Banigan's success led him to become the first President of the US Rubber Company and Rhode Island’s first Irish Catholic millionaire.
<i>Images courtesy of the Woonsocket Historical Society</i>
