Pinco clearing old Locke insulator site

CLEARING SITE

FOR INSULATOR

PLANT AT LIMA

Expect to Have it in Operation by Next January

TO EXTEND WTER SYSTEM

Taxpayers to Vote on Proposition for Bond Issue on Friday, and Prospects Are That It Will Be Approved – Cost Will Be $8,000.

Lima, July 28. – The Porcelain Insulator Corporation, which recently bought the site of the old Locke Insulator Company, whose plant was burned in January 1919, has started a force of men at work clearing up the ruins of the old plant under direction of Superintendent James W. Ryan, who was superintendent of the original insulator works built here in 1904, and who has signed a contract with the new company. The construction of five kilns will begin at once, and it is hoped to have the plant in operation by January 1st, next.

Temporary Offices Opened.

The corporation has opened temporary offices in the Postoffice block at the Four Corners in Lima, with Secretary B. A. Plimpton in charge. John M. Peck, recently of the office force of the Victor Insulator Company, began work yesterday as head clerk, Miss Margaret Skeban being stenographer. Included in the staff of the new corporation is Van R. Bennett, chief engineer; A. J. Short, electrical engineer, and B. A. Plimpton, sales agent. Mr. Bennett and Mr. Victor and Mr. Short has a storage battery shop in West Main street.

The only concession asked by the corporation of the citizens of Lima is the extension of the village water system to the plant, which is situated a short distance east of the village corporation line in the state highway. The estimated cost of extending the East Main street water mains has been placed at $8,000, and the Village Board has called a special election of the taxpayers on Friday afternoon from 1 to 5 o’clock in the court room of the Town Hall to vote the above amount, payable in eight separate bonds of $1,000 each.

Board of Trade Approves.

As the assessed valuation of taxable property in Lima is more than $500,000, the increase in the tax rate to each taxpayer will be only $2 per thousand, and it is expected the vote will be almost unanimous for the extension, only slight opposition having developed. In case of an adverse vote, the corporation would cease all work at once, and Lima’s boom would be off.

The Board of Trade and business men are enthusiastic over the prospective building of the new plant, which, it is said, will eventually employ more than 200 men, with a pay roll of $300,000 annually. Many new houses will be erected in Lima with new streets laid out, and the industrial future of the town seems assured. Owing to the rapid development of hydro electric construction work in the United States, the call for porcelain insulators is incessant, and present plants cannot begin to supply the demand, it is said. Insulators made in the old plant were becoming famous as the “Lima Insulators” and many of the old employees will return to the new plant.