Loring Coes
{{short description|American politician}}
{{Infobox officeholder
|honorific-prefix =Hon.
|name = Loring Coes
|image = Loring Coes 1812–1906.jpg
|office = Member of the
Worcester, Massachusetts
Board of Aldermen
|term_start =
|term_end =
|majority =
|office2 = Member of the
Worcester, Massachusetts
Common Council
|term_start2 =
|term_end2 =
|majority2=
|predecessor2 =
|successor2 =
|office3 = Member of the
Massachusetts House of Representatives
|term_start3 = 1864
|term_end3 = 1865
|majority3 =
|predecessor3 =
|successor3 =
|birth_date = April 22, 1812
|birth_place = Worcester, Massachusetts
|death_date = July 13, 1906
|death_place = Worcester, Massachusetts
|restingplace = Hope Cemetery, Worcester, Massachusetts
|party = Republican
|spouse = Harriet Newell Read
|children =
|alma_mate =
|profession =
|religion =
|signature = Loring Coes signature.jpg
}}
Loring Coes (April 22, 1812 – July 13, 1906) was an American inventor, industrialist and Republican politician who invented the screw type wrench, commonly known as the monkey wrench and who served as a member of the Worcester, Massachusetts City Council and Board of Aldermen, and as a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives{{Citation |editor=William T. Davis|title =The New England States: Their Constitutional, Judicial, Educational, Commercial, Professional and Industrial History, Volume 1| place = Boston, Massachusetts | publisher = D. H. Hurd & Co.| year = 1897 | pages =418–420 }}{{Citation |editor=William Richard Cutter|title =New England Families, Genealogical and Memorial:A Record of the Achievements of Her People in the Making of Commonwealths and the Founding of a Nation, Volume IV| place = New York, New York | publisher = Lewis Historical Publishing Company. | year = 1914| pages =1839–1841 }} in 1864–1865.
Early life
Coes was born in Worcester, Massachusetts on April 22, 1812.
Family life
On January 14, 1835, Loring married Harriet Neal Read of Attleboro, Massachusetts.
Invention of the screw wrench
File:Coes Wrench Company Advertisement.png published in the January 1901 issue of The Worcester Magazine]]
Coes and his brother Aury Gates Coes worked for the firm of Kimball and Fuller, a company that made machinery for the woolen industry. In 1836 the Coes brothers purchased the business, and formed the L. & A. G. Coes Company as a partnership. In October 1839 the facility where they worked was destroyed by a fire. The Coes brothers were unable to continue in businesses so they moved to Springfield, Massachusetts to work as pattern makers in the foundry of Laurin Trask. It was while they were living and working in Springfield that Loring Coes invented the screw wrench commonly known as the monkey wrench. Previous to the invention of the Screw Wrench, previously the wrenches of the time, the two common wrenches of the time the English patent wrench; and the Merrisk wrench, also known as the Springfield wrench, needed two hands to adjust, the new screw wrench could be used and adjusted with one hand.
The Coes brothers sold their pattern for spinning machines that they had rescued from the fire that destroyed their plant, and used the money to pay for the patent on the Screw Wrench that Loring Coes was granted on April 16, 1841.
L. & A. G. Coes
Death
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
{{Commonscatinline}}
- [http://www.datamp.org/patents/search/advance.php?pn=2054&id=13678&set=1 US Patent: 2,054 Method of Constructing Screw Wrenches{{spaced ndash}}Loring Coes Screw Wrench]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Coes, Loring}}
Category:19th-century American inventors
Category:American Congregationalists
Category:Massachusetts city council members
Category:Republican Party members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives
Category:Businesspeople from Worcester, Massachusetts
Category:Politicians from Worcester, Massachusetts
Category:Burials at Hope Cemetery (Worcester, Massachusetts)
Category:19th-century American businesspeople
Category:19th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court