base faintly stenciled in red paint A Sample Of / Steel Barb Fence / From Washburn & Moen Mfg. Co. Worcester Mass.
Height 18 x width 36 x depth 3 3/8 inches.

American industrialist Ichabod Washburn (1798–1868) established his first business, a woolen machinery factory, in Worcester in 1820. Throughout the 1820s, Washburn explored the manufacture of card wire at a factory in Northville, and by 1834, he consolidated these two enterprises at a new facility on Grove Street across from Salisbury’s Pond, where he made piano wire, wire for fences, and related products. By 1850, Washburn’s son-in-law became a partner in the firm, known by that time as the Washburn and Moen Manufacturing Company. Under their stead, Washburn and Moen enjoyed robust growth, becoming the largest wire mill in the world by 1865.