DENNISON, AARON LUFKIN

born , March 6, 1812, Freeport, District of Maine, Massachusetts, U.S. died Jan. 9, 1895, Birmingham, Warwickshire, Eng. watch manufacturer who was among the first to adapt the concept of interchangeable parts to the production of pocket watches. He is generally credited with being the father of American watchmaking. Apprenticed at the age of 18 to a watchmaker in Brunswick, Maine, he learned the prevailing manual methods of watchmaking. Later he went to Boston, set up his own business, and then studied the mass-production techniques being employed in making firearms at the Springfield arsenal. Surmounting the technical difficulties of machine production of small parts, Dennison in 1850 set up a factory and began to supply the market with the first inexpensive factory-made watches. His shop, forced into bankruptcy in the financial panic of 1857, was reorganized by new backers in 1859, becoming the American Waltham Watch Company. Dennison's introduction of machinery into the manufacture of paper boxes and other paper products resulted in the founding of the Dennison Manufacturing Company.