As far as John Edgerton’s question (Farm Collector, July 2008, page 4), Louis Augustus Aspinwall patented his first potato planter in 1862. He started the Aspinwall Mfg. Co. in Three Rivers, Mich., in 1884. In 1921 the company went out of business. The Aspinwall-Drew Co. was formed afterward in Jackson, Mich. The Aspinwall-Watson Co. next was located in Houlton, Maine, and was still listed in 1947. Information on these companies was very sketchy and hard to obtain, and what I could get is listed on pages 14-15 of the History of Old Time Farm Implement Companies and the Wrenches They Issued, Vol. II.
P. T. Rathbone
6767 Pershall Rd.
Marsing, ID 83639
lsr@rluckystarranch.com