The salt buckets
This was a Holy Grail of sorts as we had only seen the shattered remains of these carriers up until now. Realize that this has been hanging here for about 80 years, untouched by vandals. It is fully functional!
The lid can be lifted and latched, the whole drum will rotate to dump its load and the wheeled assembly still rolls on the cable.
Detail of the latching mechanism that pulled the cart along drive cable.
This is how it clamped onto the cable.
Here is the lever side of the mechanism. The large ball on the end of the handle allowed a kick out bar to engage or disengage the clamp. The whole mechanism can rotate within the clamp to allow for steep cables where the weight of the barrel would orient the frame vertically.
End points for mounting that allowed the barrel to rotate.
The end points fit into the mounting points on the hanging frame
Salt barrel side view
It appears that all of the tramway's iron work was built in New Jersey
This label was on one of the barrels that fell off of the cable and we saw similar markers on other hardware. Apparently barrels and frames fell off fairly often, plummeting hundreds of feet.
Cables of the type used on the tramway were called wire rope and Trenton was a very large manufacturing area.
From
http://www.wireropedistrict.com/
Iron and steel manufacturing began in the Trenton area around the mid 1700s, providing armament for the Continental Army during the American Revolution.
It was not until 1847 that the Trenton Iron Company (founded by Peter Cooper and his son, Edward, and Abram Hewitt) was functioning, and included a wire mill on Hamilton and South Broad Streets.
In 1831 John A. Roebling migrated from Germany, moving to Trenton in about 1848, when he purchased some acres of land on South Broad Street where his new wire plant would be located.
His main focus was in producing wire for the telegraph, telephones, electric power lines, the newly invented elevator by the Otis brothers and the massive twisted cable for suspension bridges, the most famous being the Brooklyn Bridge, which he did not live to see completed in 1883.
The WIRE ROPE DISTRICT occupies the area immediately surrounding the now defunct John A. Roebling's Sons Company complex. It borders the Chambersberg Italian District, famous for its fine Continental and American cuisine, on the east the East State Street Redevelopment District, on the south, the Mill Hill District and the Capital South District on the north, and the Riverfront District along the Delaware River on the west comprising the area between South Broad Street, Hamilton Avenue, South Clinton Avenue and Dye Street, roughly an eight block parcel of land which was the site of some 44 Roebling industry buildings.
It is now the hub of a major area redevelopment effort, retaining as much of its vintage mileau and charm, yet in a somewhat more modern setting
