|
|
MERCER-FRASER CO., INCORPORATED. - Early in the '70s the late H. M. Mercer established at Eureka a business
that developed into the Merder Hodson Company and later, by the admission of James D. Fraser to the partnership
became the Mercer-Fraser Company, whose present officers are as follows: James D. Fraser, president; C. L. Mercer,
vice president; H. A. Graham, secretary, and Frank W. Dinsmore, assistant secretary and manager at Eureka. The
firm maintains an office at San Francisco and there, as well as at the Eureka headquarters, makes contracts for
general construction work, house moving, pile driving, wharf and warehouse building, bridge and railroad construction,
heavy hoisting, ditches and dredging, and concrete work of every kind. In addition the firm acts as agent for all
grades of Hercules powder (formerly known as Dupont powder) and blasting supplies. By gradual growth the business
has developed into enormous proportions and easily places the company in the lead along the line of their specialties.
It would seem impossible to enumerate all of the contracts filled by the firm, but the recapitulation of a few
indicates the diversified nature of their work and the large interests involved. On the line of the Northwestern
Pacific Railroad they erected the South Fork bridge at Dyerville, the steel bridge across Larrabee creek, the steel
bridge across Van Duzen river at Alton and the Cane Rock crossing on Eel river, the largest contract for masonry
on the road. At Scotia they had the contract for the concrete construction work for the Pacific Lumber Company;
erected the county bridge at Robinson's Ferry; the three span steel bridge at Essex on the Arcata and Mad River
Railroad; the cable bridge across Eel river at Fort Seward; and the new brick depot for the Northwestern Pacific
Railroal at Fort Seward; the masonry and piers for Fort Seward creek railroad bridge and the concrete work for
tunnel No. 30 at Alderpoint. Among their contracts at Eureka were those for an addition to the Eureka foundry,
the Eureka garage on Fifth street and all of the wharf work on the bay. The First National Bank of Arcata occupies
a modern building erected by the Mercer-Fraser Company, who also erected several trestles near that town on the
railroad extending to the granite quarry. This places the company easily as the largest and most extensive contractors
of concrete and heavy construction work of all kinds, being fully equipped with machinery for the handling of heavy
work. Important among their San Francisco contracts were those for the building of section 10 on the sea wall,
and the putting in of three thousand piles and the building of a wharf at the Panama-Pacific Exposition grounds.
From:
History of Humboldt County, California
With a Biographical Sketches
History by Leigh H. Irving
Historic Record Company
Los Angeles, California 1915
Privacy Policy for
OnlineBiographies
|
NAVIGATION
Humboldt County, CA
Biographies
California
Biographies
Online
Biographies
New York
Histories
New York
Biographies
Maine
Histories
Pennsylvania
Histories
Pennsylvania
Biographies
For all your genealogy needs visit Linkpendium
|