Historic Mills of Connecticut

Companies Associated w/Complex

• Chance Vought Co., division of United Aircraft and Transport Co. 1929-1939
• Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Co., division of United Aircraft and Transport Corp. 1929-1975
• Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Co., division of United Technologies Corp. 1975-Present (2014)

Use (Historic)

• Transportation

Largest Documented Workforce

17,000 (1950)

Historic Narrative

The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Co. was the brainchild of Frederick B. Rentschler, an Ohio-born, ex-Signal Corps captain, who arrived in Hartford in 1925 with the hope of raising enough money to produce a radial air-cooled aircraft engine of his own design. Rentschler’s technological background came from years of experience as an engineer, machinist, and U.S. Army aircraft inspector, as well as having been employed as an executive at the Wright Aeronautical Corp. Not long after he approached officials at the Niles-Bement-Pond Corp. – which controlled the Pratt and Whitney Machine Tool Co. – he had secured a contract and the Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Co. was incorporated on July 26, 1925. Work on Rentschler’s engine began on August 3, 1925. Rentschler set an aggressive deadline of December 25, 1925 to complete production of what would be his Wasp engine and this was met on December 24, 1925. The 425-horsepower engine far surpassed even the company’s own expectations and easily passed the U.S. Navy’s strict qualification tests. A Hartford Courant article noted that, “Within a year, the Wasp shattered its first world record and went on to smash existing standards for both landplanes and seaplanes for the next seven years.” Full-scale production of the Wasp began in Pratt and Whitney’s Hartford plant in 1926 after the company secured a Navy contract for 200 units. The Chance Vought Corp. similarly rose to success based on the merits of their initial product, the VE-7, a two-seat training aircraft. Chance Vought was initially organized as the Lewis and Vought Corp., a partnership between Chance M. Vought and Birdseye Lewis, in 1917. The first VE-7s were produced in a rented loft building in Long Island City, New York and were scheduled to go into production for the U.S. Army when World War I came to a close. In 1919, when the Navy launched its first aircraft carrier, the U.S.S. Langley, its entire complement of aircraft was comprised of the Lewis and Vought VE-9, a variant of the VE-7. Lewis and Vought was reorganized as the Chance Vought Corp. after Lewis’ death in 1922. The paths of Pratt and Whitney Aircraft and Chance Vought aligned in 1929, when the firms joined with Boeing to form the United Aircraft and Transport Corp. United Aircraft purchased a large swath of former tobacco farmland on the east side of Main Street in East Hartford in 1929 and moved to build independent offices and factories for Pratt and Whitney Aircraft and Chance Vought. These were designed by the German-born architect Albert Kahn, and cost $2,000,000 and $1,000,000, respectively. Chance Vought occupied their plant until that same year, at which time the firm was relocated to Stratford where it shared a factory with the Sikorsky Aircraft Co., another division of United Aircraft. Pratt and Whitney subsequently occupied the former Chance Vought plant and expanded it along with its own complex during World War Two. Despite having experienced some financial difficulties during the 1930s, Pratt and Whitney resumed its prominent place in the field of American aeronautics with the outbreak of the war. The company was called upon to produce a significant percentage of the engines powering Allied aircraft, with output increasing from 1,000,000 h.p. per month in 1940, to 4,500,000 h.p. per month in 1943. By the end of the war the company had contributed roughly half of the total horsepower employed by the American air forces. Despite reductions in the number of military contracts in the post-war period, Pratt and Whitney continued to thrive throughout the second half of the 20th century. The firm has contributed heavily to the development of jet propulsion powerplants, a field it continues to be a world leader in today. The company presently operates as a division of the United Technologies Corp., a multinational technology conglomerate based in Hartford.

Number of Existing Buildings

Four (4) clusters of adjoining blocks.

Dates of Construction

1929, ca. 1940, Late-20th century.

Architect

Albert Kahn, Detroit

Builder

n/a

Building Type

• Administration
• Mill
• Powerhouse
• Warehouse / Production Shed

Architectural Description

The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Company plant is a sprawling factory complex comprised of four adjoining clusters of buildings located on the east side of Main Street, south of Willow Street and north of Brewer Street. The oldest sections of the plant were built in 1929 as two separate factories housing the Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Company and Chance Vought Corporation, both subsidiaries of the United Aircraft and Transport Corporation. These complexes were designed by the German-born, Detroit architect Albert Kahn, and consist of a mix of manufacturing, administrative, engineering, and support buildings, these supplemented and expanded over the course of the late-20th and early 21st centuries. The original Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Company plant consisted of a three-story office building, two-story engineering building, and one-story manufacturing building. The office and engineering buildings measure 180’ x 53’ and 518’ x 67’, respectively, and are constructed of reinforced concrete with buff brick curtain walls. Like the original manufacturing buildings located directly behind it, the engineering building has been enlarged over time, in this case primarily during the 1940s. The manufacturing plant is of steel frame construction and has glass curtain walls with buff brick at the watertable and cornice, and monitors atop its flat roof. The plant originally measured roughly 975’ x 400’, however, much of this was recently demolished. Similar manufacturing wings erected to the north and south in order to support expanded production during the Second World War remain, these measuring roughly 350’ x 1900’ and 380’ x 870’, respectively. An additional factory building, this with an L-shaped footprint measuring roughly 1,025’ x 1,065’ overall, was erected east of the aforementioned manufacturing buildings during the late-20th century. The layout and history of the former Chance Vought Corporation plant is similar to its divisional partner to the north. This originally consisted of a three-story office building and one-story manufacturing building. The office building measures 180’ x 53’ and is constructed of reinforced concrete with buff brick curtain walls. The original portion of the manufacturing plant is of steel frame construction and has glass curtain walls with buff brick at the watertable and cornice, and monitors along its flat roof. The plant originally measured roughly 545’ x 245’, yet has been expanded to approximately 916’ x 615’ overall through the construction of supplemental production and office space. An additional factory building, this measuring roughly 360’ x 370’ overall, was erected south of the aforementioned manufacturing buildings during the middle of the 20th century.

Exterior Material(s)

• Brick
• Glass
• Steel

Structural System(s)

• Load Bearing Masonry
• Structural Concrete
• Structural Steel or Iron

Roof Form

• Flat
• Monitor

Roof Material

• Asphalt
• Metal

Power Source

• Electricity

Condition

Good

Condition Notes

The factory complex is in generally good condition.

Specific Location

Multiple parcels comprising 798.82 acres on the east side of Main Street (Rte 517), south of Willow Street and north of Brewer Street.

Adjacent To

• Main Roads

Exterior Visible from Public Road?

Yes

Parcel ID / Assessor Record Link

• 20-45 / Link →

Acreage

798.82

Use (Present)

• Industrial

Form Completed By

Lucas A. Karmazinas

Date

12/15/2014

Bibliography

1. List of Connecticut Manufacturers, 1922, 1924, 1930, 1932.
2. Directory of Connecticut State Manufacturers, 1936, 1939.
3. Industrial Directory of Connecticut, 1947.
4. Register of War Production Facilities in Connecticut, 1951.
5. Sanborn Map Company, 1920, 1927, 1949.
6. Aerial Survey of Connecticut, 1934, 1965.
7. The Hartford Courant, 1929, 1939, 1950.
8. Roth, Matthew, et al, Connecticut: An Inventory of Historic Engineering and Industrial Sites (Washington DC: SIA, 1981).