Aaron Lufkin Dennison - Tracy Baker & Company and The Tremont Watch Company

Tracy Baker & Company and The Tremont Watch Company

After the bankruptcy, the company was effectively split into two parts. Most of the machinery and watches, together with some skilled workers, were taken back to Roxbury by Edward Howard, who established the Howard Watch Company. The buildings and large machinery were sold at auction to Royal E. Robbins who restarted watch manufacture under the name of Tracy Baker & Company.

Aaron Dennison remained in Waltham as the superintendent of the mechanical department. In 1861 Robbins dismissed him for neglecting his duties and intermeddling with other departments.

In 1864 Aaron Dennison and A. O. Bigelow set up the Tremont Watch Company in Boston. The idea was that fine parts (such as escapements and wheel trains) would be made in Switzerland (where journeyman wages were lower than American wages), and the larger parts (such as barrels plates) and assembling would be done in America.

So Dennison went to Zurich, Switzerland, where he organized the manufacture and delivery of parts to Tremont.

In 1866, without the support of Aaron who was not consulted, the directors decided to move the factory to Melrose and make complete watches there, and Dennison withdrew from the company. The Melrose Watch Company failed in 1870.

In February 1871, Aaron moved from Zurich to England where he assembled some watches using parts left over from Zurich and plates from Tremont. He then helped organise the Anglo-American Watch Company in Birmingham, which was to use stock and machinery from the Melrose company. In 1874 the name was changed to the English Watch Manufacturing Company and it appears that Dennison left the company about this time.