Was there ever actually a "buggy whip industry"?

[jmowreader]

We talk about industries that have outlived their usefulness quite often, and every time we do the term "buggy whip industry" comes up. They're the people who made buggy whips--devices used to motivate horses to pull your carriage. When carriages became horseless--or "automobiles"--and buggy whips were no longer necessary, supposedly all these people who were engaged in the buggy whip trade found themselves out on the street, jobless, skill-less and friendless.

Or did they?

Here's what I'm thinking: the "buggy whip industry" was really just a branch of the shoemaking business because it became a "replacement" business. A buggy whip is a strange thing to build a business around. They don't wear out. You buy one, and unless you lose it or someone steals it you use it your whole life. I'm certain there were buggy whips that had been handed down from grandfather to father to son and worked fine for each of their owners. When your son matured and started his own family he'd need one, but--once again--he only needed one of them. Probably what really happened is the local cobbler would make four or five buggy whips and put them on the shelf; when someone bought one he'd make another, and when the car took over from the horse and carriage the whips just sat on the shelf unwanted.

[Statistical]

1. i think it is more a metaphor.

The auto industry destroyed a whole host of industries.

Carriage makers, horse trainers, cobblers, stable industry, saddle makers, etc.

[skygazer]

8. All of which still exist

Not as prevalent, of course, but now they are specialty merchants and charge far more money than they did when everyone had a horse and/or carriage. Check out the price of a new saddle or a horse trainer - those are good businesses to be in.

[Statistical]

19. Still exists just reduced 99.9%. People still make typewritters too.

The point is prior to automobile horse was primary method of transportation and thus the industry suffered a 99% reduction in demand and need for labor.

Just because it still doesn't exist doesn't mean it was a good thing to be someone who owned a carriage company or had skill shoeing a horse as the country moved towards automobiles in a big way.

[skygazer]

24. Well, sure but the OP and some of the replies talked about it like it was no longer in existence

Like so many things, our views of horses and the way that industry works has evolved over time and horse ownership has gone from a necessity to a scarcity to what is now a luxury and a very lucrative industry for a lot of people.

I'll admit to getting sidetracked from the point mainly because as a horse person, I'm fully aware of the continued existence of a brisk and healthy buggy whip industry. So for me, that was the interest.

[Ikonoklast]

10. They also absorbed a few of those industries.

Many of the original auto manufacturers were carraige makers, first.

[skygazer]

12. A friend of mine had a gorgeous Studebaker buckboard wagon in his barn

His father sold it for next to nothing, along with a bunch of antique sleighs. Heartbreaking - had to be worth some bucks.

[Electric Monk]

2. $13.75 plus S&H

http://www.kbchorsesupplies.com/browse.cfm/4,529.html

[FSogol]

3. Have a try a this one: "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach."

I think they should stop saying that since many of those kids will go into medical school and it would be quite disastrous if a young medical intern performing an operation, thought that the quickest way was to open the stomach. -- Bob and Ray ;-)

[MercutioATC]

17. It's not the most direct route, but it WILL get you there...

[Cartoonist]

4. The Print industry

Not dead yet, but close. Computers and electronic media have just about killed this industry. I chose this as a career back in college and enjoyed working at this trade. Got laid off two years ago and never found another position with another printing company. I can't even find a job to apply for, and it's not just the economy. Printing companies began disappearing as soon as the computer became a home appliance.

[riderinthestorm]

5. Actually there are still whip makers

And yes, they do get replaced fairly quickly for reasons that have nothing to do with use. Typically they get dropped, stepped on, or "lost" in the dentritis of the average stable. In fact, it's probably a pretty good industry still. Personally, I can't even begin to number how many whips I've had, lost, or own right now. 15? Dressage whips, jumping bats, lunge whips, driving whips... lots of trainers (cough) have devised their own "special magical whips" that produce some kinda instantaneous magic on horses.... (pat parelli - cough). When I lived in Australia, we'd round up the herd grazing on the back 50,000 acres with a bull whip. We'd ride out, about 15 of us with whips, spread out and begin cracking the whip, drive them in. Kinda like Billy Crystal.... now THAT'S a whip! Freaking HURT if you hit yourself with it!

So yes, I agree it's a metaphor about change rather than making a specific point about whips. They're out there. Lots of them. And I'm not even going into the S and M stuff.

[skygazer]

9. "(pat parelli - cough)"

Can you believe how much those guys get for a rope halter and a lousy lead rope? :rofl:

What a racket.

[riderinthestorm]

14. I know, damn him. Wish I'd thought of it!!

Gawd the number of people I've watched try to "do" his shit.... Pisses me off!

What really irks is Parelli probably really knows what he's doing but he's sold his soul for a commercial schtick that's very difficult to emulate at any price. Don't get me started on the magic lead rope and halter!111!!11

Gah! My husband's a professional in the industry and it kills us to see a first time horse owner come by asking for advice for their 4 year old Arabian stallion they're trying to train the "Parelli" way. And the horse is now a monster. Beyond irritating into scary....

You can blame John Lyons (and to a degree Monty Roberts) for the round pen craze (which we use and love but is now sorely abused by novices) but Parelli owns the magic lead rope, halter and whip biz....

[skygazer]

16. Agreed

And what really gets me are the people who say right in their sales ad that they will only sell to someone who "does" Parelli. :eyes:

There are a whole lot of great trainers out there and I will take ideas from every one of them and use whatever fits me and my horse but there is no one size fits all method of horse training. If there was, it would mean every horse is exactly the same.

[HeresyLives]

6. Well somebody had to make 'em.

And they'd be sold at a saddlery, along with bits and reins and saddles and stirrups and other accoutrements for horses. But it's more a symbolic phrase than anything.

[skygazer]

7. Buggy whips most certainly do wear out

Believe me - I am a horse owner and have many friends who are carriage drivers. Buggy whips wear out and drivers go through a number of them. When you swing a lash, it creates a lot of motion throughout the whip and it will eventually wear out and either your shaft will break or the lash will need replacing.

And of course, there still is a buggy whip industry. Of course, buggy whip makers also make riding crops, lunge whips and dressage whips which, by the way, are completely different than shoes and never had anything to do with them - they are a part of the larger tack and harness industry. I have a very nice Fleck dressage whip - Fleck is a German company that has been making whips for a long time.

Certainly the buggy whip industry is not as large as it once was when horses were the main mode of transportation. But it's still around, has absolutely nothing to do with cobblers (rather hilarious thought to a horse person) and is quite necessary to those of us in the equine world.

http://www.fleck-co.de/produkte/e_traber.html

[pipi_k]

11. Whip City...

Westfield, MA...my former home

they didn't call it "The Whip City" for nothing...still do, actually... :)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westfield,_Massachusetts

[arcadian]

23. Westfield whips still makes whips

http://www.smartpakequine.com/productclass.aspx?productClassid=1879

[JonQ]

13. Presumably there was one

I doubt every buggy operator made their own.

[jmowreader]

25. Very few operators made their own...

but my thinking was, the "buggy whip maker" meme implies you had all these huge factories making nothing but buggy whips. When a vehicle that didn't need one came along, all those factories closed.

I was thinking more that buggy whips would be one of many products a company would make, and when the need for the whips decreased (as opposed to "dried up overnight"--in the era when cars replaced horse-drawn transit people generally laughed at any new invention) they would slow down making whips and instead tell the whip-line employees, "you now make men's belts."

[notadmblnd]

15. Buggy whips can still be bought

I don't know where they are made. When my son was small he was obsessed with Indiana Jones and had to have a whip. We got him two types of whips. We called a relative in Louisiana and he bought them and shipped them to us. I imagine he got them at a saddlery.

[kestrel91316]

18. There WAS a horse doctor industry that got pretty much wiped out.........

Current equine practice is a shadow of its former self, though the caliber of medicine practiced is light years better.

[burning rain]

20. It's a cheap, easy example for free-traders & laissez-faire types to use.

They don't want to touch a really significant case, such as try and explain why it's fine that the US doesn't have a consumer electronics industry despite buying them on a massive scale, because that would be hard.

[bridgit]

21. They've prolly diversified into the rider's crop gig, the, I would think very lucrative...

Catwoman S&M Dom 'love hurts' gig


The dyed & woven leather finger puzzle world


Zorro-esque dalliances


And I'm sure someone is still working the Indiana Jones angle

[arcadian]

22. Nope it existed in Massachusetts

Westfield whips, Van Deusen, H. M., Whip Company, United States Whip Company, and Sanford Whip Factory all in Hampden county