The Eastwick Press Newspaper

Eastern Rensselaer County's Community Newspaper

The History Of Cowee At The Stephentown Historical Society

By

by David Flint
Berlin Town Historian Sharon Klein spoke at the Stephentown Heritage Center Monday evening of Willis Judson Cowee and the company he founded and the many community contributions they made in various ways over the course of the history of the Town of Berlin. These included the Water Company, the Heat, Electric & Power Company, the Free Town Library and the generous support extended to the Fire Department and Rescue Squad.
[private]Although the company made all kinds of wood products, including huge contracts with Fisher Price and Tinkertoys®, the major focus was always on the patented green wired floral picks. According to Klein, the company at one time employed 165 people and shipped 8 million of these picks a week along with about 100 million popsicle sticks a month.
Klein said the company was always “self sufficient and environmentally sound.” The machines they used were designed and built on site. But with competition from cheap labor overseas and wooden parts bowing to plastic, things began to decline after the turn of the century. In 2001 a third of the work force was laid off. In 2004 the Cowee whistle went silent. That whistle, Klein mourned, “was part of our daily lives. We depended on it.”
Although Cowee’s is gone, Klein believes that, “The legacy of  W.J. Cowee & Company is woven into the fabric of Berlin.”

These wooden eggs which were made at the W.J. Cowee plant in Berlin for the White House Easter Egg Roll in 1998, 1999 and 2000 are some of the many articles manufactured at Cowee’s that accompanied an illustrated presentation by Berlin Town Historian Sharon Klein on Monday evening at the Stephentown Heritage Center. The blue egg in the center is the 1999 egg shown from the back to display the signatures of Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The yellow egg on the right was designed for the 2000 Egg Roll by prominent artist Mary Engelbreit. The designers of the other two are not known. These eggs were lent for Monday’s program by Jim Brazie of Stephentown, former Cowee Plant Manager. (David Flint photo)
These wooden eggs which were made at the W.J. Cowee plant in Berlin for the White House Easter Egg Roll in 1998, 1999 and 2000 are some of the many articles manufactured at Cowee’s that accompanied an illustrated presentation by Berlin Town Historian Sharon Klein on Monday evening at the Stephentown Heritage Center. The blue egg in the center is the 1999 egg shown from the back to display the signatures of Bill Clinton and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The yellow egg on the right was designed for the 2000 Egg Roll by prominent artist Mary Engelbreit. The designers of the other two are not known. These eggs were lent for Monday’s program by Jim Brazie of Stephentown, former Cowee Plant Manager. (David Flint photo)

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