General view of an unidentified employee setting a tray of shells into an apparatus used during the production of blasting caps at Hercules Powder Company plant in Port Ewen, New York. The apparatus is likely a press machine used to fill electric blasting caps with an explosive charge.

Formed in 1912 as part of an anti-trust settlement with DuPont, the Hercules Powder Company (later Hercules Inc.) specialized in the manufacture of explosives and smokeless powders. The company's Port Ewen plant produced a range of special detonators designed for military use, as well as construction jobs that required blasts of dynamite, such as the clearing of quarries, mines, and tunnels.