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I The A. WILHELM COMPANY Celebrates 75 th Anniversary o d ay The A. Wilhelm Company oc- For several years the new corpora Tcnpiee 28 buildings which cover 20 tion remained at the Poplar Street lo acres in Reading, Pennsylvania. A cation. The two-man paint factory bad branch of the Glidden Company, it gisrown and now was recognized as the the largest producer of syndicate store largest paint manufacturer in Pennsyl paintB, varnishes and enamels in the vania outside of Philadelphia. By 1901 world--a field in which the Wilhelm larger quarters were needed. Company pioneered in 1910. Mr. Charles Wilhelm, in addition to The story of the Wilhelm firm since the paint factory, had acquired a nut 1919 has been a highly important chap and bolt works located at Third and ter in the story of the Glidden Company, Bern Streets in Reading. He merged one of the world's largest producers of this company with another, removed the paints, varnishes, lacquers, enamels and equipment from the plant and the Third other products. Bnt, from 1867, when and Bern location became the new home Aaron and William Wilhelm founded of The A. Wilhelm Company. their paint business in Easton, Pa., Growth of the firm continued. In to 1919, when it became part of Glid 1916 more than 110 persons were em den, the A. Wilhelm firm wrote its own ployed in the Wilhelm plant and office. success story. It was during this period that Wilhelm Originally called A. Wilhelm and originated 10-cent paint, varnish and Brother, the company was moved from enamel products for sale in chain and Easton to Reading in 1871, where it syndicate stores. first occupied a three-story plant at 221 The Wilhelm payroll numbered ISO Poplar Street After its removal to in 1919, when the thriving firm became Reading, the yonng firm prospered. an important part of the Glidden Com In 1878 William Wilhelm withdrew pany. Under Glidden's banner it has from the firm and Walter S. Davis was achieved even greater success. brought into the business. The company The Glidden Company itself was name was changed to A. Wilhelm & Co. fonnded in 1870 as the Glidden Varnish The company continued to grow and by Company, as it*was known until 1917, 1886 Wilhelm products were being sold when Adrian D. Joyce headed a syn in eight different states. Sales were dicate which purchased the company in steadily mounting. its entirety. Three years later founder Aaron Wil Less than three years later the new helm died and the eompany was incor organization sprang into national promi porated as The A. Wilhelm Company. nence through the consolidation of 16 Charles W. Wilhelm, son of the founder, paint and varnish companies under the was president, and Walter S. Davis sec name of The Glidden Company. In retary and treasurer. cluded in the consolidation were plants Top--Adrian D. Joyce, President, The Glidden Co. Bottom--Frederick B, Wickham, Regional Director, Reading, Pa. and marketing facilities in Canada, California, Texas, Massachusetts, Mis souri and Louisiana. One of the most important of the new companies was The A. Wilhelm Company, Reading, Pennsylvania. This consolidation, paradoxically, first led the eompany into the wide diversi fication of products for which the name Glidden is known. In addition to the original line of paints and varnishes, the company now began manufacturing arsenical poisons, insecticides, dry col ors, chemicals and linseed oil. Mr. Joyce and his associates realized from the outset that certain essential raw materials could be manufactured far more cheaply than they eould be purchased and that control of these raw materials would give greater strength and independence to the company. They also knew this would provide plants and equipment which could be utilized to make other products and to broaden the scope of their market. This policy led Glidden into snch seemingly unrelated fields as paints, foods and chemicals. Yet each step led logically to the next one, each product to the one which followed. How these steps developed is shown by Glidden's linseed oil operations. Linseed oil is an important raw ma rtini to page S3) 10 Reading Railroad Magazine 1 GLD32074 GLD32075 The Wilhelm Company (Continued from page JO) tcrinl in paint and varnish, and in its 1919 consolidation, Glidden acqnired a linseed oil plant located in St. Lotus. The crushing season for the manufac ture of linseed oil lasted only six months nnd the plant lay idle the rest of the year. Glidden, searching for an opera tion which would keep the plant busy the year round, discovered its machin ery could be used in crushing the dried meat of the eocoanut into a vegetable oil. Further experimentation revealed this vegetable oil could be further refined and made edible. And the paint com pany had entered the food business. To carry out this refining process, the company bought an abandoned brew ery and its equipment, and the cocoanut oil became margarine, hard butter, biscuit coatings and kindred products which are widely sold to bakeries. The company then moved further into the food business. Margarine plants were purchased in Wisconsin, Illinois, Ohio and on the Pacific Coast. The plants and facilities of E. R. Durkee & Co., Elmhurst, Long Island, were acquired, as was the Dun ham Company, an old, established dealer in shred eocoanut nnd other packaged goods. The entire food business then was consolidated under the name of Durkee's Famous Foods, Inc., thus perpetuating the famed Durkee brand name. It was at this point that foods, paints and chemicals meshed together. To take further advantage of its wide grocery outlets, Glidden began manufacturing powdered blueing, Paris green and other insecticides. As an outgrowth of Glidden's interest in vegetable oil process ing and food manufacture, attention was drawn to the soya bean as a source of food and paint oils. After thorough investigation, The Glidden Company constructed a large soya bean processing plant in Chicago. This plant soon was producing soya bean flour, soya bean proteins used in the manufacture of plastics, paper coat ings, water thinned paint and lecithin, important in the paint, wood preserving, rubber, candy, baking and margarine industries. The Glidden Company's transition from paint to chemicals, pigments and lead is similar. Pigments arc as important as linseed oil in the manufacture of paints, and Glidden purchased a chemical plant in order to control its pigments. This gave the Arm its first contact with the print ing business, in which colored pigments also are used. White lead came with the purchase of the Euston Lead Co. at Scranton, Pennsylvania, and red lead with the purchase of the Metals Refining Co. at Hammond, Ind. These acquisitions started another chain of new products, among them litharge, used extensively by rubber and varnish manufacturers; type metal and babbitt; battery metal and copper powder. Utilization of tin and zinc, which came to the lead plants in scrap prod ucts, brought the company into these industries. This led to tho purchase of zinc and lead mines in California, and they, in turn, to the buying of the Sac ramento Valley and Eastern Railroad. In addition to zinc and lead, the mines produced small quantities of gold and silver. Smelters were built to re cover these precious metals. The zinc became zinc oxide, used in paints and rubber. The crude lead residues went to lead plants and some of the zinc found its way into lithopone, an impor tant pigment Since barium was re quired for this product, Glidden bought barytes properties in California and be gan production of barium sulphide and bleached barium. .The diversified development of the company has naturally brought about a realignment of Glidden business. Paint and varnish production now comprises 33 per cent of the total volume, food products 31 per cent, chemicals and pig ments 16 per cent and soya products 20 per cent. The A. Wilhelm Company of Reading is a large and important segment The general headquarters of The Glid den Company are in Cleveland. ' Glidden operates paint factories in Reading, Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis, New Orleans, San Francisco, Minne apolis, Toronto. Food plants are lolated in Elmhurst, Chicago, Portland, Berkeley, Norwalk, 0., and Louisville, Ky. Also under Glidden operation are a soya plant in Chicago, a soap factory in Louisville, pigment plants in St. Helena, Collinsville Oakland and Scran ton, zinc and barytes mines in Califor nia and paint stores in major cities from coast to coast. Under Glidden management, Read ing's A. Wilhelm Company has kept up its constant record of growth. A unified sales plan, together with standardization of products and colors, has led sales and production figures to new heights. Today the 28 Wilhelm plants employ between 400 and 600 employes who handle more than 25,000 tons of paint products a year. President of the Glidden Company nnd, therefore, of The A. Wilhelm Com pany, is Adrian D. Joyce. Mr. Joyce is nationally famous for his foresight as a leader in his industry. His policy of operating a widely diversified yet highly integrated business has been imitated in many other businesses. Director of The A. Wilhelm Company branch of Glidden is Frederick B. Wick ham. A resident of Reading, he directs the company with the title of regional director. Other executive officers of the Glidden Company are R. H. Hoisburgh, vicepresident; R. W. Levenhagen, senior vice-president; W. J. O'Brien, vice-pres ident; Dwight P. Joyce, vice-president; Paul E. Sprague, vice-president; and J. A. Peters, treasurer. *** SELECTED BRIEFS One of the easiest ways to become popular is to remember the nice things people say about a person and repeat them to him. The original noise is what counts; most people are merely echoes. The average man is proof enough that a woman can take a joke. 28 Heading Railroad Magazine GL032076