boxes of various types for packing war materials.
The chip tubing is converted into shell containers, as
well as flare containers, for the Army and Navy. A
greater part of the light-weight chip produced in this
mill is shipped to the corrugators who convert it into
corrugated boxes of various sizes and shapes for
packing food, blood plasma and numerous articles
for the Army and Navy. There is produced on these
machines, also, indented packing paper.which is
now being used by the Army as a protection in
packing helmets, and bogus wrapping papers and
building papers for the jobbing trade.
D. E. STETLER
Dodge Plymouth Dodge Job-
D. E. Stetler began selling Dodge passenger cars
in 1914 in Newberrytown, York County, Pennsyl-
vania. During World War I, in 1917 to be exact.
Dodge commercial trucks and cars were added to
the line. Dodge Brothers appointed Mr. Stetler as
dealer for York, Pennsylvania, in March, 1921. He
built one of the finest and largest service stations in
Pennsylvania at 515-27 South George Street in 1923.
The Plymouth line was added in 1929. Then, in 1937,
Mr. Stetler added the service building at 31 East
Rated Trucks, Sales and Service
Boundary Avenue which gave the firm a total floor
space of 37,000 square feet.
Since January, 1945, Mr. Stetler has included as
partners in the business his seven sons, six of them
have served in the Armed Forces. A branch will be
opened in Red Lion during November, 1945, and will
be operated on the same sound principles as the
present business in York.
The number of employees has increased from two
in 1914 to sixty-five at the beginning of World War II.
10*
AMMON R. SMITH AUTO CO.
Chevrolet Dealer
The Ammon R. Smith Auto Company dates back
to 1907 when Ammon R. Smith, as a lad of seventeen,
set himself up as an auto repair mechanic in his
father's blacksmith shop at Dallastown, Pa.
By 1910, he was buying and selling used cars
and got the agency for the "Little 4." A year later,
he built a garage of his own at the edge of town
and sold Chevrolet cars built by Louis and Gaston
Chevrolet.
Originally, the "Little 4" was manufactured by the
Little Motor Company, and thereafter the Chevrolet
Motor Company was organized by W. C. Durant,
taking in both the Chevrolet brothers and the Little
Motor Car Company. In a little while General Motors
Corporation was organized, and Chevrolet Motor
Company became a part thereof. He is still a Chev-
rolet dealer and has been a Chevrolet dealer since
about two years before the Chevrolet Motor Com-
pany was organized.
In 1914, he came to York and bought an old Luth-
eran Church building and by adding to it he has in-
creased it to about four times its original floor space.
The business grew from year to year until in 1941
seventy-six people were employed, thirty of whom
were in the Sales Department. That one year over
eight hundred new Chevrolet cars and trucks, and
sixteen hundred used cars and trucks were handled.
The ten best years prior to World War II were: New
cars and trucks, used cars and truck 19,338 units.
STANDARD RAG & PAPER CO., INC.
Paper Manufacturers' Supplies
Probably every American has had brought home
to him, during World War II, the essential and ever-
growing uses for waste paper. This usefulness, far
from new, was lifted from obscurity to national at-
tention when the armed forces began transporting
and packaging untold tons of equipment and sup-
plies in the many types of paperboard containers
and wrappings processed from waste paper.
Although it is a far cry from the recent waste
paper salvage drives to the early days of paper col-
lection in York, a local market for waste paper has
existed here in the form of paperboard conversion
mills for many years.
In the early 1880's, the Buckingham family estab-
lished a waste paper and rag business at 129 West
Philadelphia Street. At that time the operation was
largely a matter of hand labor with pushcart or horse
and wagon, to get salvage to the storage yard where
it was given a primary sorting and then delivered
for sale to the local mills.
In 1919, the original Buckingham business at 129
West Philadelphia Street was purchased by the pres-
ent corporation of the Standard Rag & Paper Com-
pany. In 1923, this establishment was moved to the
yard and warehouse at 205 West Philadelphia Street
where it has since been in continuous operation
under the same ownership.
The growth of the Standard Rag & Paper Com-
pany, under the active management of Maurice
Lavetan, has been marked by the employment of
modern labor-saving machinery as improvements
became available. Where sorting of rags and paper
was originally crude, today many distinct grades
and types of paper are normally separated and
baled. During peacetime the company employs
about twenty-two people, most of whom work at
collecting, sorting, and baling the waste paper from
local sources.
Yorkers in their homes, stores, and industrial plants
have long been educated to save rags and paper
systematically. Standard Rag & Paper Company
takes pride in the fact that this established local
practice has had much to do with the success York's
wartime paper salvage drives have achieved. Ma-
chinery for proper collection was already in exis-
tence; patriotic groups interested in the war effort
salvage-wise had only to take advantage of the fa-
cilities and organization at hand.
The necessities of World War II have proven, if
that were necessary, the value and importance of
paperboard products. Standard Rag & Paper Com-
pany, in its twenty-sixth year, looks forward with
confidence in its ability to serve the essential paper
reprocessing industries.
P. A. & S. SMALL CO.
Wholesale Distributors
On August 25, 1809, George Small opened a hard-
ware store in Centre Square a venture he rapidly
expanded into a thriving business. The York Gazette,
of November 14, 1816, carried this notice: "New iron
store George Small at the northeast corner of the
Courthouse, in the borough of York, respectfully
acquaints the public that he has received and will
constantly keep on hand a large and general assort-
ment of bar iron, Crowley Steel, English and Amer-
ican Blister Steel.
tinued about 1875. Near the turn of the century the
company decided to devote its entire attention to
the hardware business and all other interests were
sold. P. A. & S. Small Company became a specialist
in its chosen field.
Five generations of the Small family have oper-
ated the business through every phase of industrial
change, in peace and war, boom times and panics.
Pipe and Steel Warehouse.
George Small, the founder, and the four succeed-
ing family generations to carry on the enterprise
gained a wide business experience. In addition to
the hardware store, they were at various times en-
gaged in banking, milling and flour export, wire
drawing, operating charcoal and gray iron furnaces.
The many changes following the Civil War brought
changes to P. A. & S. Small Company, too. After sixty
years of successful operation, banking was discon-
General Storage Warehouse.
Today, with three large modern warehouses, the
company concentrates solely on distribution of iron,
steel, pipe and mill supplies to industry; plumbing
and heating supplies to contractors; and hardware
and food products to general stores.
About 1930, the company sponsored a merchan-
dising plan among grocery customers and the Com-
munity Pure Food Stores were introduced with one
hundred and fifty independent merchants cooperat-
ing. Company operations are now confined to twelve
counties, within a radius of 100 miles of York. Almost
100 people comprise the Small organization and
twelve trucks go out from the warehouses daily,
making deliveries throughout this busy territory.
Hardware and Grocery Warehouse.
195
S. MORGAN SMITH COMPANY
Hydraulic Turbines, Valves, Pumps and Special Machinery
Turning back the pages of history, it is found that
the great hydraulic developments of today have their
foundation in the work of the engineers and inven-
tors of the nineteenth century, who found methods
by which turbine principles, little understood at the
time, could be applied for the purpose of develop-
ing power.
Stephen Morgan Smith
Was One of These Pioneers
111 health caused his retirement from the ministry
and he turned to mechanics, for which he had a
natural bent and ability, and succeeded in produc-
ing, after many experiments, his first "Success" tur-
bine, which he sold to a company in the milling
industry.
The results proved that he had a sound idea. This
led him to start operations which began with his
designing the turbines and selling them himself,
with the work of manufacturing being done by an
outside concern under his direct supervision.
The Start of Its Own Factory
All of S. Morgan Smith's early faith and vision
had been proven practical and demand for water
turbines warranted the building of a factory which
would permit him to operate with greater ease and
efficiency. But his natural conservatism and caution
kept him from going beyond what he felt would be
needed for several years. This factory was estab-
lished some thirteen years after his start, in 1874, a
mere speck of 50 by 150 feet, compared to the giant
structures that stand over and around the original
site.
But this native prudence which kept him from ex-
panding beyond the limits of judgment was forced
again and again, by circumstances beyond the
Founder's control. Changes in papermaking and
milling, principally, brought forth a much greater
demand for water turbines and the company was
not slow to avail itself of these new opportunities.
Electricity A New Factor
About this time, or about ten years after S. Mor-
gan Smith's start, the value of falling water for the
generation of electricity was examined and appre-
ciated. The demand for electric current grew with
almost lightning speed. Industry was consuming it
in ever-increasing quantities. Homes were being
wired, and more lines were stretched in rural sec-
tions and urban districts. With this demand came
the development of long-distance transmission of
electricity.
From then on, the company went forward with
the new industry. It is doubtful if any other type
of prime mover has contributed more tp the early
growth of the electrical industry than the water tur-
bine. And the modern designs are improvements, re-
finements and further developments of the original
designs of the Founder S. Morgan Smith.
A Nation on the March
Industrial development in this country was most
rapid and this was a factor in the company's pros-
perity and further expansion. For that period of sev-
enty years, from the start of the company to now,
constitutes a bold and amazing achievement in hu-
man progress.
And, yet, the history of the S. Morgan Smith Com-
pany does not border on the spectacular. There is
no basis of comparison between it and many of the
very large industrial organizations which sprang up
like mushrooms on the industrial landscape. Rather
has it been a slow, sure and sound growth, which,
because of keeping abreast with the onward march
of progress, has been such as to place it in the
very forefront of hydraulics as the largest exclusive
builder of this kind of equipment in the United States.
Representative Accomplishments
The S. Morgan Smith Company, for example,
helped to promote the installation of the first long-
distance electric transmission system in the United
States, and built the four horizontal-shaft, twin-tur-
bine units installed in the Folsom, California, plant
of the Sacramento Electric Power and Light Com-
pany, under a fifty-five foot head, which developed
5,000 horsepower a model for its time! And the elec-
tric current thus generated was transmitted to the
City of Sacramento, twenty-three miles away, which
was a long-distance record for transmission of cur-
rent up to then.
Huge hydroelectric plants have been built since
great centers of power development such as Bonne-
ville, and the Tennessee Valley Authority, in which
the S. Morgan Smith Company has been privileged
to play an important part, and to which it has made
substantial contributions.
In excess of 8,000,000 horsepower alone has been
built by the company to date, and more than 22%
of this vast amount is installed and being used in
foreign countries.
Makers of Specialized Machinery
The S. Morgan Smith Company stands among the
foremost of the early pioneers, and is known all over
the world as a builder of specialized machinery. The
plant is the world's largest devoted exclusively to
hydraulic turbines and allied equipment.
Wide Assortment of Designs
Designs include reaction type runners for every
practical speed for low, medium and high-head de-
velopment, and in the low-head field there are high-
speed axial flow runners of both fixed and the Kap-
lan automatically adjustable blade types. Among
allied equipment are actuator and gate shaft type
governors with individual or central pumping sys-
tems; Gibbs oil bath thrust bearings for vertical or
horizontal shafts; plate steel spiral casings, draft
tubes and penstocks; steel roller gates; hoists and
appurtenances; gate valves, angle needle relief
valves and conical plug valves for pressure reduc-
ing, flow regulating, automatic check and liquid
control and many other services; butterfly valves,
Dow-disc-arm pivot valves and other designs which
cover a wide field in hydraulics; head gates, taintor
S. MORGAN SMITH COMPANY
gates, sluice gates, and waste gates; axial flow
pumps with fixed and automatically adjustable
vanes; and other appliances.
Hydraulic Turbines, Valves, Pumps and Special Machinery
with the recirculatory pumping system, provides
constant quantities of water at predetermined ad-
justable pressures. This same thoroughness is mani-
Hydraulic Laboratory
Most of the recent major advances in the art of
designing various types of hydraulic equipment
have come about as the direct result of painstaking
research and laboratory experiments. Tests con-
ducted in the Smith Hydraulic Laboratory have con-
tributed in no small measure to this recognized
progress. For no detail has been overlooked that
would contribute to this scientific effort. For example,
a large standpipe on the roof of the building was
erected specially for the testing of just one design
cone valves. This feature, when used in conjunction
fested in every operation, and the completeness of
the combined effort and methods pursued have been
a very great factor in the success of the business.
Reputation
The company has flourished through the years,
kept pace with engineering advancement, and ac-
quired financial stability and unexcelled manufac-
turing facilities. As a result its reputation has spread
to the far corners of the earth, and it has earned its
place of first rank, even in a world in which indus-
trial achievement is common!
197
SPRING GARDEN BRICK & CLAY PRODUCTS CO., INC
Brick and Clay Products
The manufacture of bricks has been established
as one of York's oldest industries. The process em-
ployed in those early days was to form the clay by
hand and burn it with wood. Many of York's early
citizens adopted this method in making bricks for
their first homes.
In 1867, three brothers, Clinton D., Israel, and
Emanuel Frey, were convinced that bricks could be
manufactured in quantities and sold at a profit to
engineers, contractors and home builders. The Spring
Garden Brick and Clay Products Co., Inc., was es-
tablished and the fact that it has enjoyed continuous
progress for seventy-eight years is a tribute to the
foresight and progressiveness of both its founders
and their successors.
From its inception, the company has been a local
family owned and operated enterprise. Improved
methods of manufacture, from the original hand-
made process, through the machine and coal-burn-
ing method to the present method of producing Co-
lonial Type Face Brick utilizing different types of '
brick-burning kilns have been adopted as they be-
came available. Modern equipment and improved
processing methods have enabled this firm to in-
crease their production capacity from 30,000 bricks
per day in 1917 to its present capacity of 95,000
bricks per day. Principal products of the company
are Colonial Type Face Brick, Common Brick and
Dutch Tile.
Since 1939, the Spring Garden Brick & Clay Prod-
ucts Co., Inc., has produced vast quantities of brick
for the U. S. Army, Navy and Coast Guard, for bar-
racks, officers' quarters, testing laboratories, wind
tunnels, etc., for naval powder factories and other
buildings needed for the Armed Forces.
The company has also furnished brick for leading
universities, hospitals, schools, libraries, private
homes, Y. M. C. A., and Post-Office buildings, as well
as the U. S. Custom House, Philadelphia, Pa.; Marine
Hospital, Baltimore, Md.; U. S. Printing Office; New
York, Pennsylvania and Maryland State Institutions;
and for public housing incidental to the war effort
throughout the East.
Spring Garden Brick & Clay Products Co.
STEWART AND MARCH
Construction Maintenance
The firm of Stewart and March was founded on
May 6, 1939, by Robert H. Stewart and Luther D.
March. The first plant location was at 514 North
George Street, York. Expanding business require-
ments necessitated larger plant facilities, and in the
Spring of 1940, the present property on North Hartley
Street was purchased and improved.
From its inception this new business was designed
for local community service specializing in road-
work, excavation, concrete construction, and equip-
ment rentals. The aim of the business was to develop
and service the local industrial plant maintenance
and construction needs, the local building contract-
ing industry, and the requirements of the individuals
of the community.
The impact of the war tremendously increased the
volume of industrial maintenance and construction
to such an extent that nearly every project under-
taken has been in assistance of local industry in the
prosecution of the war effort.
STILLMAN'S
Retail Department Store
Stillman's, at 35-39 East Market Street, is a retail
department store carrying popularly-priced mer-
chandise. Ready-to-wear for ladies includes furs,
coats, suits, dresses, uniforms, aprons, smocks, robes,
housecoats, lingerie, corsets, hosiery, gloves, milli-
nery, handbags, umbrellas and fashion accessories.
Men's furnishings, sportswear, and work clothes are
also shown. There is a complete boys' and girls' de-
partment and a selection of shoes for all the family.
A complete shoe repair service is also offered. Other
departments are drugs, patterns, yard goods, toys,
luggage and juvenile furniture. One of York's busi-
est beauty parlors is on the second floor. Six oper-
ators are on duty and the room is completely air
conditioned.
Stillman's has one of the largest stocks of domes-
tics in the city. They show blankets in abundance,
bedspreads, sheets, pillowcases, rugs, curtains and
draperies, table linens and art needlework.
In 1940, the present modern building was erected.
It was the first retail department store in the city to
be air conditioned throughout by York.
Stillman's, in York, is one of forty stores of the
same name, with central offices in New York City.
Their 250 buyers have access to the top of the mar-
ket. Merchandise is obtained not only in the largest
eastern markets, but also from Los Angeles, Dallas,
St. Louis, and Chicago.
Through friendly relations with its customers and
through savings effected by mass buying being
passed on to the consumer, Stillman's stores have
become favorably known throughout the East and
Middle West.
R. W. STRICKLER
Produce, Vegetables, Sea Foods
Back in 1903, when citizens of the community de-
pended on retailers of fruits and vegetables to dis-
play their products in horse-drawn vehicles at their
homes, and in the early morning curb markets held
at Continental Square, R. W. Strickler began busi-
ness with one horse and wagon.
Today, this progressive wholesale and retail busi-
ness, whose products include a wide variety of pro-
duce, vegetables and sea foods, has twenty-six em-
ployees and a fleet of eleven modern trucks ranging
in size from % ton to 9 tons capacity.
Storage facilities include three refrigerated ware-
houses in York and one at Biglerville, Pa., for mixed
vegetables, fruits, fish and oysters. Bananas are
cured and held in a modern refrigerated storage;
fish are frozen and held in separate rooms apart
from those holding oysters under refrigeration.
STRAYER-BEITZEL COMPANY OF YORK
Advertising Specialties
In 1919, Philip C. Strayer started in business as a
jobber of calendars and advertising specialties in
Detroit, Michigan. He was convinced that the East-
ern Seaboard offered additional opportunities for the
distribution of his products. A partnership was formed
with Floyd M. Beitzel and in 1923 they established a
manufacturing plant at 1048 West Princess Street.
Ten years later, at the bottom of the depression, the
continuing growth of the business required larger fa-
cilities and the establishment was moved to its pres-
ent location at Dewey and Locust Streets in York.
The Strayer-Beitzel Company has complete equip-
ment for manufacturing twelve-sheet commercial
art calendars, imprinting of pencils and leather
goods, automatic tinning of paper products, and
printing of all types of advertising specialties.
The main office of the company is located in York,
with branches in Detroit, Michigan, and Baltimore,
Maryland. National distribution is effected through
these facilities.
199
D. F. STAUFFER BISCUIT COMPANY, INCORPORATED
Manufacturers of "Nif-ty" Cookies, Crackers and Pretzels
When, in 1871, David F. Stauffer took over the
cake and cracker business which has been founded
by Jacob Weiser in 1858, five barrels of crackers per
day was considered a good volume of business. And
the barrel ordered was promptly delivered on a
wheelbarrow, sometimes by the owner himself!
Contrast this with the D. F. Stauffer Biscuit Com-
pany, Incorporated, today, not only York's but also
StauUer Employees in 1884.
one of the largest manufacturers of cookies, crackers
and pretzels in Eastern Pennsylvania. The com-
pany's products are widely used in Pennsylvania,
Maryland, District of Columbia, Ohio, and New York.
Ten trucks insure the regular delivery of fresh
merchandise attractively packaged in cartons and
caddies and sold under the registered trade-mark
"Nif-ty."
The business was incorporated by David F.
Stauffer and his sons in 1915. The present officers
are Calvin Stauffer, president; William H. Stauffer,
vice-president; Harry Stauffer, secretary and trea-
surer; and David E. Stauffer, assistant secretary.
Stauffer's factory is operated under modern sani-
tary conditions meeting all the requirements of State
and Federal regulations and the premises are in-
spected regularly. The four-story buildings on West
Princess Street contain 55,000 square feet of floor
space.
Where a dozen persons were employed at the be-
ginning of the business, there are now one hundred
and twenty-five on the payroll. Sixty per cent of the
employees have been with Stauffers over a long pe-
riod of time: Two from fifty-five to fifty-seven years;
five from forty to forty-six years; six from thirty to
thirty-nine years; eight from twenty-five to thirty-
eight years; ten from twenty to twenty-four years;
and twenty-nine from ten to nineteen years. Stauffer
products are made with the skill that comes of this
long experience and a fine spirit of loyalty pervades
the organization.
Read baking machinery, made in York, including
four reels and one traveling oven, is used and flour,
milk and other ingredients are purchased locally as
far as is possible.
Pretzels, upon which rests much of the fame of the
D. F. Stauffer Biscuit Company, have an interesting
history. They are one of the few foods in existence
which have retained their original form and their
popularity since medieval days.
They were first baked in monasteries where chil-
dren were sent to learn their prayers. At the end of
the lesson the priest gave each child a small salty
cake called a "pretiola" or "little reward." One
priest conceived the idea of shaping the cake, as a
reminder to his pupils not to forget their prayers.