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Ohio inventions and firsts · Company innovation · 1898

Goodyear Tire & Rubber founded in Akron

Frank Seiberling founded Goodyear in 1898; early products were bicycle and carriage tires, rubber horseshoe pads and poker chips before automobile tires.

At a glance

Year
1898
By
F. A. Seiberling
Company
Goodyear Tire & Rubber
Place
Akron, Summit County Akron · Summit County

The story

In the 1890s Akron already had rubber companies, but it had not yet become the center of the tire business. Frank Seiberling saw the chance in bicycles and horse carriages, whose riders were shifting to rubber tires.

In 1898 he bought an old strawboard factory in East Akron for $13,500, borrowing $3,500 for the down payment from his brother-in-law Lucius C. Miles. On August 29, 1898 he started the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, named for Charles Goodyear, who discovered how to vulcanize rubber.

The first products were bicycle and carriage tires, rubber horseshoe pads and poker chips. The earliest Goodyear tires sold well because they were easy to detach and needed little care. In 1901 Seiberling supplied racing tires to Henry Ford.

Seiberling also changed how tires were made. His tire-building machine, patented in 1908, let one man turn out 60 tires in ten hours, against five by hand. By the late 1920s Goodyear was the world's largest rubber company by sales, at about $230 million.

Timeline

  • 1898: Seiberling buys an old strawboard factory in East Akron for $13,500. (Akron, OH) source
  • 1898-08-29: The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company is founded. (Akron, OH) source
  • 1901: Goodyear supplies racing tires to Henry Ford. (Akron, OH) source
  • 1908: Seiberling's tire-building machine is patented. (Akron, OH) source
  • 1910: Goodyear buys a rubber factory in Bowmanville, Ontario. (Ontario, Canada) source
  • 1927: Goodyear goes public on the New York Stock Exchange. (New York) source
  • 1955-08-11: Seiberling dies in Akron. (Akron, OH) source

What it changed

  • One worker could make 60 tires in ten hours on Seiberling's machine, instead of five by hand.
  • By the late 1920s Goodyear sales were about $230 million, the largest rubber company in the world.

Why it matters

One of the big four Akron tire makers.

Places in Ohio to see

Further reading

Sources

Confidence. Medium: the main facts were confirmed, but some details (often an address or ZIP code) were not.