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Notable people · Business · Inventor

F. A. Seiberling

Akron industrialist who bought an empty strawboard factory in 1898 and with his brother Charles built it into the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company, then founded the Seiberling Rubber Company and built Stan Hywet Hall.

Born October 6, 1859, Western Star (now part of Norton)
Died August 11, 1955, Akron

F. A. Seiberling
Public domain · Wikimedia Commons

At a glance

Born
October 6, 1859, Western Star (now part of Norton) (Summit County) source
Died
August 11, 1955, Akron (Summit County) source
Buried
Glendale Cemetery, Akron (Section 19, Lot 30, Seiberling family plot) (Summit County) source
Also known as
Frank Seiberling, Frank A. Seiberling, F. A. Seiberling, Little Napoleon
Education
Heidelberg College, Tiffin, OH, two years
Known as
Business, Inventor
Organizations
Goodyear, Seiberling Rubber

Life story

Franklin Augustus Seiberling was born in Western Star (now Norton), Ohio, in 1859, the second of nine children of John Frederick Seiberling, a farm-machinery entrepreneur. He attended Heidelberg College in Tiffin for two years, then joined his father's company as secretary and treasurer.

He married Gertrude Penfield in 1887. In 1898 he and his brother C. W. co-founded Goodyear, and he became its fourth president in 1906. He patented a tire-building machine in 1908 and financed Melvin Vaniman's airship attempt in 1911; the airship Akron exploded in 1912, killing the crew.

He built Stan Hywet Hall in Akron in 1915 and in 1921 co-founded Seiberling Rubber in Barberton. He died in Akron in 1955 and is buried at Glendale Cemetery. His grandson John F. Seiberling Jr. became a US Congressman.

Ohio ties

  • Western Star, Norton (1859-1865)
    born in the Seiberling family home Summit County · source
  • Akron (1865-1955)
    family moved there in 1865; his father's farm-machinery firm, Goodyear (1898-1921), civic life and death Summit County · source
  • Tiffin (Heidelberg College) (to 1877)
    student, expelled in 1877 for a prank Seneca County · source
  • Stan Hywet Hall, 714 North Portage Path, Akron (1915-1955)
    his home from December 1915 until his death Summit County · source
  • Barberton (1921-1950)
    Seiberling Rubber Company, which he founded and led Summit County · source
  • Glendale Cemetery, Akron (1955)
    burial in the Seiberling family plot Summit County · source

Timeline

  1. 1859 Born on 6 October at Western Star, now part of Norton in Summit County, second of nine children of John Frederick and Catherine Miller Seiberling. source
  2. 1865 His father gave up farming and moved to Akron to manufacture agricultural implements. source
  3. 1877 Was expelled from Heidelberg College in Tiffin for a student prank and went into his father's business. source
  4. 1884 Became secretary-treasurer when his father's Empire Mower Company was reorganized as J. F. Seiberling & Co. source
  5. 1887 Married Gertrude Ferguson Penfield, daughter of a Willoughby clay-products manufacturer. source
  6. 1898 Bought an old strawboard factory on seven acres in East Akron for $13,500, borrowing the $3,500 down payment from his brother-in-law Lucius C. Miles. source
  7. 1898 The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company was founded on 29 August, named for Charles Goodyear; its first products were bicycle and carriage tires, horseshoe pads and poker chips. source
  8. 1900 Received U.S. Patent 641,153 on 9 January for a pneumatic rubber tire, one of many tire patents issued to him. source
  9. 1902 A court ruled that Goodyear's standard tire did not infringe an existing tire patent, freeing the company to expand; in December he patented a detachable pneumatic tire (No. 715,430). source
  10. 1905 Goodyear introduced a quick-detachable straight-side tire and became the country's largest maker of carriage tires. source
  11. 1906 Became Goodyear's fourth president. source
  12. 1910 Began buying land in Portage Township, west of Akron, for a family estate. source
  13. 1913 Became a founding member of the Lincoln Highway Association; he was its president from 1918 to 1921. source
  14. 1915 Moved into Stan Hywet Hall in December, after three years of construction to designs by Charles Sumner Schneider. source
  15. 1917 Introduced a pneumatic truck tire and started the Wingfoot Express trucking line between Akron and Boston to prove it. source
  16. 1921 Resigned as Goodyear's president when Dillon, Read & Co. made his departure a condition of a rescue refinancing, and founded the Seiberling Rubber Company with his brother Charles. source
  17. 1935 On Mother's Day his daughter-in-law Henrietta Buckler Seiberling brought Bill W. and Dr. Bob together at the Gate Lodge of Stan Hywet, the meeting that led to Alcoholics Anonymous. source
  18. 1950 Retired in February as chairman and director of the Seiberling Rubber Company. source
  19. 1955 Died of pneumonia in Akron on 11 August, aged 95. source
  20. 1957 His children gave Stan Hywet to the Akron community as a historic house museum. source
  21. 1965 Firestone bought the Seiberling Rubber Company. source
  22. 1981 Stan Hywet Hall, listed on the National Register in 1975, was designated a National Historic Landmark on 21 December. source

What F. is known for

  • Co-founded Goodyear in 1898
  • Founded Seiberling Rubber Company 1921
  • Held 19 patents; tire-building machine (patented 1908) used for over half of US tires by 1913
  • Built Stan Hywet Hall, a National Historic Landmark
  • Goodyear (1898)
  • Tire-building machine patent (1908)
  • Stan Hywet Hall (1915)
  • Seiberling Rubber Company (1921)

Stories

A factory bought before there was a plan

Seiberling's father's farm-machinery business failed in the hard times of the 1890s, leaving Frank looking for something new. In 1898, while in Chicago collecting unpaid accounts, he heard that an abandoned strawboard plant in East Akron could be had cheaply, and he bought it, seven acres for $13,500, without yet knowing what to make there. Back in Akron he talked it over with his family, especially his brother Charles, and they settled on rubber bicycle tires, with the new automobile as a longer bet. They named the company after Charles Goodyear, who had discovered vulcanized rubber in 1839.

Source

The fall of 'Little Napoleon'

Seiberling stood five feet three and was known in the industry as the 'Little Napoleon' for his height and his ambition. Between 1910 and 1920 he drove Goodyear into foreign plants, its own textile mill, rubber and cotton plantations, coal mines, a trucking line and a West Coast factory. His interest was always in production, and he paid little attention to inventory and cash. When the slump after the First World War hit, tires piled up on the loading docks with no buyers and no cash to pay for labor and materials. The Wall Street firm Dillon, Read & Co. agreed to arrange new capital on condition that he resign, and in 1921 he did. He kept a block of Goodyear stock but never ran the company again, and immediately started the Seiberling Rubber Company.

Source

A manor house that looks five centuries old

Frank and Gertrude Seiberling travelled to England with their architects in search of designs, and the chief models for Stan Hywet were the English manors Haddon Hall, Compton Wynyates and Ockwells. The house, built of reddish sandstone brick between 1911 and 1915, was planned to look as if it had grown from 1400 to 1750: the Great Hall is late Gothic, the master bedroom and breakfast room Tudor, and the music room, dining room, library and grand staircase Jacobean, with other bedrooms in Adam, William and Mary and Georgian styles. Carved oak, walnut, sandalwood and chestnut fill the rooms, and the 70-acre grounds hold a formal English garden and a Japanese garden with teahouses. The 1981 landmark nomination found that almost nothing had changed since construction, and that the house still held the Seiberlings' own furnishings.

Source

Trucks and buses to sell tires

Seiberling saw that pneumatic tires could replace the solid rubber tires then used on trucks, and in 1917 Goodyear brought out a pneumatic truck tire. To prove trucks could carry freight over long distances, he started the Wingfoot Express, which hauled goods between Akron and Boston and may have been the first long-distance trucking company in the country. Reasoning that buses would need the same tires, and finding few buses running, he founded one of the first urban bus systems in the United States in Akron in 1918. Goodyear had also built the airship 'Akron' at its plant in 1910.

Source

Inventions and firsts

All Ohio inventions and firsts

Honors and things named for them

  • Stan Hywet Hall, National Historic Landmark

Named for F. A. Seiberling

Family

  • father: John Frederick Seiberling
  • brother: C. W. Seiberling
  • wife: Gertrude Ferguson Penfield
  • grandson: John F. Seiberling Jr.

Sites to know

Homes, graves, markers, museums and monuments; the numbered ones are on the map.

12
  • 1 Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens (National Historic Landmark, NRHP 75002058)
    714 North Portage Path, Akron Summit County · source
  • 2 Seiberling family plot, Glendale Cemetery (Section 19, Lot 30)
    Akron Summit County · source
  • Seiberling home at Western Star, his birthplace (unknown)
    Western Star, Norton Summit County · source
  • Goodyear's first factory (former strawboard plant), East Akron (unknown)
    East Akron Summit County · source
  • Seiberling Rubber Company plant (unknown)
    Barberton Summit County · source

Places in Ohio to see

Ohio places

Where F. A. Seiberling was born, lived, worked and is remembered, with the ZIP code, town and county pages for each.

Myths and corrections

Things often said about F. A. Seiberling, and what the record shows.

Often said Goodyear was founded by Charles Goodyear.

The record Charles Goodyear, who discovered vulcanization, died in 1860. Frank Seiberling and his brother Charles founded the company in Akron in 1898 and named it after him; Goodyear had no part in it. source

Often said Frank Seiberling was Goodyear's first president.

The record Seiberling organized and ran the company from the start, but its first president was David E. Hill (1898-1899). Seiberling became the fourth president in 1906 and held the post until 1921. The City of Norton's history says he was president from the founding. source

Documents

Primary records: patents, letters, court and government files, nominations and old county histories, each at the archive that holds it.

Pictures

Free to use with the credit shown. Select a picture for the original and its license.

  • F. A. Seiberling
    Public domain
  • F. A. Seiberling
    Public domain
  • Washington DC area newspaper ad for Seiberling Tires.
    Washington DC area newspaper ad for Seiberling Tires.
    Public domain
  • This is a photo taken in the F.A. Seiberling Nature Realm in May, 2023, located in Akron, Ohio.
    This is a photo taken in the F.A. Seiberling Nature Realm in May, 2023, located in Akron, Ohio.
    Babybella111 / CC BY-SA 4.0

Further reading

Sources

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

Every link goes to the original source. Profile researched 2026-10-15.

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