J4 Sunday, March 27, 2016 | The Repository | CantonRep.

com

NORTH CANTON

DOGWOOD CITY EVOLVES

AFTER HOOVER CO. LEAVES
By Shane Hoover
Repository staff writer
I, Hoover Co. pushed to
change New Berlins name

H
to North Canton.
oover Co. and I cant really think of
North Canton. For anything they didnt have
almost a century, some kind of hand in start-
the city was so ing or supporting, Hillibish
intertwined with the inter- said.
national company at the Many Hoover Co.
corner of Maple and Main employees saw each other
streets that to talk about as part of a family.
one meant discussing the That company was so
other. good, said Richard Pike,
Even in industrial Stark 75, who joined Hoover
County, no city was tied as Co. as an engineer in the
close to a single business as 1960s and retired in 1998.
North Canton was married He still collects company
to Hoover, a companys memorabilia and regularly
whose products were used gathers with other retirees
around the world. for dinner.
Then it ended. Pike said generations of
Almost a decade after TTI workers kept Hoover going,
Floor Care North America so it was there when he
closed the iconic factory, needed a good job.
North Canton is emerging I cant pass it on, but
into a new, post-Hoover at least I was given that
Co. reality. opportunity, he said, his
The population has voice tinged with regret.
grown. Income tax collec- Hoover Co.s end came in
tions are back to levels last bits and pieces
seen before Hoovers dis- Chicago Pacific Corp.
mantling. Redevelopment bought Hoover in 1985,
continues at the former REPOSITORY SCOTT HECKEL ending family control. Four
factory campus. n This is an aerial view of the Hoover Co. before the historical and iconic smokestack was removed for remodeling. The company and North Canton years later, Iowa-based
have been linked for nearly a century. The city seems to have rebounded from the closing of the factory almost a decade ago. Maytag Corp. purchased
Company town Chicago Pacific.
The eponymous employees, having pros- Hoover Co. as director of the North for employees to buy and Hoover employed 2,800
Hoover smokestack that pered making horse collars A year after Boss Canton Heritage Society. covered their mortgages. workers in Stark County in
towered over North Canton and leather goods. Hoovers death in 1932, the Boss Hoover was the The company and the 1999, but Maytag cut hun-
has been removed tempo- But the product that company was the largest first mayor of New Berlin, Hoover family contributed dreds of jobs over the next
rarily for restoration, but turned the Hoover name maker of vacuum cleaners and had a benevolent, to schools, a stadium, com- few years. Whirlpool Corp.
the companys shadow still into a global brand was the in the world. paternal relationship with munity buildings, a library bought Maytag in April
looms over the city. sweeper. The entire town either his workers, for whom he and other community 2006 and put Hoover up for
William H. Boss The Electric Suction worked for the Hoover Co. felt responsible, Hillibish projects. sale two months later.
Hoover moved his fam- Sweeper Co. sold 300 or had relatives who worked said. The company even played Hoover had more than
ilys tannery to the center sweepers in 1908, the year for the Hoover Co. or some- For decades, the commu- a role in naming the com- 800 workers in North
of New Berlin in 1873. Boss Hoover bought the how were impacted, said nity and company shared munity. When anti-German Canton at the time.
Thirty years later, the patent and reorganized the Kathleen Fernandez Hilli- police and fire departments. sentiment swept the United
W.H. Hoover Co. had 200 company. It later became bish, who retired last month Boss Hoover built homes States during World War SEE HOOVER, J5

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