RototilleR – the 1960s

A Rocky Road Ahead – The Birth of Troy-Bilt –
Say Hello to Dean Leith, Jr. – & A Marvel of Marketing

We can’t start “the ’60s” without properly disposing of 1959, the end of a volatile decade at Troy’s Rototiller factory.

The scene ahead is looking bleak, but, hey, the folks at Rototiller, by now, know all about “bleak”. They also know the opposite, which we outlined in the last episode, “RototilleR – the 1950s”.

Maybe a quick recap as a refresher:

1949 saw the tiller factory miraculously pulled back from the edge of the cliff by the introduction of the Model T Roto-Ette. When the “T” went viral, it introduced the nation to the rotary tiller as a serious home gardening tool, and at the same time sowed the seeds of its own downfall. Now, by 1959, hitherto non-existent competition had sprung up like mushrooms in a shady glade. All of a sudden, it seems as though every Tom, Dick and Harry garden outfit had noticed the success of Rototiller and had jumped into the party with one variation or another of their own. (see Jones RT sto*) And as the competition ramped up in the late ’50s, the high-end Model T suffered the most. With sales slipping, combined with Kelsey’s need to retire, the company directors hired businessman John Wright as surrogate CEO who ran the company for a few years. He tried various products without sufficient success. But he did successfully negotiate the sale of the company to the much bigger and better financed Porter- Cable Co. of Syracuse, NY. to round out their existing line of lawn and garden products. This action left George Done, his brother Dave and Pete Maraj, along with a skeleton crew of workers, as the Troy factory’s sole occupants. They were keeping the plant open making spare parts for the nearly one million tillers now “out there”, as well as producing a few various tiller models to fill orders for the plant’s new owners. Soon tiller production would resume at P-C’s Syracuse, NY location.

Once again, it was like ’49 when the reality of weak market acceptance for the “Home Gardener” caused its collapse. Only now it’s ’59 and the outlook seemed just as dismal with the “T” soon to be owned by Porter-Cable, Inc. of Syracuse. But, as the story unfolded back then, we saw George Done’s engineering drawing for the Model T arrive “in the nick of time” ...and we know how that turned out, don’t we?

Could we dare to hope for history to repeat itself?

Trust me, it takes a cast iron stomach to play with these boys in Troy’s “on-again-off-again” tiller factory. So, let’s suck it up and get on with the drama. Well, if you are sitting on the edge of your chair at this point, just salivating for the answer, I’ll get you out of your misery; YES! Its classic history repeating itself in the best sense of the well-worn phrase. And, once again, it was George Done leading the charge!

Here’s how it went:

Starting with a timeline of Feb. 1960 when Mr. Wright, Rototiller’s “post Kelsey” CEO, sold the company to Porter-Cable of Syracuse, and continuing through Dec. of 1960 when Rockwell International of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, then obtained majority control of Porter-Cable in a stock swap deal*, we continue to May of 1962 when Porter-Cable (now as a div. of Rockwell Int.) reportedly * turned around and sold its newly acquired Rototiller, Inc., lock, stock and barrel, to the Moto Mower Co. of Richmond, Indiana. Whew! Anybody up for a game of razzle-dazzle in the side yard after lunch?

While most of the players and spectators in this drama were trying to figure out where the ball was and who had it, our boys at Troy’s tiller factory were turning out product for their new bosses in Syracuse. They were also engaged in transferring production facilities to the Syracuse plant and helping with technical advice on various other related issues.

Phil Carabis, who was with Kelsey from the start in 1938, was recruited to do some of this work. He and his boss, George Done, drove from Troy to Syracuse every Sunday afternoon to stay over at a local hotel for the week to help production get started at the new site.

They didn’t hold back their dismay about having to do this work. After all, we’re talking about driving four to five hours on Route 5, before the convenience of the NYS Thruway, bucking traffic in all the little canal towns that dotted the map along their journey. They presumably worked Monday through Friday then returned to Troy for what remained of the weekend for a bit of rest.

(Phil used to tell us about these times, in later years, when he was head of the Troy Bilt Service Shop.)

But, as we all know, times are always a-changin’, and our Troy boys didn’t have to grumble about the tedious trip to Syracuse for long. With the fast-moving razzle-dazzle of all this small-company-being- swallowed-up-by-bigger-company stuff going on, then again with bigger-company-being-swallowed- by-still-bigger-company stuff adding to the confusion, now top-dog Rockwell International told their new subsidiary Porter-Cable to dump their entire lawn and garden division as being unprofitable. So, being an obedient subsidiary, Porter-Cable, May 10th 1962, sold their Rototiller acquisition to Moto- Mower Co. in the state of Indiana. Now, the Troy factory, for all practical purposes, was out of the tiller business.

And here’s where the History Repeating Itself, referred to above, began to take shape. George Done, and cohorts at the factory, it seems, were not just sitting around waiting for the end of their little party with the unemployment line beckoning. Like ’49, Good ole’ George had been tinkering. Now, instead of a hasty mechanical drawing, “in the nick of time”, he had a new model sitting on the floor for brother Dave, head machinist, Pete Maraj and Meyers Hinderer of the Watervliet Iron and Brass Foundry, to feast their eyes on. Surely this new beast still would need a lot of detailing, but with all the T’s production paraphernalia recently moved to Syracuse and the Troy factory looking pretty desolate...it must have been a sight for sore eyes!

So, let’s try to see this in perspective. Here we see George Done working at home, not just making a new plan, but designing a totally new and different product, at the very same time Mr. Wright was selling out to Porter-Cable in Feb of 1960.

Let’s also understand that all during the Model T years, George had an ear for what his dealers were saying. He and others had heard dealer stories detailing complaints from owners about tiller performance; many of which translated into product improvements, and many which didn’t; but, apparently, they were heard. This new model sitting on the floor embodied improvements, filtered down through the network, from the folks who actually used these machines. Now the motor was out in front of the wheels giving the unit much improved balance, and its transmission was re-engineered with gear and shaft totally housed in cast iron. It also featured a much-needed reverse mechanism.

And the most important part of all this semi-clandestine activity is that the Watervliet Iron and Brass Foundry was actually pouring castings which were being machined and assembled into production Rototillers in Troy, NY, right under the noses of the Porter-Cable Div. of Rockwell, Int. Wooo Hooo!

The timeline gets a bit fuzzy here, but it might help to see a memoir from someone who was there at that time. Allen Cluett, who’s dad had worked with Kelsey from the beginning, and had resigned from Rototiller in 1959, was working at the Troy File Works (TFW). This was a well-established Lawn, Garden and Rototiller Dealership which Allen’s dad now owned. This is his take, in 1961, on what was going on with this new Rototiller model:

Sayings like, “History repeats itself” and “pulling the rabbit out of the hat” are fun to use in times like this, but here it is, see it for yourself.

Well, okay, like 1949, they had to be scared, maybe terrified, with everything in “Rototiller World” falling apart. Surely, they saw all this coming. George knew there were design problems with the T. But things were going too well back then to rock the boat by shutting down production for major changes. That is, until competition slowed sales and then the company was sold, and then, and then…. let’s face it, the T was gone, and the boys in Troy were done…

They knew they had to act fast, like they did with the good old Model T. The T provided Kelseys Rototiller Factory, in 1949, with a marketable product which renewed the enterprise. This new model, in 1961, was about to do the same.

And this Allen-Cluett-eye-witness-account nailed it for the history books.

What the spectators at the 1961 Schaghticoke Fair were looking at was the first sight of the Troy-Bilt Rototiller, though it took a while to get to that point. George named this new baby the “Trojan Horse” and the new company was named, “Watco Products”, suggesting its Watervliet and Troy roots. Barely over ten years after the Model T hit the market, the Trojan Horse saved the day for the boys at Troy’s Rototiller factory, “in the nick of time”. It felt good; like there was no way to go but up.

This marks the end of the first half of “RototilleR-the 1960s” Stay tuned for the second half in which we introduce Dean Leith, Jr, and detail “A Marvel of Marketing”. * Donald A. Jones “Rototiller in America” - Infinity Publishing Co., Oct. 2003

Author’s Note: Special thanks to Allen B. Cluett for first person accounts of these events and to Charlie Zuck of zucksrototillers.com for research assistance.