The Palmer Brush Company was another company that relocated to Holyoke, finding a more expansive space to conduct its growing business. The company was formed around 1940 and remained in Palmer, Massachusetts, for about 15 years.
Initially, the company’s machine shop built and sold machinery to other firms. Around 1950, the company produced machinery only for its own needs. The company produced brushes for the military to clean weapons, for household use, such as mops and dusters, and for industrial cleaning.
In April and May 1954, the company placed ads in various newspapers to sell off its machinery and equipment located at its factory at 17 Wilson Street, Palmer, Massachusetts.
On June 11, 1955, Palmer Brush Company announced that it would be moving into the Whiting & Company building at 110 Lyman Street. If this sounds familiar, the preceding blog entry provided details of another company, the Indian Orchard Manufacturing Company, that relocated to this building at about the same time. Holyoke paper mills, which were in economic decline, had space available for new or transitioning businesses under leasing arrangements.
Edward Pepesh, the principal owner, was a native of Decatur, Illinois. He was the designer and inventor of the machinery that manufactured brushes as small as those for cleaning electric razors. He needed space to build the equipment, produce the products, capital, and a sales force to market the goods. He was a close friend of Robert Belsky, who brokered the arrangements with his Whiting contemporaries.
The president of the company and 50% owner was Edward G. Pepesh of Palmer, who founded the company. The other 50% of the company was owned by three Whiting & Company officials: Robert Davidson Jr., President, Robert H. Belsky, Assistant Treasurer, both from Holyoke, and P. Wesley Shaw Jr., who was Whiting’s Treasurer and Sales Manager. The two companies would remain independent.
With the company’s expansion, it was expected that sales would rise to $3 to $5 million within 5 years.
The floor space was readied, the equipment was moved in or built on-site, and the company began moving into the Whiting building in July 1955. Advertisements for workers appeared the following month.
20 workers were employed at the time of the move, and with the expansive 40,000 square feet of floor space, up to 100 workers may be anticipated in the future. At the time of the move, the company had equipment to accommodate 30 workers.
Before the move, the company had just completed a large contract to supply brushes to a Hartford brush company. The company had a contract to produce 2 million electric shaver brushes, so there was a possibility of needing workers on multiple shifts.
There was little news discovered after the Help Wanted advertisement in 1955. The 1959 Holyoke City Directory listed the three Whiting shareholders, but not Edward G. Papesh, its former president. By 1960, the company was no longer listed in the Holyoke City Directory, the Secretary of State's Corporation Division, or newspaper articles.
Edward G. Papesh went on to serve as the Vice President of Pierson Industries Incorporated in Palmer, Massachusetts. He and his son Edward F. Papesh were awarded a patent in 1971 for a Composite tubular film process and apparatus.
Citations:
Newspapers.com (paid subscription): Citations: Holyoke (Massachusetts) Transcript & Transcript-Telegram; Springfield (Massachusetts) Republican; publication dates and pages are shown.
Ancestry.com (paid subscription): Price & Lee Holyoke, Massachusetts, City Directories
Hampden County Registry of Deeds, Springfield, Massachusetts
Secretary of State, Corporations Division, Boston, Massachusetts
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