There have been many accounts written here about businesses that started out elsewhere and later moved to Holyoke, or about the opposite. This is a story of a company that, through a merger, continued to run a plant in Holyoke, then moved out to another location and subsequently reestablished itself in Holyoke 17 years later, the Remington-Rand Co.
In August 1927, the Baker-Vawter Company at 686 Main Street was one of several companies that merged to form the Remington-Rand Corporation. Remington-Rand had previously purchased the building on May 26, 1927. There were 72,000 square feet of floor space on the factory’s 4 floors.
There was originally great promise from the merger. Remington-Rand announced it planned to build a new factory adjacent to its Holyoke plant to employ upwards of 300 workers.
By October, Remington-Rand decided to instead consolidate its operations at its Cambridge, Massachusetts, facility. Part of its operations remained in Holyoke. In February 1928, the company considered moving its library division to Holyoke. However, in January 1929, the company temporarily, then permanently, shut down its Holyoke plant.
Remington-Rand continued to own the plant at 686 Main Street, which remained idle for some time. Holyoke Photo Mount leased the plant from 1934 to 1938.
At that time, Remington-Rand considered moving its Cambridge plant to Holyoke, but chose Tonawanda, New York.
Finally, in 1946, Remington-Rand followed through with plans to reestablish itself in Holyoke. The company decided to move its printing mill from Brooklyn, New York, to Holyoke. The Casper Ranger Construction Company was selected to perform extensive renovations to the plant to accommodate the printing business. Once completed, the plant began operating in 1947.
In 1955, Remington-Rand Co. became a division of Sperry-Rand Co. In August 1960, the 35 workers remaining in that division at the Holyoke plant lost their jobs when the systems division was to be moved to N. Tonawanda, New York or Benton Harbor, Michigan. This division produced printed office cards and stationery. The Univac division remained in Holyoke and will be featured in the following chapter.
Citations:
Newspapers.com (paid subscription): Citations: Holyoke (Massachusetts) Transcript & Transcript-Telegram; publication dates and pages are shown.
Ancestry.com (paid subscription): Price & Lee, Holyoke, Massachusetts, City Directories
Hampden County Registry of Deeds, Springfield, Massachusetts
Massachusetts Cultural Resource Information System, MACRIS, Boston, Massachusetts
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