Supplying The World

Supplying The World. . , A visitor to Lansing in the 1880s, looking southwest toward the Capitol and downtown, would see both sides of the Grand River stacked high with wood and factories belching smoke. On the west side of the river on Grand Avenue between Michigan Avenue and lonia Street was E. Bement and Sons, makers of plows, bobsleds, and a variety of stoves for the home. On the east side of the river starting at Saginaw Street and running south to Michigan Avenue was the Lansing Wheelbarrow Co. Until the advent of the automobile, these two companies were the largest employers in the city., E. Bement and Sons, founded in 1869, turned out thousands of plows, harrows, kettles, cultivators, seeders and, its ultimate specialty, cooking and parlor stoves. In the 1880s, the firm employed 1,000 workers. According to the ballyhoo on an advertising wagon roaming the streets of Lansing, Bement stoves were sold in 43 states and territories of the U.S. and exported to every continent but Antarctica, including "the Islands of the Sea.", During its heyday, Lansing Wheelbarrow Co. produced more wheelbarrows than any other company in the world. It was incorporated in 1881 by E.W. Sparrow and C.B. Stebbins. Arthur O. Bement, of E. Bement and Sons, raised the capital stock of the company and served as its first president. A.C. Stebbins, the son of the founder, was later president. The company continued making wheelbarrows and carts into the 1930s.