MsC 344
Manuscript Register
PAPERS OF THE DEXTER COMPANY
Collection Dates: 1904 to 1954
20 linear ft.
This document describes a collection of materials held by the
Special Collections Department
University of Iowa Libraries
Iowa City, Iowa 52242-1420
Phone: 319-335-5921
Fax: 319-335-5900
e-mail: lib-spec@uiowa.edu
Posted to Internet May 2002
Acquisition Note:These papers were given to the University by the Dexter Company in 1958.
Access and Restrictions: This collection is open for research.
Photographs: Box 14
Digital Surrogates: Except where indicated, this document describes but does not reproduce the actual text, images and objects which make up this collection. Materials are available only in the Special Collections Department.
Copyright:Please read The University of Iowa Libraries' statement on "Property Rights, Copyright Law, and Permissions to Use Unpublished Materials"
Use of Collections: The University of Iowa Libraries supports access to the materials, published and unpublished, in its collections. Nonetheless, access to some items may be restricted by their fragile condition or by contractual agreement with donors, and it may not be possible at all times to provide appropriate machinery for reading, viewing or accessing non-paper-based materials. Please read our Use of Manuscripts Statement.
History
The Dexter Company was founded in 1894 in Dexter, Iowa, by R.D. Hunt and L.V. Gaines. This washing machine manufacturing company moved to Fairfield, Iowa, in 1904. In 1936, it entered into partnership with the Ohio firm that manufactured the Nash-Kelvinator. Philco purchased the Dexter Company in 1954, at which time the company had just begun to manufacture clothes dryers as well as washing machines.
Scope and Contents
The records of the Dexter Company date from 1904 to 1954, and document the company's history up to the time that it was bought by Philco. Approximately twenty linear feet of records, housed in some seventeen boxes, make up the collection. Corporate reports, financial statements, patents, advertising, correspondence, and stockholders agreements combined with legal papers, contracts, auditor's reports, and payroll registers give a fairly complete picture of this company's activities up to the mid-1950s.
Box List:
Box 1
Advertising, Philco, 1951 -- 1953
Annual Corporation on Reports, 1925 -- 1926
Annual meetings, Board of Directors' Meetings, Financing, 1935 -- 1943
Annual reports, 1950 -- 1952
Appliance Manufacturing Company -- Board of Directors' Minutes, Correspondence, etc., 1949 -- 1952
April I Stock, 1929
Bank of America National Trust and Savings Association, Dexter file, 1951 -- 1955
Bank Statements, 1929 -- 1944. (4 folders)
Box 2
Bank Statements, 1944 -- 1952. (2 folders)
Board of Directors' Meetings, annual meetings, list of stockholders of record, 1913 -- 1919
Board of Directors' Minutes, Appliance Manufacturing Company, including transfer of part ownership to Dexter from Nash-Kelvinator interests, 1939 -- 1952
Box 3
Board of Directors' Minutes, Appliance Manufacturing Company, including reference of Nash-Kelvinator stock sale to Dexter interests, 1943 -- 1951
Board of Directors Minutes, Appliance Manufacturing Company and merger of Appliance Company with Dexter Company, 1952 -- 1953
By-laws, Directors' meetings, 1929 -- 1936 and Sales records, 1920 -- 1949
Capital stock tax, ca 1918 -- 1921
Certificate of stock, 1923, 1926, 1931, and 1941
Contracts, ca 1925 -- 1938
Contracts, adjustments, and agreements, 1925, 1926 1932, 1934, and 1938 -- 1942
Contracts and agreements, ca 1928 -- 1939
Box 4
Copies of stockholders' financial statements, 1929 -- 1951
Cow Case, Charles H. Gage, 1929 -- 1931
The Dexter Company and Appliance Manufacturing, 1947 -- 1953. (5 folders)
Dexter-Appliance Consolidation, 1952
Dexter Decals
Dexter -- History. Finances including some Hunt family history, 1936 -- 1938, 1948, and 1952
The Dextergram, Volume 15 Number l, March 1933
Domestic Laundry Cross-Licensing Agreement, 1935
Box 5
Domestic Laundry Cross-Licensing Agreement, 1935 -- 1936
Financial Statements, Dexter and Appliance, 1940 -- 1953. (24 folders)
Formal offer for Prima MFG Company sent to Hoswell, October 1935
R.D. Hunt's file, 1928 -- 1930
Box 6
Kelvinator interest in Alliance, 1943 -- 1946
License contracts, Grinnell, Iowa, Washing Machine Company, 1909 -- 1911, 1915 -- 1916, 1918, and 1922 -- 1923
List of Dexter stockholders who received dividends of $500.00 or more for the years 1929 -- 1930
May, stock information, 1923 -- 1929
Maytag License contract, 1917 -- 1918
Memo and correspondence, 1953
Minutes of Board of Directors, corrected list of common stockholders, and certificate of amended articles, 1919 -- 1929
Minutes of Board of Directors, annual meeting, and more, 1929 -- 1932
Original articles of incorporation, related correspondence, amendments and revised by-laws, 1913 -- 1939
Original stock certificate book, 1911 -- 1912
Box 7
Outgoing correspondence: R.D. Hunt to W.H. George and L.O. Gaines, 1911 -- 1912
Outline for an Analysis Engineering Company of Operations and Management, Wolf Management Engineering Company
PATENT MATERIAL
Apex Electrical Company patents, 1935 -- 1937
Baker Spinner Design -- F.M. & Company, 1938
Barnes & Reinecke -- double tub design and Alliance Ware, Inc., February -- June 1945
Misses Barrett & Barrett, Washington, D.C., 1939
Beam Manufacturing Company, patent and royalty agreement, 1950 -- 1954
Behan patent -- N.L. Etten Chamberlain Corp., 1935 -- 1936
Bendix infringement, 1949 -- 1950
Bendix type washers, 1937, 1939
R.S. Blough, 1937 -- 1938, 1940, 1953 -- 1954, and 1956. (3 folders)
Brass wringer gears(Universal Castings Corp.), April -- July 1945
Cast iron wringer gears, May -- July, 1945
Chartered Institute of Am. Inventors, patent file, 1933 -- 1934, 1936 -- 1937.
Commissioner of Patents, 1932 -- 1938, 1943 -- 1944
Box 8
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
Current patents, 1911, 1928, 1929, 1937, 1939, 1940, 1943 -- 1945, 1948 -- 1953
Information on clothes dryers, 1925, 1929, 1930, 1932, 1933, 1935
C. Dietz -- Pat. no. l, 786, 705 (see Tefft & Tefft ), 1932
Dishwashers, 1931 -- 1933, 1936
Irving Dunn -- Chas. E. Mehlhope, 1928 -- 1932
Vernon Dunn -- gear assembly patent no. 11,187 (see Tefft & Tefft ), 1935 -- 1937
Dunn patent reissues, 1950
Vernon Dunn -- rollstop mechanism no. 83,289 (see Tefft & Tefft)
Box 9
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
Electric Household Utilities Corp. royalty -- lift-off ironers, 1937
William Fuhr, 4919 Lake Park Ave., Chicago, Ill., 1944
William George -- Chas. E. Mehlhope, 1922, 1923, 1925
Gordon patents, 1938
Hainsworth Hydraulic Washer, 1936 -- 1937
Harry La Rue, 1937
Lawnmowers, 1932 -- 1935
Lovell-Chamberlain Toggle Release -- Infringement, 1949
Box 10
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
Maytag infringement file, 1943 -- 1947
Maytag suit, 1932, 1935 -- 1936, 1938 -- 1939
Maytag -- Synder, 1917 -- 1918, 1932 -- 1933, 1938 -- 1939
Chas. E. Mehlhope, 1923 -- 1932. (2 folders)
Misner patent, 1937
National Household Devices Co., Howard W. Power, patents, 1931
Box 11
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
New wringer, 1933 -- 1934, 1940
New wringer designs, 1942, 1945
New wringers patents file, 1932 -- 1933, 1940
Opinion re: infringement by subscribers to the Domestic Laundry Cross-Licensing
Agreement of patents owned by APEX Electrical Manufacturing Company, May 14, 1936.
Parker, Carlson, Pitzner & Hubbard, patent lawyers, Chicago, 1934 -- 1937, 1939, and 1940. (6 folders)
Patch Washing Machine Design, 1944 -- 1945
Box 12
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
Patent arrangements: Carlson, Pitzner, Hubbard & Wolfe; Charles Woodin, 1949
Patent file, 1934
Patents, 1936 -- 1953. (2 folders)
Patents and ideas on other washing machines, 1932 -- 1933, 1936 -- 1937
Patents -- ironer, 1932 -- 1934, 1936
Patents -- miscellaneous, 1931 -- 1936
Patents received for our consideration, 1934 -- 1935, 1937
Patents: trademark for Haag and Dexter, 1941 -- 1946
Permo Products Co. -- Flanders Ironing Machine, 1934 -- 1935, 1937
Delbert Rizor -- drain hose nozzle (see Tefft & Tefft), 1935 -- 1936
James P. Shea patent
Watkiss Stoke -- Salt Lake City, 1932, 1937
Super Century gear unit, 1939 -- 1940
W.D. Tappon, patent service, 1936 -- 1937, 1939, 1941
Box 13
PATENT INFORMATION (continued)
Tefft & Tefft -- patents, 1932 -- 1944. (4 folders)
Timer drawings (R.H. Jordan), 1950 -- 1954. (3 folders)
Trademark Reflex, 1939 -- 1941, 1943
Trademarks, 1949
Weaver patent -- Martin E. Anderson (Electric Household Utilities Corp.), 1937
D.M. Wenger -- patent file., 1931 -- 1932, 1934 -- 1937
L.L. Wise patent, 1940
Wringer rolls, May -- June 1945
Philco, 1952 -- 1954
Photographs and advertising, ca 1948 -- 1951
Proxy statement and exhibits, 1953
Purchaser's agreement F.H.A., 1935, Iowa Des Moines National Bank and Trust Company
Rainbow Contract 1929 -- 1935, 1940
Sales records, 1920 -- 1949
Schedules on forecasts and automatic program, automatic production, 1953 -- 1954
C.L. Schmidt & Co., 1929
Securities and exchange Commission Reports, 1936 -- 1940
Signed receipts of stockholders who permitted holding up their last 1929 dividend check until in January 1930
Specifications for the construction of an addition to the foundry, 1950
State permit to increase capital stock; amendment to articles of incorporation; new articles of incorporation, 1929
Box 15
Stockholders, including Philco transfer, 1948 -- 1954
Stockholders' dividend orders, 1930 -- 1932, 1935
Transfer of Dexter stock in cases of estates, 1926 -- 1927
Trundle Engineering Company Reports,1950 -- 1951
Weekly Time Book, 1914
Wolf Management Engineering Company, 1948 -- 1949. (2 folders)
Box 16
Common stockholder records: index A -- K, L -- Z, grouped by years, 1929 -- 1942
Box 17
Common stockholder records, 1942 -- 1954. (Indices in Box 16)
Unboxed materials
Certified list of Holders of Common Stock of the Dexter Company, 1929 -- 1954. (71 volumes)
ITEM NUMBERS
The following items are not in boxes, and are assigned item numbers:
18: Minutes of Board of Directors, May 28, 1913 -- May 16, 1919, with trial balance, 1915
19 -- 23: Journal, 1923 -- 1954. (5 volumes)
20-“Journal, 1928-1933: Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Record of Checks Drawn, Bank Balances, Reserves, etc.”;
22-“Journal, 1939-1944: Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Record of Checks Drawn, Bank Balances, etc.”;
23-“Journal (Machine), 1945- Jan. 1954”;
24 -- 26: General ledgers, 1923 -- 1954. (3 volumes)
24-“General Ledger Transfer Binder, 1923-1950: Investments Records, Inventories, Fixed Assets, Accounts Receivable and Payable, Payroll Summaries, etc.”;
25-“General Ledger (Machine), 1955-1954” Book No.1
26-“General Ledger (Machine), 1951-1954” Book No.2
27 -- 28: Cash receipts journals, 1945 -- 1954. (2 volumes)
28-“Cash Receipts Journal, 1952-1954”;
29: Cash register, January 1945 -- January 1954
30 -- 31: Invoice registers, 1945 -- 1954. (2 volumes)
32: Factory payroll register, January 1945 -- January 1951
33: Foundry payroll register, January 1940 -- January 1951
34 -- 36: Sales journals 1945 -- 1954. (3 volumes)
37: Auditors recommended year-end entries, 1923 -- 1951
38: Auditors recommended monthly bank reconciliations, 1944 -- 1954
39 -- 42: Common stock transfer records, l929 -- 1956. (4 volumes)
APPLIANCE MANUFACTURING COMPANY
43: Board of Directors' Minutes of Appliance Manufacturing Company, Alliance, Ohio, 1936 -- 1942. Articles of incorporation, certificate from Corporation and Securities Commission
44 -- 47: General ledgers, 1936 -- 1952. (4 volumes)
48: Journal entry sheets, book # l, September 1936 -- December 1948
49: General journal, book #2, Appliance Manufacturing Company, January 31, 1949 -- January 31, 1954
50: Payroll summaries, Appliance Manufacturing Company, 1937 -- 1944
51: Cash receipts,Appliance Manufacturing Company, January 1942 -- September 1946
52: Accounts payable, Appliance Manufacturing Company, October 1941 -- January 1946
53: Machine ledger, sales journal, January 2, 1950 -- October 24, 1954
54: Cash received and cash disbursement and purchase journal, January 1950 -- August 1954
