George Walther Sr. Inventions Information

George Walther Sr. (August 13, 1876 – April 10, 1961) was an American inventor, engineer, businessman, civic leader and the holder of over 100 patents for truck wheels, brake drums, fifth wheels, and landing gear/legs for the trucking industry. He was the founder of the Dayton Steel Foundry.

Walther developed the first practical cast steel wheel for solid rubber tires. This was a basic but critical contribution to the evolution of the early trucking industry and the U.S. Army trucks in World War I.

Walther followed the design of the cast steel wheel for solid rubber tires with the design of a cast steel wheel for pneumatic tires and then the design of an improved brake drum. When semi-trailer trucks were developed, he designed improved versions of the fifth wheel and landing legs for semi-trailer trucks. Walther's engineering skills resulted in patents for many developments of truck wheels, brake drums, fifth wheels, and landing legs that have helped to expand the role of trucks in the transportation industry.

George Walther was born on August 13, 1876, in the industrial German city of Steinbach-Michelstadt of Hessen, Germany. The two cities, separated only by a railroad, were small: Michelstadt was the larger, with 1,500 people, and Steinbach, home of the Walthers, had 700 residents.

The son of Heinrich and Elizabeth Walther, Walther was number 5 of 7 children. The Walther boys, according to the custom of the day, started their apprentice training early. Walther was fascinated with foundry work. He started to work in an iron foundry helping fashion solid iron wheels for mine cars.

Toward the close of the 19th century in Hessen, Germany, two teenagers, Walther and his brother Jacob, one an apprentice molder and the other an apprentice pattern maker, dreamed of opportunity in the country across the Atlantic Ocean.

In 1892 the two youths took their dreams to their father. Many other German fathers were hearing the same requests "We want to go to America." Their father considered the request carefully and then decided that the two boys could go to America to live with his brother Jacob in Dayton, Ohio. Their father borrowed the money to pay for their passage, signing a personal note as security.

Walther was 16 years old when he and his brother, 17, arrived in Dayton, Ohio, in 1892 to live with their uncle. Their early training as apprentice molders and pattern makers in the German foundry that made wheels for mine cars helped them find jobs. Within six months they sent their father the passage money he had borrowed to allow them to come to America.

During the day Walther worked as an apprentice iron molder at the Dayton shop of McHose and Lyon Company, manufacturers of building columns and ornamental iron. His brother found a job with Barney and Smith, manufacturers of railroad cars. After work Walther attended the Y.M.C.A. night school. Later he enrolled in the International Correspondence School, a home mail course.

After being in the United States for the required five continuous years, Walther became a U.S. citizen on October 17, 1899.

It was not all work and no play for Walther. He somehow found the time for active participation in sports. He became interested in the sport of the day: bicycling. He was an active bicyclist and won a number of prizes in bicycle racing. In 1897 Walther was the Ohio State 5-mile Champion and in 1899 won the title of Ohio State 1-mile Champion with a winning time of 2 minutes 32 3/5 seconds. On the same day Walther and C.G. Wagner won the 5-mile Tandem race.

Ten years after he had left for America, in 1902, Walther returned to Germany to further his education. He enrolled in the Technical School of Michelstadt and spent a year of intensive study.After a year at the Technical School of Michelstadt over, Walther boarded a ship to America and returned to Dayton in 1903.

Walther created his own foundry self-study or coop program to study the foundry business by getting jobs at foundry to foundry throughout the Midwest.Walther's private "co-oping" took him into iron and steel foundries in Cincinnati, Hamilton, Pittsburgh and Milwaukee. He watched, asked questions and listened to old foundry men ... he was learning the foundry business.

Walther became convinced there were business opportunities in the steel foundry business. He knew there were only two steel foundries in Ohio and none in the Dayton area, where his brother was working. So Walther returned to Dayton with a plan to create the Dayton Steel Foundry Company.

In 1905 Walther and his brother along with two others, Geo. Martin and Mr. Graham, formed a partnership, with a thousand dollars each. Walther's share was one acre of land that he purchased on South Broadway.

The Dayton Steel Foundry was built on land that was previously a corn field at the intersection of Miami Chapel Road and South Broadway Street in Dayton, Ohio. The foundry initially consisted of a tiny, ten by eight foot shanty for an office and a small building for a foundry opened for work in the spring of 1905.

The foundry initially used a crucible steel melting process. Scrap steel metal was melted in crucibles in oil furnaces. The furnace was lined with fire brick and had a steel cover which was removed for a melter to take a crucible with molten steel from the furnace. The melter was protected by an asbestos suit and gloves as he had to stand right over the intense heat to carefully grab the crucibles with tongs without breaking them. With several employees the two brothers handled the melting and molding. Many a night Walther slept in a hammock in the foundry because he couldn't leave the work.

Convinced that the infant automobile industry had a good future, Walther and his brother concentrated on small steel castings for passenger cars, many of which were manufactured in Indianapolis and a few in Dayton.

After a few years, the two partners, Martin and Graham, who had more assets than Walther and his brother, felt their other assets might be endangered as partners in Dayton Steel Foundry and were interested in withdrawing from the partnership. Walther then borrowed money to buy their two interests. In 1909 the Dayton Steel Foundry was incorporated by Walther and his brother with $500,000 common stock and $250,000 preferred stock.

Walther and his brother were continuously looking to improve the foundry operations. In 1911 the Dayton Steel Foundry installed a 2-ton converter and changed from crucible steel melting to making steel by the converter process. While the Dayton Steel Foundry made steel castings by the converter process, Walther and his brother monitored new developments on electric furnaces.

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