P.D. (Philo D.) Beckwith (1835–1889) was the founder of Round Oak Stove Company (later officially known as the Estate of P.D. Beckwith Inc.) and Mayor of

Dowagiac, Michigan Dowagiac ( ) is a city in Cass County, Michigan, Cass County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 5,879 at the 2010 United States Census, 2010 census. It is part of the South Bend, Indiana, South Bend–Mishawaka, Indiana, Mishawaka, ...

. Born in 1835 in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, Philo D. Beckwith settled in

in 1854 and opened a

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals pr ...

. His experiments with heating stoves in the 1860s led to the reshaping of his foundry business from the roller grain drill to the heating stove. Beckwith cast his first stove around 1867 to heat his struggling foundry and shortly after, the

Michigan Central Railroad The Michigan Central Railroad (reporting mark MC) was originally incorporated in 1846 to establish rail service between Detroit, Michigan, and St. Joseph, Michigan. The railroad later operated in the states of Michigan, Indiana, and Illinois in ...

ordered the heaters for its depots between

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

and

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. By 1871, Beckwith had made heating stoves his primary product (though he would continue manufacturing grain drills until his death) and the Round Oak Stove Company was born. Beckwith's company provided relatively high wages for the times and the, then, nearly unheard of benefit of sick pay. The town was, as a result, relatively insulated from the labor struggles occurring in the larger cities at the time. Beckwith, was a committed freethinker who wanted to "make the townsfolk aware and appreciative of those his personal pantheon of heroes and heroines whom he considered to be the true benefactors of the human race".¹ The theater busts included (extraordinary for the times) women and freethinkers such as Thomas Paine, Robert Ingersoll, Walt Whitman, Victor Hugo, George Sand and Voltaire among others.² The company expanded and Beckwith became a very popular man in town. He served as mayor for much of the 1880s and he invested a great deal of money and energy into various philanthropic activities. Beckwith died in January 1889 at the age of 54, leaving the management of the firm to his son-in-law, Fred E. Lee. Round Oak Stove Company officially became the Estate of P.D. Beckwith Incorporated after Beckwith’s death and continued expanding into the early 1900s. The company added new products, like furnaces and cooking stoves, and Round Oak produced a wide array of advertising materials. The success of the firm can be attributed to solid products and quality advertising. Round Oak stayed strong into the 1920s and survived

the Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

, though greatly damaged.

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

government contracts helped the company stave off elimination, but once the war ended, Round Oak was a troubled company. In 1947, the company sold its buildings to Kaizer-Frazer for the production of automobile engine parts and the Round Oak name was sold to Peerless Furnace, which continued to make repair parts for furnaces and stoves. A Round Oak comeback in Dowagiac in the early 1950s was short lived and Round Oak was left to history. Today, Beckwith Estate or "Round Oak" Stoves are widely sought after collectibles. ¹ Ingersoll: Immortal Infidel, ed. Roger E. Greeley (Buffalo, 1977), p. 127 ² Freethinkers, A History of American Secularism, Susan Jacoby (Owl Books, 2004) p. 149-150

External links

Round Oak Museum at Southwestern Michigan College: https://web.archive.org/web/20080907215036/http://www.swmich.edu/museum/roundoak.php
April 19, 1920 Supreme Court Decision * http://vlex.com/vid/20019490 Round Oak Museum Stove Identification Guide * http://www.swmich.edu/museum/guide.php Heater Model Build Dates * http://www.roundoak.info/heaters.html Range Model Build Dates * http://www.roundoak.info/ranges.html Leland Haines’ publisher * http://www.roundoak.info Replacement Parts manufacturer * http://www.roundoakman.com Pictures of Vintage Catalog Pages * http://www.goodtimestove.com/goodtime_special_sections/round%20oak%20specials/roundoak%20catalogs.htm {{DEFAULTSORT:Beckwith, Philo D. Mayors of places in Michigan People from Dowagiac, Michigan 1835 births 1889 deaths 19th-century American politicians