Howard Deering Johnson

In the 1950s and 1960s, Howard Johnson’s rose to become the first and largest American restaurant chain in the industry. The company’s familiar orange roofs and white steeples covered much of the U.S. highway system. Colloquially known as "HoJos," it was also a leader in the development of roadside lodging. 

Howard Johnson (1897-1972) began his restaurant venture in 1925 in a single location in Quincy, Massachusetts. Seeking better financial opportunities, he bought a combination drug store, newsstand, and soda fountain. Soon noticing the popularity and profitability of ice cream, he developed his own formula with nearly twice the butterfat content of other ice creams, with a creamier consistency, not like hard, hand-dipped ice creams at the time. Needless to say, folks lined up to buy his ice cream. "HoJos" were eventually known its twenty-eight flavors.

The rise of highway travel also elicited the rise of crudely-made billboards. Howard Johnson elected an upscale approach to make his buildings stand out with memorable signage. On top of a historic New England-style white building was a bright orange roof that was visible in the daytime and floodlit at night. He topped it off with a steeple reminiscent of a New England church or city hall, a weathervane, and added the “Simple Simon and the Pieman” neon sign. Later modernizations dropped the nursery rhyme characters. The beautiful Howard Johnson's at left was located in Queens, New York City, in 1940.

By the 1950s, the company expanded operations by opening hotels, then known as Howard Johnson's Motor Lodges, which were often located next to HoJo restaurants. Johnson also owned and operated “company stores,” using franchising only when money was tight. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, it had become the largest restaurant chain in the U.S. with over one thousand owned and franchised Howard Johnson’s restaurants.

Lacking the vision of the previous business CEO, handing over a business to a second generation can spell doom for a company. Under the leadership of the son, Howard B. Johnson, his father's legacy of first-class dining and lodging fell to the wayside. Howard Johnson's no longer stood alone in the restaurant and lodging universe. By 1980, the once-great company was in dire straits through mismanagement and cost-cutting from a guy who wanted no further future ties to the business. For a $360 million profit, H.B. sold the company to Britain’s Imperial Group. Their six-year ownership saw further decline, which became an embarrassment to the industry. All hotels and company trademarks, including those of the former restaurant chain, have been owned by Wyndham Hotels and Resorts since 2006 as Howard Johnson by Wyndham. In the following fifteen years, the Howard Johnson name dramatically diminished.

Multi-faceted Remington Rand

Remington Rand, Inc. originated from E. Remington & Sons of Ilion, New York, which began manufacturing sewing machines in 1873 and later acquired the rights to produce typewriters from inventor Christopher Latham Sholes in 1876. The Remington No. 1 was the first typewriter to use the QWERTY keyboard layout. The company exhibited its typewriters at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition and expanded globally during the 1880s. The company was formed in 1927 through the merger of the Remington Typewriter Company and the Rand Kardex Bureau, Inc. A division of Remington Rand also made electric razors beginning in 1937.

Remington Rand merged with Sperry Corporation in 1955 to become Sperry Rand. It manufactured the UNIVAC line of mainframe computers, the first commercial computer system, initially for the U.S. Census Bureau. Along this same timeline, they manufactured modular office furniture under the name Remington Rand Modular Furniture. The Sperry Corporation sold the division in 1979 to Victor Kiam, who became the company spokesman. His line, "I liked the shaver so much, I bought the company," became a memorable advertising slogan of the early 1980s. Sperry later merged with Burroughs Corporation in 1986 to become Unisys. Remington Products was sold to the battery manufacturer Rayovac in 2003 (now part of Spectrum Brands). 

Acme Blog Post

A major factor in the widespread use of the "Acme" name was the rise of alphabetized phone directories, particularly the Yellow Pages, in the 1920s. In the same era, Acme was also used in films starting in the silent era. Companies sought to appear at the top of listings to increase visibility, and names starting with "A" were guaranteed to be near the beginning of the alphabetical order. and implied being the best. This led to a surge in real-world businesses adopting the name, including Acme Boots, Acme Brick, Acme Markets, and Acme Quality Paints, below.

Warner Bros.' The Looney Tunes writers, particularly Chuck Jones, adopted "Acme Corporation" as a fictional conglomerate that supplied Wile E. Coyote with an endless array of products, from anvils to rockets. The name's irony was central to the humor: despite implying "the best" or "the peak," the products were consistently flawed and failed catastrophically, often with hilarious results. The name became synonymous with a faceless, omnipresent company that sells everything, fictionally. The actual production of Acme anvils was carried out by the Columbus Forge & Iron Co. in Columbus, Ohio. They were also available through the Sears-Roebuck catalog in the early twentieth century.

Acme Quality Paints was founded in 1884 in Detroit as Acme White Lead and Color Works, later becoming known as Acme Quality Paints. The company was a significant producer of durable, affordable paints for homes, barns, and industrial buildings, particularly prominent in the Midwest and southern United States. By the 1920s, the company had expanded considerably, operating a large plant with over 700 employees. During this year, Sherwin-Williams purchased the Acme Quality Paint Company.

Kem-Tone, the first emulsion-based, fast-drying paint for the do-it-yourself market, was introduced in 1941 and met with remarkable success. The prefix “Kem” indicated that the paints were “chemically involved materials,” and Kem preceded other paint product names. Kem-Tone helped deal with the raw material shortage that the nation faced after the war. The company's influence extended to automotive finishes, with advertisements promoting "Acme Quality Motor Car Finish" as a solution for dull-looking cars. Acme Quality Paints brand now centers on the automotive and industrial industries.

Note: The widespread use of the Acme name for products and companies stems from its historical significance and linguistic appeal. The word "acme" originates from Greek, meaning "peak," "zenith," or "prime," signifying the highest point or best example of something. In spite of the legend, ACME is not an acronym for "American Companies Make Everything" or "American Company that Manufactures Everything."