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Press Room: Corporate News
More about Hamilton Beach/Proctor-Silex Inc.
Hamilton Beach/Proctor-Silex Inc., headquartered in Richmond, Va., is the nation’s largest seller of small home appliances. The company is celebrating 100 years of innovation, thanks to its founders, Louis H. Hamilton and Chester Beach. Hamilton and Beach met in 1904 at the U.S. Standard Electrical Works in Racine, Wisconsin. Beach perfected a lightweight, high-speed, universal motor that could run on either alternate or direct current, and this motor prompted the duo to form The Hamilton Beach Manufacturing Company in 1910. Some of Hamilton Beach’s first products were the Sew-E-Z home motor and the now-classic drink mixer.
As Hamilton Beach celebrates the accomplishments of its founders throughout 2004, it recognizes how the past affects today. This year will bring the launch of the Eclectrics™ collection, a line of small kitchen appliances made from die-cast metal. These colorful appliances provide cooks the conveniences necessary for today’s kitchen, while the line’s hefty construction is reminiscent of the quality known by the earliest Hamilton Beach customers.
Hamilton Beach has been inspiring great results among its customers for nearly 100 years, and for this, there is much to be proud. The 1920s saw the introduction of the company’s first portable household vacuum, food mixer and juice extractor. By 1934, Hamilton Beach customers could purchase a third-generation stand mixer. During the 1940s, the country’s focus shifted to more dire needs, and Hamilton Beach participated in wartime efforts by producing instrumentation motors and other military equipment.
While those accomplishments may seem well in the past, inventing is a progressive process that often builds from prior successes. What doesn’t seem possible today is often reality tomorrow. For instance, the 1950s consumer probably could not have guessed that the BrewStation™ coffeemaker unveiled forty years into the future would be capable of one-hand dispensing right into your coffee cup.
As we celebrate 100 years of accomplishments, we remember Hamilton and Beach for their innovation. It is still at the very heart of our products, our company and our future.
