Yeoman shares history of family business at ‘Spark!’ event


On Oct. 29, Tom Yeoman, president of Yeoman & Company, spoke at the Heritage Center about his family’s company that has been in business in Monticello for 95 years. Yeoman shared several tools the company has designed, including this full-size shovel to-go.

Yeoman’s presentation was part of the Heritage Center’s “Spark! Places of Innovation” Smithsonian Museum exhibit. (Photos by Kim Brooks)
By: 
Kim Brooks
Express Editor

     Tom Yeoman, president of Yeoman & Company, kicked off "Spark Talk" at the Monticello Heritage and Cultural Center on Oct. 29.

   The Heritage Center is host to the "Spark! Places of Innovation" Smithsonian Museum exhibit from Oct. 26 through Dec. 8. This exhibit highlights small-town sparks of innovation all over the U.S. It "explores stories of towns that tapped into existing strengths to confront challenges and create opportunities. See how their unique combination of place, people, and creativity ignited change – socially, artistically, technologically, or culturally.

   The exhibit "takes visitors on a journey to see places where uniqueness is an asset and to meet people who have stepped outside their comfort zone to solve community problems," states the Spark! Handbook. "These towns are working not to survive, but to thrive through innovation."

   This year marks Yeoman's 45th year in the family business, having joined the ranks in 1979.

   Yeoman & Company, originally Yo-Ho (for Yeoman and Hoag), actually started 95 years ago in 1929. It was Yeoman's grandfather, William F. Yeoman, who started the three-generation family-owned company.

   Today, the company maintains a product line of more than 600 garden, long-handle, and winter tools.

   Yeoman's grandfather was working for John Deere in the mid-1920s repairing combines for wheat farmers throughout the country.

   "Back in those days, farmers didn't own combines," explained Yeoman. "John Deere owned the combines and farmers would lease them.

   "If a combine broke down," he continued, "you got ahold of my grandfather and he'd repair it."

   After traveling for months on end all over the country, William's wife wanted him to spend more time at home. So he got a job working at Hall Manufacturing.

   "Hall Manufacturing was the predecessor of Franklin Industries on S. Cedar Street," Yeoman said. "At that point in time, they manufactured dairy barn stanchions, bushel baskets, and wagon hardware."

   William Yeoman was the sales manager.

   In the late-1920s, he went to the powers that be at Hall Manufacturing, suggesting they should sell snow shovels and garden hoes.

   "They weren't interested in doing that," said Yeoman.

   This led William to pursue his own designs for such tools, working with a machine shop in Farley, Iowa, to build the tooling for him.

   One of the very first tools he made, a round-wire long rake, is still in production at Yeoman & Company to this day.

   William would assemble the tools in his home on S. Chestnut Street, even enlisting the help of his sons, Orvin (Tom's father) and Willard.

   "My grandfather would leave on Monday morning and go out with the back end of his car full of lawn rakes and go out and sell them," said Yeoman. "He'd come back when he ran out and do the same thing the next week. That's how it all got started…"

   In the mid-1930s, the Yeomans purchased a building on Seventh Street in Monticello, which was demolished in April 2020. This was the former Monticello Tire & Rubber Co. that was built in 1917.

   Over the years, the building was added onto a handful of times. In 1979, when Yeoman joined his family's business, they were still operating out of that facility. He began working in production.

   In 1995, Yeoman & Company relocated to a brand new 65,000 square-foot facility on Hardscrabble Road, having operated out of a 27,000 square-foot facility in town. That's where the company has been located since.

   During WWII, manufacturing companies had a hard time buying steel due to the war effort.

   "One of our main staples during WWII was a 24-inch steel pusher," said Yeoman.

   In order to get their hands on steel, Yeoman & Company became a government contractor and started producing steel pushers for the war effort.

   "They used them to shovel the snow off (aircraft) carriers and battleships that were in the North Atlantic," said Yeoman. "Because it snowed a lot in the North Atlantic and you had to clear the decks."

   Many of the products manufactured by Yeoman & Company are one of a kind because the company is the only one that uses a certain material or maintains a certain design.

   For instance, the spring-steel pushers are built so that the edges of the blade don't bend.

   The same pusher is also made out of aluminum that also contains a high carbon steel wear strip.

   "The reason we use high carbon steel is because it wears better," explained Yeoman. "Aluminum is a very soft metal. Dragging it on concrete or asphalt, it wears out pretty quickly. That's why we put this wear strip on it."

   Yeoman & Company also manufactures poly (polyethylene) tools, only company to do so.

   "We've had a line for about seven to eight years now," said Yeoman.

   Today, Yeoman is involved in sales and product development within the company. A couple of years ago, he came up with an idea for a fiberglass handle round-point shovel that is branded CAT (Caterpillar). He obtained a patent for this particular tool; the patent has to do with the handle connection.

   Yeoman has also designed the shovel to-go. It's a full-size poly carbonate shovel that comes in a box and can be quickly assembled. It even fits in the truck on a car!

   "Nobody makes that," Yeoman said.

   A year ago, Yeoman & Company also installed their first production robot to install a D-grip onto a wooden handle. Yeoman explained this process required two employees before and was very labor-intensive. Now, those employees can take on other tasks within production.

   In the late-1990s, Yeoman started outsourcing 50 percent of their tooling components from Asia, with the other 50 percent made in Monticello, Iowa.

   "We've always been the ugly step-sister in the industry," Yeoman joked. "We're probably 100 times larger than where we were when I came back into the business."

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