Moment in Time (April 21, 2022)
William Weinman is shown on the hill in Marble Cliff that is the site of their new home that is designed to overlook the Scioto River. He is accompanied by his 7 years-old daughter Ruth, who is also shown in later years dressed in her horseback riding outfit. In the distance is the home of Sylvio Casparis, and the home at 1499 Roxbury is at the right of the 1914 inset image. At the bottom is the Weinman home.
George M. Weinman established the Columbus Steam Pump Works, later called the Weinman Machine Works, in Columbus in 1863. He married Delaware resident Elizabeth Pfeifer, and in 1869 they had a son William Nelson Weinman. George died in 1878, and the company was leased to the Royce and Pulling Company until William turned of age. At nineteen years old, he assumed the management of the nationally known Weinman Machine Works. The factory on Spruce Street increased in size to meet the product demands, and the company was renamed the Weinman Pump Manufacturing Company. His father had several patents for steam pumps and pump parts, and William added more over the next decade.
In 1891, William married Henrietta Heinmiller, the daughter of former Columbus Sheriff and City Councilman Louis Heinmiller, and they had a daughter Ruth in 1907. Ruth, an only child, lived with her parents until 1914 in a house built by her father at 380 King Avenue, when the Weinmans hired Columbus architect Frank Packard to design a new home at 1445 Central (now called Roxbury Road) in Marble Cliff. (William’s sister Stella was married to architect J. Upton Gribben. The couple lived on Fairview in Grandview, and he worked in Packard’s firm from 1895 until 1904.) The Weinman property is on a hill on lot #9 of the original 1889 plat of Arlington Place, overlooking the Scioto River. The original nine-room home that the family built, shown at the bottom of the photo composite shown here, underwent a major renovation in 1997 and was included in the 2001 GH/MCHS Home Tour. The exterior roofline, windows, central hall, and first floor rooms of the original structure were kept in their original configuration, but the square footage was nearly tripled, resulting in a modern home with 22 rooms.
Ruth donated photos and papers to both the Ohio Historical Society and the Grandview Heights/Marble Cliff Historical Society before her death in 2002. In her papers, she described a passion for horseback riding that she developed at an early age. Her neighbor and playmate was Ruth Casparis, who lived several properties to the north of the Weinman home. They Casparis family had a stable built on their property, and Ruth Weinman would often ride along the river, the bluff, and the railroad tracks with Ruth Casparis. This passion carried over to her adult years when she became a member of the River Ridge Riding and Polo Club, which operated out of stables on the Lane Farm on Henderson Road in Upper Arlington. One of the donated photos is included here, showing Ruth dressed in her riding outfit.
After graduating from Columbus School for Girls in 1925, Ruth studied sociology at Ohio State University, graduating in 1929. She married L. Kermit Herndon, then an assistant professor in chemical engineering at Ohio State. Herndon would later take over the Weinman’s pump company when William Weinman died in 1950. Herndon, who retired from the pump company in 1971, was prominently featured in LIFE magazine in 1957, in an article about the Sputnik-era missile fuel research that he directed at Olin-Mathieson Chemical Corporation. His photo in the magazine was taken by famous photographer and photojournalist Alfred Eisenstaedt.
William N. Weinman and Ruth are shown in the 1914 photo standing on the hill where their home would eventually be built. In the distance is the Casparis home, which would become the convent home and offices of Our Lady of Victory Church. The home at 1499 Roxbury is seen between the lot and the Casparis home.
References:
1) William Alexander Taylor, Centennial History of Columbus and Franklin County, Ohio, Volume II, 1909, pp469-470.
2) LIFE Magazine, Vol. 43, No. 22, Nov 25, 1957
3) Ohio Historical Society (now the Ohio History Connection)
4) Chemical Engineering, The Ohio State University, 26th Annual Report to the Alumni, 1974.