John Huggins
by
Darrell E. Hamilton
 
       John David Huggins was born in Ashtabula, Ohio on April 23, 1921 to Earl and Amanda Huggins in the Maternity Hospital on Oak Street (West Eighth Street). John shares the same birthday with William Shakespeare and Shirley Temple. My very first crush was Shirley Temple. Already knowing her birthday, it is highly unlikely that I will ever forget John’s birthday.
       John’s maternal grandparents (Olson) were from Sweden. His paternal grandfather, John David Huggins emigrated from the British Isles to Ohio while his paternal grandmother came from West Virginia to settle in Ohio.
       John was one of three children. His sister Elsie Jean was the oldest and his bother James was the youngest.
       John’s father worked as the manager for The Electric Laundry at the Harbor on West Sixth Street. 
       John lived the first nine years of his life on Cherry Street (West Ninth Street). His father then built a house on West Fourth Street in 1930 during the depression.
       Growing up during the depression, John learned about not having things you dream about having. He learned about having to make do at an early age. John also learned at an early age how to make twenty five cents here and there for menial tasks.
       At age eleven there were two “old maid school teachers” that lived next to John. They were the Pearson sisters. He would mow their lawn and tend their garden. The sisters also had a stoker for their furnace. John would go over to their house once a day and make sure their house was comfortable. He continued doing chores for the sisters until he went to college. One of the sisters, Paula Pearson was John’s first grade teacher at Washington grade school.
       John made most of his money growing up by mowing grass. He was paid between twenty five to thirty five cents. John also mowed Mr. Venditti’s lawn who was the Harbor High School band director. Mr. Venditti would give John an extra ten cents for polishing his car.
       After moving to West Fourth Street, John transferred to the Jackson building through the sixth grade. Once John reached the seventh grade, he attended the high school building, Harbor High School.
       John’s first full time job was obtained when he was sixteen with the Electric Laundry during the summer months. He started out working with the process known as steam cleaning. Steam cleaning was not really steam cleaning. The clothes that were to dirty to be dry cleaned were cleaned with a lot of soap and a scrub board.  The clothes were then dried and sent through the dry cleaning process.
              When John got through with the “steam cleaning”, he would then go to the third floor to the press room where in the summer time “it was hotter than heck”. John worked there long enough to know that he didn’t want to make it his life’s work.
       The Closes were the people that owned the Electric Laundry. Mr. Close had died before John started working at the Electric Laundry. Mrs. Close ran the Electric Laundry for a while after her husband had died. Mrs. Close had an electric automobile. It was a Baker. John said it was about a 1923 and it was made in Cleveland. An electric automobile in Ashtabula at that time was a rarity. John’s father would sometimes bring the car home and give the family a ride which would thrill John and his siblings riding in such a unique automobile.
       John’s remembers while his family lived on Cherry Street, there were two Swedish families and one Irish family. Everyone else on the street was Finish. His very first playmate was a five year old Finish lad who could not speak a word of English. They played the entire day together without speaking a word to each other.
       The first great event of John’s life was when he played a cornet duet for the high school when he was in the sixth grade. John had taken cornet lessons from Richard Tuner who at the age of sixteen won the national cornet championship. John played the duet with Junior Fawcett, the son of the principal of Harbor High School.
       When John was going into the seventh grade, Mr. Venditti, the high band director, said he would put John in the senior band if he would play the tuba. John agreed and ended up playing the tuba and sousaphone all the way through high school and college.
        John graduated Harbor High School in 1939. After graduation John enrolled at Ohio State. John roomed with friends from Ashtabula. In his sophomore year at Ohio State, his friend John talked him into joining a fraternity house. John really could not afford to join but his friend talked him into washing dishes for his dues. John also worked at various summer jobs including painting houses.
         With World War II in progress, John feared being drafted before he could finish college. Between his junior and senior year, John enlisted in the Army to get a deferment for a year so he could finish college. Being he took a deferment, John had to go to college through the summer months between his junior and senior year. That summer John ran a boarding house for the fraternity and was also the treasure for the fraternity house. He made enough money off the boarding house that they were able to refurbish the entire fraternity house. John was labeled the most successful treasure in fraternity history. That was the beginning of John’s business experience.
       John met his future wife during his senior year at Ohio State. His fraternity house faced her sorority house. From his room John could see a very pretty girl coming out of the sorority house. She was wearing bobby socks, a plaid skirt and a sweater. Just what all the college girls were wearing at the time. As he watched her as he probably did many times before, he said to himself, “I’m going to marry that girl”.
        John and his future wife, Hildegarde Day met officially through a mutual friend who set up a blind date between them. Hildegarde was from Schenectady, New York. They dated for nine months. In the mean time because hr had went to summer school, John graduated early in March of 1943 with a degree in business administration. He asked his future wife to wait for him while he did his tour of duty in the Army. John went into the Army while Hildegarde finished college. She graduated in June of `1943 with a degree in landscape architecture. In the mean time, Hildegarde went back to New York and started working while John dodged bullets in Europe.
       The war was over and John was discharged on January 26, 1946. On February 16, 1946, John and Hildegarde were married in a church across the street from her parent’s house. They lived in  Schenectady with her parents while John tried to find a job. John looked for a job in New York and in the New England area but with ten million service men returning to their jobs, work was very scarce. Since John had been in college and had no permanent job to return to like most of the service men, it was very difficult to find a job.
       John and his new wife decided to give Ashtabula a try. They moved in with his parents. Hildegarde found a job right away as a clerk at Carlisle’s department store almost right away. In the spring of 1946, John was hired at Iten Fiber for thirty-five cents an hour.
       Housing in Ashtabula after the war was very scarce. A woman whose husband had passed away, offered to rent her house to John and  Hildegarde. She was to stay in the house and to have kitchen privileges. The house was located at 13th Street and Ohio Avenue.
       In 1947 their son Peter was born who is now the President of Iten Industries. Peter was to be followed by three sisters. Jill was born in 1949. Judy was born in 1950 and Margaret was born in 1955. All of his children live in Ashtabula with the exception of Judy who lives in the Chicago area. While I am on the subject of the children, I would like to thank Jill Huggins for additional information and pictures. Thank you Jill!
       In 1952 Mr. and Mrs. Huggins bought a house on West 4th Street. They would live there the next ten years.

       John had come a long way with Iten Fiber in the first twelve years he worked there. Charles Iten, who was the founder of Iten Fiber Company, was born in Switzerland. He had no family except a wife who lived in Massachusetts. In Ashtabula, Charles lived at the Ashtabula Hotel. Every Saturday as John remembers, Mr. Iten would write his wife a letter and send her a check.

       In July of 1958, Charles Iten died. Shortly afterwards his wife put Iten Fiber up for sale. There were quite a few speculators including John Huggins. John was determined to be the next owner of Iten Fiber. Only one problem stood in John’s way. He did not have the money to buy Iten Fiber but John had a million dollars worth of determination. He phoned a friend of his that served with him in the Army. This friend worked for the IRS. He ask him the question, “How can a person buy a company such as the Iten Fiber when you don’t have any money?” His friend answered, “leveraged buy out.” This was not very common in 1958 but today it is a common way of doing business. John called his banker and the rest was history.
       By the time Charles Iten died, Iten Fiber was on the skids. Fiber glass parts were cheaper to make than vulcanized fiber. Fiber glass parts cost half as much to make than vulcanized parts did. At one time Iten Fiber made all the attachment parts for all the major vacuum manufactures in the United States.
              John had talked Charles Iten into buying a small machine to make fiber glass products. After John bought Iten Fiber, vulcanized fiber parts were slowly phased out. Today, no company in the United States makes vulcanized fiber parts. According to John, only a couple companies over seas still makes vulcanized parts.
       John Huggins and Iten Fiber (Iten Industries) are no strangers to this writer. My step father, Albert Gilbert worked for Iten Fiber for thirty years starting in 1950. My brother, Charles Hamilton, worked for Iten Fiber for about twelve years when he died in 1972. Even my sister Deanna and sister-in-law worked for John Huggins at one time.
       I can remember many names from Iten Fiber. Names such as Joe Kincaid, Walter Jones, Ray Hare Sr. and many more to numerous to mention in this column.
       Going to the “plant picnic” was more like going to a family reunion. John made his employees feel more like family. Everyone seemed to know everyone else and their family. John also remembered his past employees as I interviewed him. Listening to stories about my brother and step-father was heart warming as with his other employees in the past. Many of them no longer with us.
       Today Iten Industries has expanded to many buildings and out of state. John Huggins is a story of a man who started with nothing, worked hard and wasn’t afraid to ask, what if?
       John has served on the school board and was a past president of the Ashtabula Area Chamber of Commerce. These days John is retired and spends the winters in Arizona. He has lived in the same house on Southwood since 1962. He has eight grandchildren.
       John said his secret to success is to make sure you make a profit and above all perseverance was the key. In closing John remarked, “Amen!” Happy belated birthday Mr. Huggins!

Elsie, Jimmy & John Huggins - age 10

John Huggins

  

John in his dorm room as a freshman at Ohio State.

John Huggins at Iten Fiber - 1960's

 John & Hildegarde

John, Hildegarde, Mike and Judy Loftus, Susan, Peggy, Peter & Jill - (1976)

Hildegarde & John

John David Huggins