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An American Enterprise Abroad: American Radiator Company in Europe, 1895–1914

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2010

Mira Wilkins
Mira Wilkins
Affiliation:
Visiting Lecturer in History, Smith College
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Abstract

Although Singer was the first American manufacturing firm to produce and market extensively in Europe, the American Radiator Company is perhaps more typical of the United States firms that expanded abroad in the nineteenth century. Professor Wilkins documents the evolution of this multinational enterprise and offers her study as a test of recent theories on direct investment abroad.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 43 , Issue 3 , Autumn 1969 , pp. 326 - 346
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1969

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References

1 In my forthcoming book, The Emergence of Multinational Enterprise: American Business Abroad from the Colonial Era to 1914, to be published by Harvard University Press, I document in detail the large number of U.S. companies that went into international business in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. My book and Mr. Davies' article in this issue of Business History Review give a background on the experiences of the Singer company.

2 Unless otherwise noted, unpublished material referred to in this article is from the Secretary's Office or the International Division of the American Radiator and Standard Sanitary Corporation (American-Standard), New York, N.Y. The management of that corporation kindly opened the records to me for this research.

3 These generalizations will be documented in my forthcoming book.

4 Clarence Woolley, Report to American Radiator Company, Board of Directors, Sept. 18, 1894; Bond, Joseph, Report to Board of Directors, June 23, 1896.Google Scholar

5 Bond, , Report to Shareholders, January 18, 1895Google Scholar; Bond, , Report to Board of Directors, June 11, 1895Google Scholar; Interview with J. Miller, January 1963.

6 Bond, , Report to Board of Directors, June 11, 1895.Google Scholar

7 Bond, , Report to Shareholders, January 22, 1896Google Scholar; Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, March 10, June 23, 1896.

8 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, November 10, 1896; Report to Shareholders, January 19, 1897.

9 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, December 22, 1897. Woolley had made a trip to Europe in the summer of 1897, and doubtless he supported these proposals. See Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, September 7, 1897.

10 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, December 22, 1897, July 15, 1898, January 15, 1924.

11 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, June 11, 1895; Letter from Downe in Minutes of Shareholders Meeting, January 22, 1896.

12 The difficulty lies in showing how Courtot was paid for the factory. There is no indication of its being acquired by the newly established French radiator company, but from all circumstantial evidence, it must have been.

13 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, American Radiator, May 10, August 23, September 7, 1898; Interview with Miller, January 1963; By-Laws, Compagnie Nationale des Radiateurs, American-Standard, International Division; Minutes, General Meeting of Compagnie Nationale des Radiateurs, October 28, 1898, June 25, 1901; Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, Compagnie Nationale des Radiateurs, October 28, 1898.

14 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, American Radiator, November 3, 1899, January 15, 1924.

15 Ibid., June 23, 1896; Interview with Grazier, January 1963.

16 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, March 1, 1900.

17 Ibid., November 3, 1899; Woolley Report in Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, February 2, 1900.

18 Woolley Report in Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, February 2, 1900.

19 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, March 1, 1900.

20 Ibid.

21 Ibid., March 1 and August 3, 1900.

22 Ibid., November 1, 1900.

23 Ibid.

24 Ibid., February 4, 1901; Clough, Shepard, A Century of American Life Insurance (New York, 1946), 163.Google Scholar

25 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, February 5, 1901.

26 Ibid., October 31, 1902.

27 Ibid., July 31, 1903.

28 Ibid., May 2, 1905.

29 Ibid., August 3, 1905.

30 Ibid., October 27, 1905.

31 Prospectus, in Scudder Collection, Columbia University Library, New York.

32 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, January 24, 1906.

33 Ibid., October 27, 1905.

34 Ibid., July 31, 1906.

35 Ibid., November 5, 1907.

36 Ibid.

37 Ibid., November 3, 1910, November 1, 1912.

38 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, Compagnie Nationale des Radiateurs, November 19, 1902, American-Standard, International Division; Interview with Miller, February 1963.

39 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, National Radiator Company, Ltd., September 20, 1911; Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, Compagnie Nationale des Radiateurs, September 15, 1904; Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, National Radiator Gesellschaft m. b. H., January 12, August 19, 1904, April 15, 1906, April 25, 1907, April 30, 1912. All the previous records are located in American-Standard, International Division. See also Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, American Radiator, November 1, 1912.

40 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, American Radiator, November 3, 1910. The stock in the Italian company was in 1914 paid by the German company as a dividend to the parent concern. Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, Nationale Radiator Gesellschaft, July 10, 1914, American-Standard, International Division.

41 Minutes, Board of Directors Meeting, American Radiator, November 3, 1910.

42 Ibid., November 3, 1911.

43 Annual Report, 1914, American Radiator.

44 The concept of “defensive” investment was suggested to me by Professor Raymond Vernon.

45 Kindleberger, Charles P., American Business Abroad (New Haven, 1969), 1–36.Google Scholar

46 See Polk, Judd, Meister, Irene W., and Veit, Lawrence A., U.S. Production Abroad and the Balance of Payments: A Survey of Corporate Investment Experience (New York, 1966), esp. Chap. 3.Google Scholar

47 In Polk et al., there is unquestionably a deterministic streak: “The choice of the company between exporting and producing abroad is not a free choice but determined by marketing and financial conditions partly or largely beyond their control.” Ibid., 22. On the other hand, they point out: “Broadly speaking, the growth of manufacturing is directly related to economic development abroad and the collective desire of U.S. business to participate in this promising growth.” Ibid., 43, my italics; “desire” would seem to imply choice.

48 In another lecture Kindleberger changes his stance: “There is no rule of thumb as to whether any given direct investment will improve or reduce competition….” Kindleberger, , American Business Abroad, 66.Google Scholar

49 Polk, et al., U.S. Production Abroad and the Balance of Payments, esp. chap. 3.Google Scholar

50 Wilson, Charles, The History of Unilever, 3 vols. (New York, 1968)Google Scholar, passim.

51 Kindleberger, American Business Abroad, implied in many places.