Selle Generator Works

The Selle Gear Company was incorporated September 25, 1886. The timber-frame, four-story red-brick building dates to 1888. A boiler and engine room were attached. It was constructed on Chestnut St (now Selle St) between S High St and Broadway St. Their specialty was the manufacture of the Selle Platform Truss Gears, for omnibuses, three spring wagons and trucks, as well as suspensions and parts for horse-drawn carriages. The Akron Selle Co. was bought in 1903 by Akron's Hower family.

The company grew and evolved over the years, adding buildings and additions as times changed. Akron Selle Co. got into metal stampings before World War I, and for a time built truck bodies. During World War II, workers made military parts. Akron Selle Co. produced parts for cars, trucks and planes -- and even gasoline gauges for dirigibles. Akron Selle continued to make sheet metal stampings for the auto industry until they closed their doors for good in March 2001. The property was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on November 9, 2005. The historic property is now known as The Selle Generator Works.