117 Ruch Street Coplay, PA 18037
John Goodison, who had been general agent for the bankrupt Sarni
Agricultural Implement Assn. Co., together with G. H. Samis,
purchased the interest and factory of the insolvent company. They
operated for a year, but under adverse circumstances, and were glad
to enter into negotiations with the Sawyer & Massey Co. of
continued as usual and John Goodison was retained as manager by the
Hamilton firm.
John Goodison 20 HP steam traction engine built in 1922 by the
John Goodison Thresher Company, and owned by Donald Shell of
Ontario.
John Goodison was not satisfied with the new arrangement, and
late in 1889 acquired sole ownership of the concern. The days of
Sawyer & Massey control convinced him of the future of the
threshing machine industry, and he wisely abandoned the manufacture
of reapers and plows and concentrated on threshing machinery. For a
while he called his factory the Tunnel City Thresher Works, but
soon changed it to the John Goodison Thresher Co. Meanwhile, the
fame of the Mc Closky thresher was spreading, and in 1892 Mr.
Goodison acquired the right to build these machines. He persuaded
John Mc Closky to move to Sarnia and work in his factory. The years
that followed saw the firm prospering and soon the Goodison
‘New Mc Closky’ threshers were favorably known throughout
both eastern and western Canada.
A 20 HP John Goodison steam traction engine built in 1920. This
engine is owned by Vince Riddell of Ontario, Canada, and is here
chugging around at the Ontario Steam & Antique Preservers show
at Milton, Ontario, Canada.
John Mc Closky was born in Ireland in 1847. At the age of
seventeen he came to Canada along with his parents, three sisters
and five brothers. The family located in the bush near the tiny
settlement of Old castle, about 11 miles from the present city of
Windsor, Ontario, Canada.
John Mc Closky died of pneumonia in 1902 at the age of 55,
leaving behind in his workshop several uncompleted models of
inventions he had been working on. John Goodison was called by the
Lord in 1915. The firm, now known as Goodison Industries Limited,
is still headed by the third generation of the Goodison family.
Author Norbeck and the Norbeck Research Library, which now
contains over 550 binders of history and information from around
the globe.
In 1902 they began to build a few portable engines and two years
later entered the traction engine field. Only single cylinder, side
mounted engines were built and the original design was never
changed.
In 1920 Goodisons began selling Hart-Parr gas tractors and after
the big merger of 1929 became Canadian distributor of Oliver
tractors and equipment. Thus, another well known make of threshing
machinery and steam traction engines passed into history.
The big merger was of the following companies, Nichols &
Shepard Company, Hart-Parr Company, American Seeding Machine
Company and the Oliver Chilled Plow Company merged to form the
Oliver Farm Equipment Corporation. Then the White Motor Corporation
acquired the Oliver Corporation in 1960. Today the White Farm
Equipment Company from South Bend, IN, is a division of Allied
Products Corporation.
22 HP 1927 John Goodison, owned by Mr. Leroy Walker of Glen
Rock, PA; photographed at the 1987 Rough &Tumble Reunion,
Kinzers, PA.
