20211015_GYS2021-22_INSIDE_PAGES

GUIDE TO YELLOW SPR INGS | 2021– 2022 7 market. Believing the college years were a time for learn - ing from life itself as well as from books, Morgan required both work and study of every student. This makes it possible today for 1,700 students, skimmed from the top rank of high school seniors in every state, to attend a college that can accommodate less than 1,000. For every student in a classroom, there is another student out in the world filling a paid job. Each quarter in the year round schedule, some students return to classes and others go out to fill jobs of every kind in all parts of the country and sometimes (under the Education Abroad Program) in distant lands. The returning students bring a rich cargo of first-hand knowledge to be shared not only with classmates and professors but with townspeople. To test Morgan’s second theory, the town guinea pig stayed home. But it achieved changes just as drastic as those that revived the college. “I never agreed with the idea that a community should entice industry with tax incen - tives and other pay-offs,” says Morgan, who has always preferred small business to specialized big business and who is still going strong at 85 as president of Community Services, Inc., an organization concerned with every aspect of community development. “The first thing is to create the proper intellectual climate. In such an environment, new enterprises can be born, develop an economic base for the town and attract other cre - ative elements which will make the town thrive both economi- cally and culturally. Modern technology opens up a great field for development of new industries in communities that provide an atmosphere of free- dom and intellectual ferment in which to experiment.” In the early 1920’s, the Antioch College cash drawer was empty. But the new presi- dent offered to back any prom - ising ideas with the college’s own peculiar capital — advice, encouragement and a place to work. The available workshops weren’t much at first but the advice and encouragement were top-notch. The results were top-notch, too. Student Morris Bean became interested in the so-called “lost wax” cast- ing method while working in a foundry. Using college facilities, Bean and his wife developed a new method for casting aluminum, now known as the “Antioch process.” Today they employ some 400 workers, making precision aluminum castings, tire molds and other products, and their staff is heavily loaded with Antioch graduates. Working with students in the college laboratories, Sergius Vernet perfected a thermostat that is used today in almost every household washing machine, in airplanes and army tanks, many auto- mobiles and satellites. He now employs over 200 persons, including 30 experimental and research experts who are still developing new products. Hardy Trolander and two other former students started the Yellow Springs Instrument Co. in two college science rooms, making special equip- ment, ranging from electronic stopwatches accurate to within one ten-thousandth of a second to instruments for measuring the rate of blood flow. They struck it rich with a precision electronic timer for an Air Force bomb-scoring system, built their own plant and now employ about 50 workers. “The college was behind us,” Trolander said recently. “It is the greatest spirit for development of free enterprise.” As a student at Antioch, Ernest Morgan got a job in a New York printing plant where he met and admired the work of Bruce Rogers and other out- standing typographers. While still a student, Morgan bought $300 worth of second-hand equipment and started the Antioch Bookplate Company in a tiny shop. He hitchhiked through neighboring states to get dealers to handle his prod- uct, then returned to Yellow Springs to do his own printing. The first year, sales totaled $400. Two years later, when he was a senior, they were up to $1,300. Today the company employs some 25 persons, Continued on page 8 Hardy Trolander, left, and David Case in the Yellow Springs Instru - ments facility at Antioch College. The business was one of several that contributed to the industrial core of Yellow Springs, eventu - ally becoming one of the village’s largest employers. A Distinctive Country Inn Hotel “ A Visual Masterpiece” – Cincinnati Enquirer Recommended by OHIO Magazine and Fodor’s Travel Guide • Deluxe Continental Breakfast • Completely Smoke-Free Facility • Deluxe Jacuzzi Suites • Historical Displays Just 10 minutes from Yellow Springs! 10 S. Main Street (Rt. 72) Cedarville, Ohio 937-766-3000 www.hearthstoneinn.com