History
From 1828 to the Present
Reed Supply Company Inc. is the culmination of what began as the Paddock Iron Works in 1828, a machine shop in St. Johnsbury, VT. It was taken over by O.V. Hooker and Frank Hooker and operated as O. V. Hooker & Son until the Hooker family took over completely in 1878 changing the name again toHooker Manufacturing Corporation. The Hooker family had one of the best equipped machine shops in New England at the time while also producing their standard products of smoke stacks, draft tubes, spark arresters, saw mills, etc. Dupont hammers and Howard saw tables were also manufactured there, both of which were St. Johnsbury inventions.
In 1916, Frank and Ralph Hooker sold their interest to Perley Hazen, Louis Smythe, Alexander Dunnet and Morton J. Reed. Mr. Reed had been employed by Hooker Manufacturing Corporation as a bookkeeper for 10 years and gradually began acquiring the stock of the other owners. During this time, the business operated as Hooker – Reed Co., until 1926 when Morton Reed acquired all of the stock and interest in the company and the name was changed again to Reed Supply Co., Inc.
While operating as Reed Supply Co., Inc., there have been several ownership changes. Morton Reed died suddenly at the age of 56. His son, Carlyle, took over the business and gradually shifted its operations from a machine shop to dealers in machinery, industrial and mill supplies.
Carlyle Reed sold the business to Doug Beane and Eugene McDonough. Doug Beane had been an employee of Reed Supply Co., Inc. Eugene McDonough at that time was married to Carlyle Reed’s daughter, Barbara. Upon their retirement in 1991, R. Douglas Hamilton purchased Reed Supply Co., Inc., from Doug Beane and Eugene McDonough. He began adding a line of logging supplies to the business sometime in 1998. On July 1, 2004, Kevin and Pam Johnson purchased the business from R. Douglas (Pam’s father), who retired one year later. Kevin remains today as owner of Reed Supply Company, Inc.
Reed Supply Co., Inc. continues to sell Industrial, Mill and Logging Supplies, Safety & PPE, Industrial shipping items, and much more. We stock a large selection of fasteners, drill bits, Rustoleum paints, Norton abrasives, shovels, gloves, stock steel, steel banding chain, cable, and many other miscellaneous industrial supplies. We deliver throughout most of Vermont and western New Hampshire.
St Johnsbury Man Has 100 Year Old Machine Shop
January 27, 1928 – Unknown Newspaper Article
The century old machine shop in this town has changed its name, but not its management, and Morton J. Reed has purchased the interests of the other stock-holders in the Hooker Manufacturing Corporation and will conduct the factory hereafter under the name of Hooker-Reed Company.
In the century since the shop was established on the Passumpsic River by J. C. and J. H. Paddock, there have been more than a dozen people interested either in its management or ownership, or both. O. V. Hooker, and his son, Frank B. Hooker, were the longest owners and in 1912 capitalized their partnership into a $50,000 corporation.
Starting in 1878, they sold out in 1916 when Mr. Reed was advanced from bookkeeper to manager. He was educated at the St. Albans VT high school and received his business education at the Albany Business College. Mr. Reed is active in the church and fraternal life of the community.
