See also: Huffy documents

Country: USA

The story of Huffy starts with the founding of the Davis Sewing Machine Company in Waterton, New York State, by John and Joseph Sheldon. The company manufactured sewing machines to a design by Job Davis - hence the name. In 1887 the company got into financial difficulties and was bought by George Huffman who moved the company to Dayton, Ohio. In 1892 George Huffman introduced the manufacture of bicycles. This was quite a common diversification at the time - the three great mass-produced precision-engineered goods of the time were sewing machines, machine guns and bicycles - and if you could make one of these you could probably make the other two. Sewing machines and bicycles had another synergy in areas with a continental climate - sewing machines sold during the long, cold winters and bicycles sold in sun drenched summers.

In 1924 the Davis Sewing Machine Company again got into financial difficulties and was taken over by The Huffman Manufacturing Company (also owned by George Huffman!). in 1934 the Huffman Manufacturing Company, now owned by Horace Huffman Sr, introduced the infamous ‘Huffy’ brand of bicycles. In 1976 Huffy proudly declared that it was the biggest selling bicycle brand in the US and in 2006 Huffy claimed to have sold over 100 million bicycles in its history. Huffy exists to this day, although I suspect that all its bikes are manufactured in the Far East - and are much the better for that. More...