Hooven’s partners were George Adam Rentschler, Job Owens, George Helvey, Henry Sohn and James E. Campbell, a future governor of Ohio. The parnership was incorporated in 1880 as Hooven, Owens, Rentschler (H-O-R) with J.C. Hooven as its president. The new firm continued making both of the Monarch and Eclipse lines of products. In 1883, the company manufactured its first Corliss stationary steam engine and soon specialized in making Corliss engines exclusively. H-O-R’s Corliss Engine Works became one of the largest engine makers in the country. In 1928, 12 years after Hooven’s death, it merged with the Niles Tool Works to create the General Machinery Corporation. Later mergers joined the company with Lima Locomotive in 1947 and Baldwin Locomotive in 1950.
The Hoovens owned a home in Hamilton on the northeast corner of Ross Avenue and South B Street. It had been built in 1860 as a modest eight-room brick house, and after Hooven bought it in 1882 it was expanded to 14 rooms with a tower and a ballroom on the third floor. Hooven held lavish entertainments in the home, and his guests included President William McKinley and President William Howard Taft along with other visiting celebrities. The house served as the home of the Campbell Gard Post of the Veterans of Foreign Wars from 1944 until the city of Hamilton razed it in 1969 for a road improvement project.
In 1894, Hooven purchased a 42.5-acre peach orchard on the east side of Section 2, Fairfield Twp., from Freeman G. Cary for a summer home. Cary was an 1831 graduate of Miami University and a founder of Farmer’s College in 1846 and helped start Ohio Female College in 1848, both located in College Hill, Ohio.
Cary was one of the most distinguished authorities on horticulture and agriculture in the Middle West. His residence, located on Mt. Pleasant Pike (today’s Pleasant Avenue in Fairfield), featured a beautiful lawn, deciduous trees, evergreens, shrubbery, rolling grounds and a large conservatory and greenhouse which Cary had designed for botanical experiments. It was this property that Hooven purchased in 1894 and named “Hoovenden.” The photo seen here shows the conservatory and greenhouse in the foreground and the house in the background.
A long stone wall with two entrances ran the entire length of the property adjacent to Mt. Pleasant Pike. Just outside the northern entrance was a platform for people to board or exit Cincinnati and Hamilton electric traction cars. Much of this wall and traction platform can still be seen along the west side of Pleasant Avenue between Resor Road and Gelhot Drive.
Hooven made several improvements to the property, including a complete system of water works that carried water to the house, an irrigation system and having the house’s walls frescoed by Cincinnati artists. The drive leading to the house had flower gardens on each side that created an idyllic scene for visitors. The 18-room residence was generally conceded to be one of the finest in the Southern Ohio.
Hoovenden was known as a “home of hospitality” and the Hoovens were considered to be very generous and highly cordial with visitors. They frequently entertained members of their family, H-O-R employees, business clients, local social groups such as bridge clubs, church groups, girls Hi-Y clubs, and Hamilton High School student picnics. One newspaper account of a student gathering indicated “the throng of young people summoned there by invitation came for an evening of pleasure. The young people danced on the verandas in the light of hundreds of Japanese lanterns” (Hamilton Evening Sun, June 20, 1902).
Hoovenden was nearly completely destroyed on Aug. 31, 1909, when a lace curtain in the Colonel’s room caught fire from a gas jet and the flames spread throughout the house. The Hamilton Fire Department sent their “Old Neptune” fire engine to the scene in record time and the men were able to save the stables and greenhouse. Hooven estimated the total loss from the fire at $50,000 (about $1.6 million in 2023).
A little more than three months later, on Dec. 10, 1909, another fire partly destroyed the large observatory, a small potting house and much of the greenhouse. Many palms and flowers in that building were killed by the heat. The Hamilton Evening Journal (Dec. 10, 1909) indicated that the fire “practically wiped ‘Hoovenden’ out of existence. First the magnificent residence was destroyed and now a greater part of the beautiful greenhouse. The residence of the keeper and the stables are all that remains on the estate. Col. Hooven will likely start the erection of a new country house early in the spring.”
Hooven held the property until his death in 1916 when it passed to his widow, Jennie (Enyeart) Hooven. According to Butler County land records, she sold the land to George A. Rentschler, Jr. in August 1924. Rentschler, who had replaced Hooven as president of H-O-R, renamed Hoovenden as “Home Hill Farm.”
On April 7, 1925, shortly after Rentschler had purchased Hoovenden, another fire destroyed two large barns on the property. Farm hands, passing motorists, and members of the Hamilton Fire Department were able to save the valuable greenhouse, automobiles in the garage and more than a dozen horses and cows. The destroyed barns contained hay, oats, grain and various pieces of farming equipment. The loss was estimated at $10,000 (nearly $170,000 in 2023).
Colonel Hooven received considerable wealth from his ownership of Hooven, Owens, Rentschler and spent some of it on a variety of other business ventures. He served as an officer or director of the Champion Coated Paper Company, the Republican Publishing Company, American Frog and Switch Company, Hooven Automatic Typewriter Company, Dayton Rubber Company, Cincinnati Horse Shoe and Iron Company and the F.P. Stewart Granite Company. He helped finance the Cincinnati, Lawrenceburg and Aurora Traction Company and the Cincinnati and Hamilton Electric Railway Company.
Even though his health was failing him, Hooven worked to rebuild the companies he owned that were damaged during the 1913 Great Miami Flood. He continued serving as president of Hooven, Owens, Rentschler, a position he held from 1880 until his death in 1916.
Hooven’s obituary in The Butler County Democrat indicated that he had been one of Hamilton’s best-known businessmen. “Through his power of organization, his acute business judgment, his insight into the affairs of men, made of him a leader in the business world. He achieved success because by his devotion to duty, attention to business, unswerving honesty, faithfulness in the minor details of life, made success his due” (Butler County Democrat, March 2, 1916). When Hooven died, the value of his estate including his beautiful Hoovenden summer home was estimated at $525,000 (about $14,295,000 in 2023).
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