The “barn” was a real barn on Central Avenue in Dayton where Col. Edward Andrew Deeds and Charles Kettering arguably kickstarted modern motoring and helped birth what was then DELCO — Dayton Engineering Laboratories Co. Together with other technically inclined minds, the “gang” tinkered with what became the electric cash register and other inventions. A replica of the barn can be found at Carillon Park today.
In the years following the Great Flood of 1913, Deeds and Kettering founded the Dayton Engineers Club on East Monument Avenue in full view of the Great Miami River, evidently confident in the Miami Conservancy District’s flood prevention plans. Aviation pioneer Orville Wright was a club member for 34 years.
Decades later, in the early 1990s, club members resurrected the idea of the Barn Gang, in spirit if not in a literal barn. They met every Tuesday for lunch and talked over technical and engineering problems, but also history and business issues.
They still meet each Tuesday, and now the club is designating the third Thursday of every month as its “Entrepreneur Night” when those with an interest in engineering and business can gather over drinks for connections and conversation. The next session will be 7 p.m. Dec. 15.
“It has a social aspect definitely, but it’s not a social club,” said Ben Graham, industrial engineer and owner of Ben Graham Corp., who could be found at the club on a recent morning with a name tag pinned to his jacket identifying himself as a member of the “Barn Gang.”
Bob Johnson — fellow member and former electrical engineer for what was General Motors’ DELCO Products Division — said the Barn Gang’s name was chosen quite deliberately.
“We’re all pretty well caught up in the history of the Engineer’s Club and the original Barn Gang,” he said.
“When you mention the names of Deeds and Kettering, they mean a great deal to us,” Graham said.
Jim Tankersley, principal research scientist for Battelle in Dayton and a recent speaker for the club, said the gatherings benefit younger members in particular, giving them a chance to tap into a “brain trust” with long experience.
“A lot of the guys here are still tinkering in their garage,” Tankersley said. “Every now and then, someone comes up with something.”
Graham recalled that there was a time when club employees could not remove table cloths for cleaning before they were reviewed by club officers. It seems members were scribbling crucial calculations on the table cloths, and they didn’t want to lose that data.
It wasn’t all equations and inventions, though. Harry Couch, who worked for GM’s Inland Division as a chemist, recalled how Deeds established crucial connections with New York bankers when he worked to help build a power station near Niagara Falls. Those connections across an array of fields proved useful when growing Dayton businesses needed loans in the early 20th century, he said.
“It’s really what made the community wealthy and growing 100 years ago,” Couch said. “That’s what we’d like to get back to.”
In that spirit, attorneys, accountants, salespeople and other professionals are welcome at the Engineers Club, said Scott Reeve, club president and member since 2000, as well as president of Composite Advantage.
“If you’re talking to more people, you’re going to find more opportunities,” Reeve said.
And more ideas. Members of the latest incarnation of the Barn Gang don’t believe that Dayton’s best days are behind it.
“Fifty years from now, they’ll be talking about today’s members,” Graham predicted.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2390 or tgnau@Dayton DailyNews.com.
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