HISTORY, SHE WROTE
Rosalie Yoakam
Shroyer Road is named for one of the original pioneer families of Montgomery County. Brothers, John and Jacob Shroyer, moved to the county in 1810 from Maryland.
John’s grandson, George Shroyer, was born Sept. 26, 1865 in Montgomery County. He was one of the five sons of Andrew J. and Mary Ann Oakes Shroyer.
Of his early school training the Centennial Portrait and Biographical Record of the City of Dayton and Montgomery County, Ohio, edited by Frank Conover in 1897 says he “received a good common-school education in his native township.”
At the age of 15, Shroyer left school and went to work in Dayton. There he helped his father in the agricultural implement business.
Two years later, at the age of 17, he became a traveling salesman. Shroyer covered Missouri, Kansas and Texas for about five years selling harvesters and binding machines.
He next worked for the Joyce, Cridland & Company in the U.S. and Canada and sold railroad supplies. This job lasted six years.
In 1887 Shroyer married Fannie R. Joyce, the daughter of Frank I. Joyce, a Dayton native, who later became president of the Joyce, Cridland & Company.
The Shroyers’ had three children: Hazel, Clifford, and Thelma.
After leaving Joyce, Cridland & Company, Shroyer established a sporting goods store called G.W. Shroyer & Co. of Dayton. It was opened in 1894 at 23 W. Fifth St. and sold bicycles and various bicycle wheels, attachments and supplies. The company also did repairs.
Shroyer later owned a Cadillac agency in Dayton.
Besides being a business man, Shroyer was civic minded. In 1914, he became the first mayor of Dayton under the manager form of government.
Following World War I, the city of Dayton faced a challenge concerning aviation development. Charlotte Reeve Conover explained the situation in her book: ‘‘Dayton, Ohio An Intimate History,’’ writing ‘‘the government realized that a central experimental plant was necessary and Dayton was chosen as the most logical location.... If Dayton wanted the research field she would have to produce for the government a suitable site.”
Frederick Beck Patterson, the son of John H. Patterson had done aerial photography during WWI. He decided to raise the money to give such a site to the government. It would be located near the village of Fairfield (later combined with Osborn into the city of Fairborn).
To reach this goal Patterson organized a 19-member Dayton Air Service committee. G.W. Shroyer was one of those members.
After a successful campaign, Patterson sent a telegram to the U.S. Air Service. It read in part: “Our public spirited citizens today subscribed sufficient money to buy the new site for the government’s aviation experimental field on the eastern boundary of Dayton.
“Enough money was raised to pay for the five thousand acres in the proposed gift and a ... nucleus for a memorial to the Wright Brothers.”
Shroyer, therefore, had a hand in preserving Dayton’s aviation heritage.
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