Our History
More Than a Century of Success
Our company dates back to 1902, the year Teddy Roosevelt became the first American president to ride in an automobile; the U.S. paid France $40,000 for the rights to the Panama Canal; and Michigan beat Stanford in the first Rose Bowl game. That same year in Columbus, Ohio, E. C. Derby founded the Buckeye Stamping Company, and the origins of our company were firmly established.
Back then we served many Ohio-based companies, delivering our products via horse-drawn wagons. A few years later in 1910, we opened an operations plant in close proximity to our largest customer, Federal Glass, and started to produce parts in that new facility.
By 1943, the company had grown enough to attract investors. That’s when Floyd Bell, president of Bell Sound, purchased the Buckeye Stamping Company. We continued to produce parts for military equipment, small candles, and intercom-wired tow lines used for pilot communication during flight.
When the 1950s arrived, the Buckeye Stamping Company expanded to an 80,000-square-foot facility on Marion Road in Columbus. Ten years later, Bell founded F. W. Bell Inc. within the walls of the Buckeye Stamping Company and manufactured voltage testing instruments, sensors, and gravity measuring equipment at that location. During that time, the company designed and manufactured instrument knobs and electronic enclosures using machinery and employees from the Buckeye Stamping Company.
In the early 1960s, the company began to sell instrument knobs, followed by the addition of enclosures toward the end of that decade. In 1971, Bell founded Floyd Bell Associates under the Buckeye Stamping Company, and the company manufactured electronic audio alarm devices. That same year Bell’s son, Dave Bell, took over as president of the company. Dave Bell led the company until his death in 1986, at which time the vice president, Dick Osborne, took over until his retirement in 1998.
Buckeye Merges With Shapeform
In 1995, company stockholders sold the Buckeye Stamping Company to D & H Holdings Ltd. The following year Buckeye Stamping purchased Shapeform Inc. Based in Plain City, Ohio, Shapeform Inc. manufactured deep draw tube-shaped aluminum products. End users included missile and flare housings for the military, oxygen tanks for firefighters and scuba divers, air cleaner housings for Hummer vehicles, electronic tracking devices used by the United States Navy, and other tubular products.
The merged companies operated under a new name, Buckeye Shapeform. The seamless tin containers, plastic knobs, metal and plastic enclosures and metal Shapeform products were manufactured at the corporate facility.
In 2000, Kenneth Tumblison became president of Buckeye Shapeform. During the severe economic downturn that marked a decline in revenue of between 25 and 30 percent, he played a big role in keeping the company in business. Today, Buckeye Shapeform stands strong as a vibrant competitor in the marketplace.