Founders Mishawaka produced for companies elsewhere

the born-here ledger, at the record's strength

William J. Oliver — the contractor: William Jesse Oliver was born 13 January 1867 in Mishawaka, a nephew of James Oliver of the chilled plow, and founded his companies elsewhere: W. J. Oliver and Company, based at Langley, South Carolina, built several hundred miles of railroad across the Southern Appalachians in the 1890s and 1900s and was one of the most successful contracting firms in the nation in its day; in September 1904, at Knoxville, Tennessee, he organized the William J. Oliver Manufacturing Company, whose Dale Avenue machine works was described in its time as the largest privately owned manufacturing plant in the South; in 1907 he founded the railroad that became the Smoky Mountain Railroad, and the same year submitted the initial low bid for the construction of the Panama Canal — the bid eventually rejected, the United States building the canal itself, the episode standing in his record at exactly that strength in the People section. He died at Knoxville on 28 March 1925. Knoxville claims him as its own on a residence claim; the birth is Mishawaka's.

Remo Belli — the drumhead maker: Remo Delmo Belli was born 22 June 1927 in Mishawaka and grew up here, in his own words. A professional jazz drummer in Los Angeles after Navy service, he opened the Drum City shop in Hollywood, and out of the shop's practical problem — calfskin heads failed in bad weather — and a collaboration with the chemist Sam Muchnick, he founded Remo Inc. in 1957 to make the Mylar drumhead that became the industry standard. The invention record is the Inventors section's — including its finding that the strong form of Belli's claim does not survive the patent record and that his earned claim stands on the 1960 patent — and his founding stands here at the class's size: a Mishawaka-raised founder whose company is California's, as Oliver's were Tennessee's. The geography is printed honestly in both: the founding acts are theirs, the ground they acted on is not Mishawaka's, and neither company is counted among the city's firms.

Sources:

1. Notable People — "William J. Oliver" (the birth of 13 January 1867 in Mishawaka; the nephew's relation to James Oliver; W. J. Oliver and Company's railroad building; the William J. Oliver Manufacturing Company organized September 1904 and the Dale Avenue works; the 1907 railroad founding and the Panama low bid, at its exact strength; the death of 28 March 1925) and "Remo Belli" (the birth of 22 June 1927 and the Mishawaka upbringing in his own words; Drum City; the Muchnick collaboration; Remo Inc. founded 1957; the Weather King standard).
2. Inventors & Inventions — Belli's claim tested against the patent record, cross-referenced.