Frederick Badet and John Teel — two men and a croquet set

begun 1874 · the name from 1888

The founding act: In 1874 a grocery clerk, Frederick H. Badet, and a woodworker, John W. Teel, began making croquet balls, mallets, and stakes by hand in their spare time, on the old Mill Race. Croquet was one of the few outdoor games proper young women of the era could play, and the sets sold across the country. In 1888 the firm took the name South Bend Toy Manufacturing Company and moved to 1012 High Street. The Studebaker brothers dealt with it directly: South Bend Toy built youth-size Studebaker farm wagons under an arrangement with the wagon firm. In 1895 the company introduced the first willow doll carriages offered in the American market, hand-woven in the factory, and became — on The History Museum's account — the nation's leading producer of doll carriages as well as croquet sets.

The run: The lines ran on for a hundred years — coaster wagons and wheelbarrows, stick and hobby horses, ball bats, doll furniture and houses — and through a partial conversion to war work in the Second World War, when baby carriages were classed essential and their production continued. The original company was sold in 1957 to Chicago interests headed by Benjamin F. Fohrman and John W. Dorgan; production in South Bend ran to 1985. The founders' own record is the founding and the first two decades; the century that followed is the Businesses section's.

Sources:

1. Businesses — "South Bend Toy Manufacturing Company" (the 1874 spare-time beginning by Badet and Teel on the Mill Race; the 1888 name and the High Street move; the Studebaker wagon arrangement; the 1895 willow doll carriages and the leading-producer standing on The History Museum's account; the war work; the 1957 sale to the Fohrman and Dorgan interests; production to 1985).