Background
Elmer Henry Maytag was born on September 15, 1883, in Newton, Massachusetts, United States. He and had as a brother Lewis Bergman Maytag.
Elmer Henry Maytag was born on September 15, 1883, in Newton, Massachusetts, United States. He and had as a brother Lewis Bergman Maytag.
Elmer Henry Maytag attended the Newton schools and spent two years at the University of Illinois (now the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign).
Elmer Maytag became treasurer of the Maytag company in 1909 and in 1920 was elected secretary and treasurer. He also founded the Maytag Dairy Farms.
In addition to guiding the Maytag Company very successfully through expansion and building a sound financial base that enabled the company to weather the difficult years of the Great Depression, Elmer Maytag quietly devoted considerable time and energy to bettering the lives of his employees and fellow townspeople. The Jasper County Savings Bank, of which he was president, provided credit to business and professional people and to area farmers. He instructed bank employees to give the borrowers every opportunity to keep their property and dignity. There is no record of anyone being thrown off a farm or out of a home if they made a sincere effort to meet their responsibilities. At one point, when the factory was closed because of a lack of orders, Elmer Maytag opened the factory and paid wages out of his own pocket so that the families of employees would have a happier Christmas. During the Depression, he anonymously paid for thousands of dollars worth of groceries and other necessities for townspeople who were in need.
The Maytag Dairy Farm developed from one dairy cow that, in 1919, provided milk for his children, to a large Holstein-Friesian dairy herd that won many awards, to a 4,200-acre farming enterprise, to the actual dairy operation that now produces the world-renowned Maytag Blue Cheese.
Elmer Henry Maytag married Ora Kennedy in 1909, and they had four children: Frederick Louis "Fred II," Mary Louise Maytag, Robert E. Maytag, and Elizabeth J. Maytag.