George Matthew Verity was a steel manufacturer from the United States.
Background
George Matthew Verity was born on April 22, 1865, in East Liberty, Ohio. He was the younger of two children and only son of Jonathan and Mary Ann (Deaton) Verity. His father's family, of French Huguenot origin, had emigrated from Yorkshire, England, to Ohio in 1831; his mother was of colonial Virginia descent. She died when her son was two, and for the next two years, until their father's remarriage, the children lived with their maternal grandparents.
Jonathan Verity was a poorly paid Methodist minister whose assignments kept him moving from one part of Ohio to another, and George, with little opportunity to make lasting friendships, had a lonely, impoverished childhood.
Education
Verity attended various schools, finally graduating from the high school in Georgetown, Ohio, in 1883. When his father moved to a new pastorate in Cincinnati, George attended Woodward High School for a few months and then took an eight-month course at Nelson's Business College.
Career
Verity began his business career in 1884 as manager of the W. C. Standish Grocery Company in Cincinnati. By 1887, he had become convinced that a competing company posed a serious threat to the firm's existence and persuaded the widowed Mrs. Standish to sell out. Verity secured a position with the Sagendorph Iron Roofing and Corrugating Company of Cincinnati, and in 1888, became its manager. The firm, which manufactured sheet metal roofing, was in receivership, but Verity introduced new bookkeeping methods and, through careful supervision of production and a vigorous sales campaign, nursed it back to financial health.
After a fire nearly destroyed the company's plant, he took the lead in reorganizing it in 1891 as the American Steel Roofing Company, becoming its vice-president and general manager. During the 1890's, a decade of cannibalism among industrial competitors, he was active in forming an association of producers of sheet metal building materials and nearly effected a corporate merger of twenty-five of them in 1899.
Shortly thereafter, he became involved in a plan to organize a company to construct a sheet-steel rolling mill. Ordinarily, such mills bought steel bar from Pittsburgh and rolled it into sheets, but Verity and William Simpson, a former tin plate manufacturer, decided to become self-sufficient by erecting their own open-hearth furnace for making steel. After much difficulty, the two men were able to raise $500, 000 to construct facilities in Middletown, Ohio.
Incorporated in 1899 as the American Rolling Mill Company (Armco), with Verity as president, the company experienced early financial and production crises, but soon won some repute for bringing together an open-hearth furnace, bar mill, sheet mill, and galvanizing shop to provide a continuous chain of production. With a rising demand for steel, the company prospered; by 1904 its capitalization had risen from $500, 000 to $1, 400, 000 and the number of employees from 350 to 1, 000.
Verity died at his home in Middletown, Ohio, in 1942, shortly after suffering a stroke, and was buried there in Woodside Cemetery.
Achievements
Some impressive innovations took place under his presidency. In cooperation with the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company before World War I, Armco developed steel with magnetic permeability for use with dynamos, motors, generators, and transformers. During the same period, the company successfully experimented with "ingot iron, " which resisted corrosion and was therefore especially useful for making culverts and wire fencing.
In the early 1920's, Verity helped commit his company to the construction of a revolutionary continuous steel mill invented by John Butler Tytus; the mill was the prototype of many others that increased production of steel nationally. Through such ventures, Verity's company found an array of specialized markets.
Verity was a pioneer in welfare capitalism, introducing the eight-hour day and a variety of recreational and safety programs to Armco plants. He was also active in many projects involving the health, education, and recreation of the entire community. He won praise as a beneficent employer and civic leader, though he was occasionally accused of paternalism in his relations with employees and the community.
Personality
Though a resolute and industrious man, Verity was not a financial, marketing, or mechanical genius, but he had the ability to select line and staff men from whom he could elicit a full measure of effort.
As an industrialist, he exemplified the traditional rags-to-riches story of the businessman who, without special advantages or abilities, achieved success by pluck and diligence.
Connections
On October 19, 1887, Verity married Jennie M. Standish; they had three children, Calvin, Leah, and Sara.
