Richard Knight LeBlond was my great-grandfather’s brother and son of Robert Emmet LeBlond and Elizabeth Jane Knight. He is not in my direct line.

From the Cincinnati Business Courier, March 9, 1998:

R.K. LeBlond’s legacy lives on

Now Makino Machine Tool Co. in Mason, LeBlond was a leader in the production of lathes and other tools

By Steven Wright, Courier Contributor

At the Rookwood Pavilion shopping center in Norwood, one can sip gourmet coffee, browse through a best-seller, consume a meal, get a haircut or purchase clothes and shoes. However, from 1917 to 1989, one of the premier tool companies in the world, the R.K. LeBlond Machine Tool Co., occupied the site. The company now operates as Makino Machine Tool Co. in Mason.

The early career of the company’s founder, Richard LeBlond (1864-1953), was in the tradition of many successful, late-19th-century industrialists. Born in Cincinnati, LeBlond attended public schools, but dropped out to work as an apprentice for the Franklin Type Foundry. He continued his education at the Ohio Mechanics Institute in the evenings.

In the early 1880s, LeBlond moved to St. Louis and worked as a journeyman machinist in a type foundry. Two years later, he obtained a job with Brown and Sharpe in Providence, R.I.

Feeling confident and determined to succeed, LeBlond returned to Cincinnati in 1887 and, with two employees, began manufacturing type molds, gauges and small tools. Business was so brisk the first year that LeBlond hired five additional men and moved the operation from Pearl Street to a much larger facility at Second and Plum streets.

In 1891, LeBlond received an order from Lodge & Davis Machine Tool Co., (later American Tool Works) for lathe attachments and 12-inch lathes. This event, concluded a historical study, “marked the beginning of the LeBlond Co. as a producer of machine tools.”

In addition to these orders, the superintendent at Lodge & Davis, Nicholas Chard, left and formed a partnership with LeBlond. Chard encouraged the “new” company, LeBlond and Chard, to manufacture not only lathes, but to design them, too. Following Chard’s suggestion, the company’s new product line was developed in 1892, when it unveiled its own 14-inch lathe.

The Panic of 1893 took its toll on the fledgling company. For a while, only LeBlond and Chard worked, then Chard, disillusioned with the firm’s progress, sold his interest to LeBlond and left. The bicycle craze of the mid-1890s helped refuel LeBlond’s operation as bicycle manufacturers clamored for production lathes.

In the midst of the company’s rebound, LeBlond hired William Groene as a design engineer. Groene’s impact on the company was immediate. In a few years, LeBlond moved from manufacturing only one type of lathe to producing several different sizes, as well as single and multiple-spindle drills and milling machines. To accommodate this expansive growth, the company moved to a new facility in Linwood and incorporated as R.K. LeBlond Machine Tool Co.

The company accomplished a great deal in Linwood. It developed gun-boring lathes which became a company staple and proved beneficial during World War I. The company won a bronze medal in 1900 for design at the Paris Exhibition. Soon after, LeBlond produced its first gear-driven lathe equipped with a chain drive and an independent electric motor.

It became evident by 1916 that the Linwood facility could not accommodate all the company’s manufacturing needs. LeBlond employed 830 and received orders totaling $4.8 million, and with Europe at war, there was an unprecedented need for LeBlond’s gun-boring lathes. In just two years, the company employed more than 1,000 and orders totaled $7.4 million.

To meet the demand, a new and innovative factory was constructed in 1917 on 21 acres at the corner of Edwards and Madison roads. Designed by the Cincinnati firm Zettel and Rapp, the new facility exemplified the “factory beautiful,” a school of industrial design popular in the early 20th century. In addition to modern production areas (everything from nuts and bolts to shafts and scales were produced to make the operation almost totally self-sufficient), a self-contained powerhouse and raw/finished material distribution points, the facility gave special attention to the workers’ environment, inside and outside.

The designers took advantage of natural lighting, in addition to installing state-of-the-art electric lighting. Workers’ locker rooms were equipped with showers and modern washrooms. Other amenities included an employee dining hall, an infirmary and a coffee-service area, as well as apprentice- and shop-training classrooms.

The outside grounds resembled a park, complete with a lake, fountain, stone bridge and landscaped pavilion. Public access did not become restricted until World War II when, because of defense work, the government required a fence topped with barbed wire.

After years of experimentation, Groene and his research team found a way of turning automobile crankshafts. In 1927-1928, LeBlond marketed a special crankshaft lathe that revolutionized the industry. What had required several special-purpose lathes to accomplish could now be completed on a single lathe. Between 30 and 50 crankshafts could be produced in one hour, far exceeding the previous production rate.

For more than 50 years, LeBlond was the leading producer in the world of this special lathe — virtually every American car had its crankshaft made on a LeBlond lathe.

Throughout the 1920s and in the years following World War II, LeBlond diversified its product line into manufacturing small aircraft engines, electric hand tools, trucks, fire engines and industrial mixers. Some of the products were newly developed while others resulted from acquisitions.

Throughout the 1930s, the poor economy affected LeBlond. Shipments fell to levels the company had not experienced since the early 1900s. Employment suffered, too. In 1932, LeBlond employed only 155, again, a level not seen since the early 1900s.

LeBlond rebounded quickly with America’s entry into World War II. The company devoted its entire facility to defense work. Employing more then 1,300, LeBlond churned out numerous types of gun-boring lathes so vital to the war effort.

By the 1950s, LeBlond was the unquestioned leader in lathe production. It claimed almost all of the domestic market and about 70 percent of the international. However, by the 1960s and 1970s, increased competition from the Far East and the general downward spiral of numerous American hard-core manufacturing operations, including the automobile industry, forced LeBlond to make changes.

By the 1970s, LeBlond ceased crankshaft lathe production. The company’s last foray into lathes at the Norwood facility was developing numerically-controlled lathes used in manufacturing large jet engines and nose cones for missiles and rockets.

Gradually, it became obvious that the exacting specifications, extreme temperature requirements and the necessity for “clean” environments, coupled with the size and weight of the lathes, would force LeBlond to move. Modern manufacturing standards could no longer be maintained in a 72-year-old facility.

In 1989, eight years after LeBlond was purchased by Makino Milling Machine Co. Ltd. of Tokyo, it moved to a state-of-the-art facility in Mason, along Interstate 71. Today, the company employs about 450 and specializes in die/mold machinery and aerospace lathe products.