HUNTINGTON - After attending Marshall College for two semesters in 1924,
Huntington native Henry Ray Ellinwood moved to California,
where he went
into business making camera equipment.
While
taking flying lessons, Ellinwood noticed how loosely the wires in his
plane fit together.
He devised a better way, designing an aluminum and
rubber clip that held the wires in place.
In
partnership with a man named Adler (his first name has been lost in the
mists of history),
Ellinwood opened a Burbank plant to manufacture his
clip design.
The
two men named their company Adel, taking the first two letters of their
last names. Adler
parted with the company shortly after its inception.
The company struggled in its early years,
but with the outbreak of World
War II, Adel found it couldn't produce its clips fast enough.
In
addition, military leaders worried that the California plant was in
danger should there be
Japanese air attacks. They urged Ellinwood to
build a second plant somewhere inland.
And
so in 1942, Ellinwood built a plant in his hometown of Huntington. At
the height of the
war, the plant at 1444 Adams Ave. employed as many as
500 workers on three shifts.
After
the war, the plant had its ups and downs. Meanwhile, it had passed out
of Ellinwood's hands.
In 1965, Adel was acquired by Tansamerica Delaval
Inc. In 1993, the company closed its
Huntington plant, returning all
operations to California.
Left suddenly jobless, many of Adel's veteran employees had never worked anywhere else.
Enter
Huntington businessman Rick Houvouras and other local investors, who
teamed up and raised $800,000 to start a new company - Star
Technologies.
The
new venture began operation by hiring a half-dozen former Adel employees
and pledging to them
that, once the company reached a given level of
profitability, they could become partners in it.
Today
the Star Technologies plant, located in the 2400 block of Fourth Avenue
in East Huntington,
produces millions of aircraft fasteners and other
precision parts each year.
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Note: This Article and picture appeared in the Herald-Dispatch Newspaper on Mar. 02 , 2015
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