Park Sherman
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Park Sherman Company was an American manufacturer based in Springfield, Illinois, founded in the early 1930s when Jacob Sherman purchased the plant of the Springfield-based Shanklin Manufacturing Co. The Park Sherman Company operated in Springfield from the early 1930s, when founder Jacob Sherman bought a plant formerly operated by the Springfield-based Shanklin Manufacturing Co., until 1960. Sherman had earlier founded the Universal Lamp Company in 1913 to produce his patented Auto-Lite carbide miners' lamps, and by 1918, Sherman had moved the company from Staunton, IL to Chicago, before eventually taking over the Springfield plant. After replacing Shanklin, Park Sherman continued to make lamps and other items for the mining industry, including the popular Storm King line of lamps.
While the firm's roots were in mining equipment, it became far better known in the decades that followed for its stylish consumer and office goods. Park Sherman became better known for producing cigarette lighters, desk accessories and a variety of office and novelty items. Park Sherman Co. was known for producing a variety of desktop items and smokers' accessories, with key products including cigarette cases, lighters, and desk sets. Its output ranged from perpetual calendars and cigar/cigarette boxes to barware and novelty desk organizers, often executed in brass, chrome, cork, and lacquered wood with Art Deco or later mid-century modern styling. According to a 2004 presentation to the Sangamon County Historical Society, one of the local newspapers once estimated that most Springfield residents had Park Sherman items in their homes without realizing it, a testament to how ubiquitous the brand's small decorative and functional objects had become in mid-20th-century American homes and offices.
The company was sold in 1960 to the New Jersey firm Ketcham & McDougall, after which the Park Sherman division moved from Springfield to Murfreesboro, Tenn., with only seven of the 300 workers moving with the company, and Jacob Sherman died the following year. Today, Park Sherman pieces are actively sought by collectors of Art Deco and mid-century decorative arts and smoking memorabilia, prized for their period materials, playful design, and the brand's now-storied place in American industrial design history.
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