image: company logos from 1920 to today. For over a century, Gunlocke has manufactured great furniture for large and small companies, government agencies and even U.S. Presidents. Image: Earliest existing photograph of factory exterior. 1902: William H. Gunlocke and four other wood furniture experts acquire a vacant factory in Wayland, New York. They establish the W. H. Gunlocke Chair Company, which initially specializes in seating for homes, libraries and lounges. Image: Photo of the factory floor. 1911: The rapidly growing company expands its range of products to include office seating. 1912: Gunlocke introduced steambending in the company’s manufacturing process. Image: A sell sheet featuring some of the latest Gunlocke Products.. 1920: Gunlocke was awarded its first National Contract with Western Electric. Due to this contract, demand for Gunlocke’s office seating was so strong that the company discontinues its household furniture to concentrate on manufacturing for the corporate market.
Image: 1930s advertisement featuring "Distinctly Modern Office Furniture." Despite the Depression, Gunlocke continues to grow. President Franklin D. Roosevelt enhances the company’s prestige by choosing Gunlocke furniture for the White House. 1937: Following the death of his father, Howard Gunlocke became president and established the use of direct sales people and showrooms. Howard also used the first traveling showroom, which he had set up in the back of a trailer truck. Image: photo of Bank of England chairs in production. During the war years, most of Gunlocke’s output is for government and military facilities. Assembly-line manufacturing techniques are implemented to produce high quality seating in unprecedented quantities. Image: 1950s chair sales truck. In the booming postwar period, Gunlocke establishes a factory showroom for the southwest states in Dallas, Texas. Image: JFK in the Oval Office, seating on the Washington, "The President's Chair."
1960: Gunlocke invested in a Whittier, California operation to serve nine western states. 1962: President John F. Kennedy makes crucial Cuban Missile Crisis decisions – from his Gunlocke chair in the Oval Office. 1969: The Gunlocke family sold the company to Sperry and Hutchinson (S&H) Company. Under S&H, the W.H. Gunlocke Chair Company was renamed The Gunlocke Company Image: Newspaper clipping of the Case plant construction. Gunlocke expands its Wayland, NY headquarters to 665,000 square feet and begins manufacturing casegoods. Many families in the Wayland area have now worked for Gunlocke for two or three generations. Image: A sell sheet featuring awarding winning guest seating. Gunlocke’s award-winning Courthouse Chair combines technologically advanced manufacturing methods with exacting craftsmanship. 1981: Gunlocke returned to private management with the purchase of the company by its four top executives: vice president of finance;
vice president of marketing; vice president of sales. 1989: Muscatine, Iowa-based HON Industries [later known as HNI Corporation] acquires Gunlocke. Image: ClearTech repelling water. State-of-the-art machinery applies Gunlocke’s exceptionally durable ClearTech finish to all worksurfaces. With the latest high-tech equipment and more than 800 skilled employees – known within the company as members – Gunlocke continues to produce superior wood furniture at competitive prices. Image: Company photo of massed members forming the numbers in “100” representing 100 years of Gunlocke. 2002: Gunlocke celebrates its 100th anniversary. More recent highlights include the 2006 introduction of Menu, the casegoods collection that provides meaningful choices in size, layout, aesthetics and price. Watch for the launch of other innovative Gunlocke product lines in the near future.Thonet's bentwood chairs were staples in cafes, and his rockers graced millions of hearths.
Michael Thonet, an Austrian cabinetmaker who lived from 1796 to 1871, was obsessed with innovative design. In 1830,Thonet experimented with ways to steam and bend beechwood from the local forests into curved and sturdy, graceful chairs. By 1853, he had opened his own shop, Gebruder Thonet, and by 1860 was producing bentwood rocking chairs with woven cane seats and backs. Thonet's innovations included the first, affordable, factory-produced, assembly-line chairs that could be shipped in pieces and easily assembled. The Prototype The Schaukel-Fauteuil No. 1 is the first bent beechwood, solid cane-woven rocker, created by Michael Thonet in 1860 in Koritschan, Moravia. The early rockers were stained dark -- either black, hazelnut or mahogany, in contrast to the lighter woven cane seats and backs. The rockers curve around the side of the seat, round over the front and sweep into an open, slightly upturned end, finished with a small scroll. The sinuous arms and spiraling front legs and seat supports taper at the tips into nearly closed curved hooks.
Sales of the first bentwood rockers were slow, but, as the style gradually caught on, Thonet added tufted upholstered seats and backs and changed the configuration of the curving wood. Evolving Styles The basic design remains unchanged, but slight variations in style over the years point to various dates of manufacture. The Thonet museum displays an 1880 rocker with simple, unembellished curved arms, a side support under the seat that starts as a front spiral and ends in the back as a deep U with a slight curved tail. The rockers are an unbroken curve of wood in font, ending in a slightly up-curved, plain tip in back. An 1883 reclining rocker was all closed curves with a continuous cane lounge seat. The back rockers curve completely around and the shorter arms are low and have a wide bentwood overlay. A 1904 rocker, with an upright seat, featured elaborate scrolls on both sides, plain curved rockers, and higher two-piece arms. The changing styles help to identify the period in which a Thonet rocker was produced.