26 against its own products. The companies severed their agreement. A friend of T.B. Stearns, one Colonel Deeds, introduced the management team to Frank Beam Yingling, an inventor who owned the Columbia Machine Tool Company in Hamilton, Ohio. In 1925, Western States sold the Salt Lake City plant and moved all production and equipment to Columbia Tool, which would handle all manufacturing while the Western States staff focused on design work and sales. Four key employees made the move to Hamilton: General Manager Dudley R. Parker, Secretary- Treasurer Dean R. Dove, Andy P. Gallacher, and Roland Wadsworth. Roberts remained in the New York office, but spent much of his time calling on sugar plants and doing design work in Hamilton. The first large order under this new arrangement was for 22 electric motor-driven machines for General Sugar Company’s Central Vertientes sugar mill in Cuba. Colonel Deeds was part owner of the mill. Then, in 1926, Western States unveiled its first electric motor-driven centrifugal, the first complete centrifugal to be manufactured in Hamilton, and the first to carry the Roberts trademark that would become so familiar. Once again, the Pennsylvania Refinery in Philadelphia was the inaugural customer. CHAPTER 2