This aerial view of NCR Crop. World Headquarters located in Dayton, Ohio was taken in August 2006.
NCR announced today (6/02/09) that the company will move its corporate headquarters from Dayton, Oh., to Duluth, Ga., taking with it more than one thousand jobs. But it’s not just the jobs it’s the sense of betrayal. NCR (National Cash Register) is a homegrown success story.
One of the area’s leading figures, John Henry Patterson, founded the company in 1884. NCR helped make Dayton a hotbed for invention and innovation. Almost every big name in Dayton’s past helped contribute to NCR’s success. Charles F. Kettering, Thomas J. Watson, Sr. and Edward A. Deeds all played their part. Deeds and Kettering went on to found Delco Electronics which became a division of General Motors. Edward Deeds and Charles Kettering teamed up to power the cash register with an electric motor.
NCR is one of the companies that fueled Dayton’s grown in the first 50 years of the 20th century. The company served consumers and the U.S. government, introducing the first automated credit systems around World War I and during World War II provided the brainpower to break the German’s Enigma coding system and save thousands of lives. Moving forward, the company created transistorized computers, liquid crystal displays, bar code scanners and ATMs.
The move means the loss of Dayton’s sole Fortune 500 corporate headquarters.
NCR History Timeline
Information via: WHIO
Information via: DDN
The NCR complex in the company’s heyday. The complex grew up around
what is now Main and Brown streets near Stewart Street.
Foundry Building
The NCR factory complex near its peak. The Montgomery County fairgrounds are in the foreground of the photo.
NCR’s Sugar Camp recreation complex in its early days.
Circa71 
Great photos of NCR.
NCR’s move didn’t surprise me. It was like losing someone after a long illness.
I wrote a couple posts on my blog PlumwoodRoad.blogspot.com about NCR and John H. Patterson.
Our family lived on the first street south of the factory in the early 1950s, and my father sold for the company for several years following WWII.
Hello! Of course, our family is devastated. My father and grandfather were so proud of NCR and of course, General Motors. These changing times are difficult to say the least. We remain close to all the history and will hopefully be in touch in the future. Sincerely, Barbara and Nicholas Schaus
Thanks for your comments, these men were pioneers of their time. Dayton and the world in general need more people like them. Best to you and your family.
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