Bendix Ad – 1954 Lorain County Farm & Rural Directory

With all the hubbub recently about Bendix possibly moving its World Headquarters to another city (which you can read about here in the Chronicle-Telegram in case you missed it), I thought I'd post this ad. It appeared in the 1954 Lorain County Farm & Rural Directory.

The company has been at that location since 1941. (Click here to see a historical timeline.)

The directory ad is interesting to me from a graphic design and marketing viewpoint, because it includes the company's former name and logo, as well as a product logo that looks fairly modern.

But the main interest of the ad of course is the aerial photo, showing the headquarters and plant looking very much all alone on Cleveland Street. Quite a difference from this Bing Maps aerial (below) showing all the development that occurred over the last 60 years.

I've had the opportunity to visit the Bendix headquarters once or twice, as the company is a longtime client of my employer. It's a cool-looking building from the outside, but I can understand why the company feels the need to have a modern, new building to attract the best and the brightest.