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Our Story

Jay Lehman, Founder

Founded by Jay Lehman in 1955 to serve the local Amish and others without electricity, Lehman's ships old-fashioned, high-quality merchandise all over the world.

Jay's vision was to preserve the past for future generations. "I was concerned that some day the Amish would not be able to maintain their simple ways of life because these products would no longer be available," he said. His goal was, and still is, to provide authentic, historical products to those seeking a simpler life.

What started as a tiny business employing Jay's father, brother and sister in a one-room hardware store in northeast Ohio today is the world's largest purveyor of historical technology.

Homesteaders, environmentalists, missionaries, doctors in developing nations, and others living in areas where there is no power or unreliable power can rely on Lehman's. Man-made disasters, such as the Great Blackout of 2003, as well as natural disasters like Hurricane Isabel are leading people to search for a self-sufficient lifestyle.

Ironically, many of our core customers have now become our vendors. Local Amish crafters, who have honed their skills over many generations, now make our handmade quilt frames, well buckets, wheel barrows, chicken crates, buggy robes and many more products.

If you think it isn't made any more, check with Lehman's before you give up.

If you think it isn't made any more, check with Lehman's before you give up. The story behind Lehman's reads like a movie script, but every word of it is true. Founded by Jay Lehman in 1955 to serve the local Amish, today Lehman's ships old-fashioned, high-quality, merchandise all over the world.

Jay didn't even finish high school, but because he had the foresight to look to the past for his business, he turned a one-room country hardware store into a low tech superstore. Think about it: in 1955 Disney Land in California opened its doors. Baseboard heat and huge automobiles were all the rage. Rebel Without a Cause was the top film; Elvis Presley was introduced to screaming fans; and the television replaced the radio as the entertainment medium of choice. Leave It to Beaver, by the way, was the top show.

It was in this climate that Jay decided to carry products that his Amish customers needed to preserve their way of life. He thought, rightfully so, that one day no one would be making butter churns, apple peelers, wooden spoons and drying racks. So he was going to make, stock and sell these generation-spanning products.

Ezra Lehman, Jay Lehman's father

He borrowed every dime from his father to buy the tiny store at the corner of Kidron and Emerson roads (about an hour south of Cleveland) and worked for the first few years without collecting a paycheck. His first employees were his father, Ezra Lehman, brother David Lehman and sister Pearl Lehman. Raymond Steiner, a family friend, soon joined the group and for 10 years the business was quite small. Lehman Hardware & Appliances, Inc. (as it was known then) sold non-electric, practical, old-fashioned products to the local Amish.

And here's where the gift of Lehman ingenuity came into play. When Jay was told "we can't get those anymore" he simply didn't believe it. When customers complained about the difficulty of getting parts for their Perfection oil stoves, he found a vendor in South America and had them shipped directly to him. It must have run in the family because Dave didn't take no for an answer either.

When our Amish customers could no longer obtain ice boxes, Dave contracted with local manufacturer Kidron Body to have them made exclusively for us. We were the last company in the United States to produce ice boxes.

In the early 1960's Jay and his young family took an extended (it lasted 12 years!) assignment with Mennonite Central Committee, a disaster and relief organization, in Africa. During his time overseas, he realized that missionaries and doctors in remote locations need many of same products as the Amish. He also, using that ole' Lehman ingenuity, discovered several products the missionaries were using that made sense for Lehman's!

For example, on a five-day trek into the Northern Sudan to deliver supplies to famine-stricken refugees, Jay was greeted at one hostel with an ice-cold glass of lemonade. "Where," he asked incredulously, "did you find refrigeration in this remote desert?" His hosts showed him a unique gas refrigerator. He crawled around the product to figure out how it worked, saw the phone number for the manufacturer in Europe, and on his way back to the United States, met company officers and secured a distributorship for the gas refrigerator, now one of our biggest sellers.

In the 1970s two pivotal events occurred. One, you might remember. The other, we are quite sure you don't. The first was the energy crisis? the oil embargo? the concerns of our increased dependence on foreign fuels. People wanted non-electric appliances, wood heating stoves in particular, and guess who had them in stock? Jay Lehman, because he wanted to continue serving his Amish customers even though most retailers thought he was crazy.

Highlights of three of the more noticeable antiques at our Kidron, Ohio headquarters: an Oil Pull farm tractor (still runs -- sometimes!) almost 100 years old, a restored old-style English phone booth, and a Civil-war era barn, rebuilt piece-by-piece

The second, lesser known event, was the letter received by Organic Gardening magazine from a pleased Lehman's customer. The editors were intrigued with this tiny hardware that was already starting to ship products all over the world, thanks to the contacts Jay had made during his service overseas. They ran an article about the company and Lehman's was inundated with phone calls, letters and requests for more information. Within a few months, Lehman's non-electric catalog was born.

That increase in business, including selling out a three-year supply of wood stoves in TWO MONTHS, was certainly a bump to the bottom line, allowing for expansion. But more importantly, it put Lehman's on the map as the place to get your non-electric, old-fashioned, practical merchandise. Over the years more events, such as ice storms in the northeast, black-outs in California, damaging hurricanes, Y2K, and even - sadly enough - 9-11, made people realize that our electric grid is not failsafe.

Jay had made a calculated risk that if he continued making and selling the old-fashioned products that virtually nobody else was, some day he would be the leader in this niche market. And his risk paid off. Today's Lehman's is the world's largest purveyor of historical technology. The second generations of Lehman family members are now running the business. Galen Lehman is the president and Glenda Lehman Ervin is the Marketing Director. Jay, although he never uses it, carries the title of Chairman and Founder.

Because of our attention to historical authenticity, not only do historical museums and re-enactments groups purchase our products, but Hollywood has caught on. Virtually every big name Hollywood production set in a 19th century time period buys their products from Lehman's. Cold Mountain with Nichole Kidman; Open Range with Kevin Costner; Pirates of the Caribbean with Johnny Depp, they all featured Lehman's products. Why us? We asked the set designers and art directors.

They gave us several reasons that made sense to us. Go through this list and see what you think:

1. One-stop shopping. Why run all over the place when you can find everything old-fashioned you need for light, heat, food and water in one place?
2. We ship anywhere. We have a list of over 208 countries in our database, including some you probably have never heard of.
3. We have the products in stock. Unlike some on-line, "virtual" companies, we have over one acre of retail and warehouse space under roof in our northeast Ohio headquarters.
4. Where else are you going to find brand-new, historically accurate tools, appliances, kitchenware and toys from the Civil War era (especially important when you are designing a set that is from 1850, i.e. it won't be filled with antiques from that era, now fill it?)
5. And perhaps most importantly, we know how to use the products. We were even listed as Historical Technology Consultants for the PBS series, The Frontier House.

As we celebrate a half century in business, we want you to know how much we appreciate your business and value your friendship. And in what is perhaps the ultimate irony, the very group that Jay founded his business to serve, the Amish, have now become our core vendors. Who else, in the year 2004, can you find to hand-craft hickory rockers, woven baskets, rag rugs and wooden wheel barrows?

One of our favorite things to do is find a product that is no longer made, secure the rights to produce it; have it "reverse engineered" by an Amish craftsman; and put it back on the market, thereby preventing its extinction.

In his desire to serve the Amish, Jay has come full circle. By asking them to create the home and farm furnishings from a century ago, they can use skills passed on from generation to generation. Jay has again enabled this religious minority to escape the rigors of time, by helping them preserve an old-fashioned, slower-more, simpler time.

We invite you to visit our store in Kidron, where you'll see the Amish buggies parked at the 65-foot hitching post, the rolling farmlands, picturesque windmills and clotheslines and much more. You'll truly think you have stepped back in time.

Lehman's

One Lehman Circle

Kidron, OH 44636 U.S.A