Rieder, Talmon Henry

• Rieder, T. H (Talmon Henry), 1878-1922

Talmon Henry Rider was an industrialist and rubber company executive in Berlin and Montreal. He was born in New Hamburg on August 10, 1878, the eldest child of Peter Rieder (1850-1936) and Emeline Merner (1857-1940). Talmon had eight siblings: Maude, Idella (Della), Elmer, Loretta, Esther, Eva, Talma (May), and Alma.

Talmon attended the Berlin High School, completing a year of school on June 1894, then going to work in his father's general store before entering business through his first job at the Berlin Gas Works. On October 1, 1906 he married Martha Melvina Anthes (1878-1971), daughter of John Schmitt Anthes (1844-1915) and Lydia Catherine Herlan (1849-1935), and they had four children (Paul, Edward Anthes, Margaret Catherine, and Helen Elizabeth). Talmon and his young family moved to Montreal in 1914 when he took up a position there.

Talmon died unexpectedly after a sudden illness on April 14, 1922 due to complications from pneumonia that affected his heart. At the time he was head of Ames-Holden McCready, Limited in Montreal, and had just started the development of the Westmount area of Kitchener into a contemporary garden suburb, inspired in part by the Westmount area in Montreal where he and his family lived. He was interred in Mount Hope Cemetery, Kitchener. Martha and their children moved back to Kitchener soon after Talmon's death.

In 1896, Talmon was employed by William Henry Breithaupt as a clerk at the Berlin Gas Works specializing in writing shorthand and recording gas meter readings. In 1899 he became the bookkeeper and a minor shareholder in the newly formed Berlin Rubber Company (Margaret Avenue, Kitchener) and was soon appointed as a director. In 1903, he and Jacob Kaufman organized the Merchants Rubber Company (Breithaupt Street, Kitchener) and Rieder managed this factory until it was merged with several other companies in Quebec and Ontario to form the Canadian Consolidated Rubber Company in 1907. Rieder was vice-president and managing director of this company, and in 1908 he became president. He also directed the operations of the Canadian Consolidated Felt Company. By 1910, the United States Rubber Company (later Uniroyal) had obtained full control of the Canadian Consolidated Rubber Company. Talmon convinced the company to build its new tire plant in Berlin, rather than moving all operations to Montreal, and production in the Dominion Tire factory (Strange Street, Kitchener) began in early 1914. Talmon and his young family moved to Montreal in 1914. In 1919, Talmon resigned from his positions in the Consolidated Rubber and Felt companies to assume the position of president and managing director of the Ames Holden McCready Company of Montreal and began building up a large leather and rubber footwear system that included the construction of a second tire plant in Kitchener.

In addition to his work in the rubber industry, Talmon Henry Rieder had an interest in urban planning. In 1912 he purchased several farms in the German Company Tract Lot 22, on the west side of Berlin, and had the lands surveyed and divided into lots. With three other partners he formed the Westmount Improvement Company to carry out his vision to develop this area on the border of Berlin and Waterloo into a contemporary garden suburb, inspired in part by the Westmount area in Montreal where he and his family lived.

Revised September 2020 SP.
Revised May 2022 by DR.

• "Last Rites for Late T. H. Rieder". The Gazette (Montreal). April 17, 1922, p. 5.
• Talmon H. Rieder - Find a Grave
• Talmon Henry Rieder - Waterloo Region Generations
• The man who built Kitchener - article on Talmon Henry Rieder