A historical account submitted by the Logan County History Center describes how the A.J. Miller Co. shaped Bellefontaine's industrial development for more than 100 years.
The business started as a family carriage shop and became a maker of hearses, ambulances and specialty vehicle bodies, according to the submission. After an April 1900 fire, it rebuilt quickly; by that November a new factory was running, and the company added woodworking, furniture parts and cedar chests while keeping up carriage and buggy output. It began building automobile bodies for Meteor Motor Co. of Piqua, Ohio, in 1912.
The submission says the firm was making its own chassis and selling complete automobile hearses by 1917, and that plans for a pleasure car line ended when Ally Miller died unexpectedly in 1919. The business passed to son-in-law John W. Grabiel and daughter Clara Lee Miller Lentz.
After Commonwealth Auto Co. failed in the 1921 postwar depression, the account says, Albert R. Riggs loaned money to shield the company from creditors and refocused it on hearses. Production restarted in February 1922, and debts were cleared in under two years. Miller later ranked among leading funeral car and ambulance manufacturers, surviving the Depression and World War II.
A 1953 event marked 100 years in Logan County. In 1956 the company announced an agreement for Wayne Works to buy it, and A.J. Miller merged with Meteor Motor Car to form Miller-Meteor Co. Operations stayed in Bellefontaine through the 1960 model year before moving to Piqua; Miller-Meteor closed there in 1979.