Trommer Extract of Malt Company records

The Trommer Extract of Malt Company was established in Fremont, Ohio in 1874, and was located at 117 South Arch Street. The company was named for Professor Trommer of Germany, who was the chemist who formulated the compound. This medicine was brought to the attention of Dr. John B. Rice, of Fremont, while he was an army surgeon during the Civil War. It was Dr. Rice who was able to obtain the formula from Professor Trommer and the rights to sell the new medicine everywhere but Germany. Trommer Extract of Malt was manufactured very similarly to beer. Grain (normally barley) was steeped in warm water to remove the soluble starches.

The firm was open fifteen years before it was incorporated on May 7, 1889. A branch of the Fremont Company was opened in London, England in 1894 and was operated by them for eight years, at which time it was bought by a group of English investors.

The officers at the time of incorporation were as follows: Ed. H. Zurhorst, president; W. S. Lewis, secretary; N. C. Sherwood, treasurer and general manager. The firm became the Trommer Company on April 18, 1900 and in that same year added a new product called Palmiacol.

According to the History of Sandusky County, Ohio: With Portraits and Biographies of Prominent Citizens and Pioneers, published in 1882 by H.Z. Williams & Bro., "the article manufactured ... is an inspissated extract of malt, with a small proportion of hops, and consists of malt sugar, dextrine, resin and bitter of hops, tanin, diastase, phosphates of lime and alkaline salts. It is considered by eminent practitioners to be a valuable agent in pulmonary consumption, dyspepsia, etc. ... they have built up an immense trade, extending through all the United States, and into Mexico, Central America, South America, England, Japan, Sandwich Islands, West India Islands, and Canada. This has been done by extensive advertising in all medical journals, and employing physicians as agents" (p. 432).

The Trommer Company closed its doors on November 15, 1933 by order of the Ohio Department of Taxation.