REID, JAMES SIMS (22 Nov. 1894-29 Nov. 1981), inventor, manufacturer, and physician, was born in Yazoo County, Mississippi. He received an M.D. degree from the University of Louisville in 1916 and then served as a medical captain in Europe during WORLD WAR I. He came to Cleveland Βι¶ΉΣ³» 1920 where he worked for two years with the CLEVELAND BOARD OF HEALTH.
His entrepreneurial career began in 1920 when he invented a much-improved gas cap and radiator cap for automobiles and founded the Easy-On Cap Company to manufacture and market his inventions. That company was sold to a forerunner of the EATON CORP. in 1928.
"Doc" Reid then acquired the STANDARD PRODUCTS CO. in 1930 to manufacture and market his other inventions, including a greatly improved, flexible window channel, within which automobile windows moved up and down, as well as a revolutionary rotary automobile lock. By 1954, from one to 50 parts developed by Reid could be found on every car. He also made several significant improvements to the M-1 Carbine rifle, of which Standard Products was a major producer in WORLD WAR II.
Standard Products early became, and still is, a world leader in the manufacture and production of automotive window channel and weatherstrip. By 1981, the year of Reid's death, the company had 21 plants, 4,000 employees, and sales of $228,984,000.
Reid and his wife, Felice Marjorie Crowl (1896-1967) had three children: James Sims, George McKay, and MARGARET CROWL (Mrs. Werner D. Mueller). Reid died in Sarasota, Florida and is buried in Crown Hill Cemetery, Twinsburg, Ohio.