Why Onaway says it "steered the world"

Onaway’s slogan makes a big claim: “Onaway Steers the World.” The Onaway Historical Museum describes the American Wood Rim Company as the world’s largest producer of wooden automobile steering wheels and bicycle rims. Its longer local history calls the world-largest description an estimate. That is the honest way to carry the story: it is a well-documented local historical claim, not a modern record certified against every competing factory.

The scale behind the slogan was real. The company used nearby hardwood and supplied steering wheels to major automakers. Onaway’s current master plan says the city’s population reached 2,800 by 1920. The museum says employment estimates vary and puts 1,200 to 1,500 workers across American Wood Rim and its sister company, Lobdell-Emery. Because both population and employment estimates vary — and the jobs were spread across two companies — it is safer not to turn those figures into a precise share of residents.

On January 14, 1926, a fire that started in a sanding machine spread through the plant and killed four workers. The company moved its operations to Alma. The city master plan records the effect in plain numbers: Onaway’s population fell to about 1,500 by 1930.

You can still follow the story around town. The city plan says privately maintained Awakon Park has iron sculptures and a history walk through the American Wood Rim and Lobdell ruins. Downtown, the old courthouse now holds city hall, the Onaway Historical Museum, and the local library. WCMU reported in July 2026 that the museum is also restoring the surviving Lobdell administration building for future exhibits. That living work may be the best meaning of the slogan now: Onaway is still deciding how to tell the story it built from wood.