Over 80, Goshen Foundry owner is still fired up

Do you know a good foundry man? Chester Le Baron, business owner, inventor, racing enthusiast and real estate entrepreneur is looking for one.
Le Baron, who owns and runs the Goshen Foundry, is as industrious is as today as he was when he built his own race car at age 22. Now in his eighties, he’s trying to get the foundry humming again.
Asked what shaped him, he said, “I liked what I did; it was fun and it still is.”
Back in the 1960s, Le Baron invented a light-weight hydraulic, quick-release roller for printing that was less than half of the cost of a conventional printing cylinder.
In its heyday, the invention was used by American Can Co, Lilly-Tulip, Coca-Cola and Georgia Pacific. Known as the Le Baron Easy-Mount, many are still in use, he said.
At one time, you could stand in the middle of ShopRite and turn around, LeBaron said, and every label or item you saw was printed with the device.
Le Baron acquired the Goshen Foundry in 1982 just to supply himself with raw materials for making gears, but the business expanded faster than expected, he said.
“(The company) grew four times as large and shipped gears all over the U.S. and abroad for the packaging industry,” he said.
Since the loss of his last foundry man, the production of printing cylinders and occasional custom gears has shrunk, and Le Baron has had difficulty finding someone new.

Not like the old days
Le Baron, who has been good with his hands since childhood, reflected on the days when workers like him performed tasks with their hands. Many such jobs are controlled today through robotics, he said. “Machinists are scarce,” he said, “Now they have (computer-controlled tools) –just put it in the machine and the machine does it.”
He learned tool making from his father, a machinist at General Mechanics who had “given me training on every possible manufacturing machine that they had,” he said.
That training stood him in good stead throughout the years. For a while he owned a speed shop and sold parts he made to race car drivers. He used his skills to build his own race car. Assembled from junk yard parts, it had an aluminum body and an 8-cylinder motor. He raced it at Hinchcliffe Stadium in Patterson, N.J. and at Orange County Speedway in Middletown, N.Y. He still keeps up with friends in the business and occasionally goes to races.
One of his prized possessions is a telegram from stock car champion Jerry Unser, telling Le Baron that his son, Bobby, had won a race in a Jaguar fitted with a Le Baron Quick-Change gear box.“Congratulations on a fine piece of equipment” Unser wrote.
Le Baron still likes fast cars and owns several, but his favorite is a ’63 Corvette Stingray “or maybe the ‘55 T-bird.” Asked if he still likes to drive fast, he said, “Not too bad, I’m more trying to protect the car now. When you’re young, you don’t care.”

Labor’s love not lost
Although he still makes some gears for customers, including Nexans — a large engineering firm in Chester— over the years he has grown more heavily involved in the real estate business.
He prefers historic properties, especially those that hark back to early manufacturing and the importance of the railroad, he said.
In addition to the Goshen Foundry, which at one time in its history made cast iron pipes and posts for gaslights, he owns the Farmers’ Hotel--where patrons of the Erie Railroad once stayed. He also bought the former Borden’s Condensed Milk Factory in Walden, he said.
“I can visualize the people that originated these places--what was in their mind.They needed a place that had water,an industrial location, so that they could make things. And they needed transportation—like a railroad—because a lot of my places have railroads.”
Other historic properties he owns include the former Wallace Home on South Church Street and the historic Goshen Inn, whose opening in 1912 was considered such a social event that it was covered by the New York Times. Later Dwight Eisenhower and Hillary Clinton would each visit.
Le Baron's properties blend business and nostalgia for the days of the industrial revolution, of steam engines and locomotives.
Today he earns most of his money as a landlord, he said, but he is always thinking about new ideas. He is currently working to develop a smart shock absorber that can adjust according varying road conditions.A new foundry man to help him out would be just the thing to move from concept to production, he said.
“It’s dirty and dusty work, and you have to like it,” he said.