::Fasco Fans

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Fasco

History (compiled by Sean Brown and Bill Kreiner)

The F.A. Smith Mfg. Company of Rochester, New York began business in 1911. This company made after market "add on" parts for the new horseless carriages that were beginning to be so popular that we now call the automobile. In the early days of automobile manufacturing there were not many accessories available.

The F. A. Smith Mfg. Company began producing dome lights, flower vases that hung from the interior door section, and many other accessories that were not standard items on automobiles of the period. As automobile-manufacturing companies began to include many of these items that F. A. Smith produced as standard features, the company had to look for other missions and scopes of work.

In 1933 the F. A. Smith Mfg. Company introduced their first electric fan powered by a motor of their own design. This small fan with an eight-inch diameter blade was a stationary type desk fan. The company introduced their first oscillating model in 1935. In 1936 the company offered a full line of stationary and oscillating fans in sizes ranging from the small 8" to the larger 16." And introduced a new more powerful motor design to drive the 16" fans.

F. A. Smith manufactured several lines of fans under various brand names. A few of the brands are Arctic-Aire, Royal Rochester, Spartan, and Viking, and King Kool . All of these brands were produced by F. A. Smith at the Rochester plant. The company became one of the largest fan manufacturers in this country in the late 1930s and continued to be a leader for the next three decades. In 1955, fan production was moved to a new manufacturing facility in Fayetteville, North Carolina. These fans were very popular and many were sold and still survive today.

Fans made after 1948 will be labeled as FASCO, or a combination of FASCO and Arctic Aire or Spartan. In 1948 F. A. Smith Mfg. Co. became FASCO and this company is still in business today as the world's largest producer of fractional horsepower driven blowers. They became part of Tecumseh at the beginning of 2003 but will continue under the FASCO name.

Fasco ceiling fans were manufactured out of Fayetteville, North Carolina.  The first ceiling fan they produced was called The Parlour Fan, which came out in 1978 and was offered in assorted brass and painted finishes, with solid wood or plastic blades. This model used the Vari-Low variable speed system, which had two speed settings, high and variable speed. Some minor design changes came to The Parlour Fan in 1980, as well as the addition of a new fan model, The Charleston. Using the same motor as The Parlour Fan, it was offered in three speed, instead of Vari-Lo. Fasco's ceiling fan line was eventually bought by Patton in 1996, and then sold to Marley Engineering a few years later. To this day Marley still manufactures two '90s Fasco models, the Gillespie and the Porch Fan.
Some Fasco fans may be labeled Spartan. Spartan was one of their relabels, for as long as the company existed, another one was Air Mark, which was used in the late 90s.