The post-war growth for the country meant Higley Construction reached even greater heights. This is the decade that Albert Higley Jr. graduated from Denison University, went into the army and began working for his father’s company. Higley Construction completed it’s 5,000^th contract, with the Sears Roebuck and Company project.

Our work in the 1950s was dominated by Higher Education and Corporate/Office Renovations. University campuses were expanding rapidly to account for the men returning from war to finish their education and the implementation of the GI Bill. At Case Institute of Technology, the Wickenden Building was completed in 1954, and the Chemistry Building was completed in 1955. The same could be said for offices and corporate spaces. With the economy showing a low level of unemployment and the changes in culture, this meant that offices needed to be larger and modernized. Our company completed office spaces for Ohio Farmers Insurance and Thompson Electric.

The company progress report is a tradition at Higley Construction dating back to this decade. The first report was published in 1954 and was only 3 pages, it included photos and drawings of projects. Compared to 2023, our progress report was 18 pages and not only included project information, but also employee statistics and market updates.  Most recently, we published our centennial progress report which captured the last 100 years of Higley (read more about that here).

In the later part of the decade, another exciting development occurred – the first project photo in color. While color films and photos were becoming more available, the norm was still black and white photographs. Our first use of color photography comes from a photo of the 1957 project, the Western Reserve Historical Society. The building is still around today – see this side by side comparison between the 75 years!

Overall, the 1950s was a pivotal decade with huge growth and achievement for the company. The decade saw the celebration of our first quarter of a century anniversary and a large expansion in project sizes and capabilities. The company was ready to jump head-first into the next quarter of a century continuing in its traditions of excellence and quality.