Doug Gammon to retire after 40 years

Monday, July 24, 2017
Doug Gammon standing next to a nearly complete stained glass window bound for Louisiana. This window costs approximately $200 per square foot.
Gabe Franklin

After a career spanning more than four decades, Doug Gammon of Gammon Glass is retiring at the end of the year.

“I used to do this down in my basement,” Gammon said. “I’d be down there two o’clock, two thirty, three o’clock in the morning.”

After graduating high school, Gammon moved to Kansas City where he worked for Hallmark Cards for a short time before he was offered a job by a family acquaintance at Hopcraft Stained Glass.

To create an inside curve on a piece of glass Doug Gammon scores the final line he wants, then breaks off several smaller pieces.
Gabe Franklin

“I had no idea what I was getting into,” Gammon said.

There, he spent three years as a union apprentice learning to work on stained glass and flat glass such as automobiles and store fronts.

Afterward, Gammon and his wife Judy made the decision to move back to Nevada and he went to work at Village Market.

“We decided to start doing a little bit of flat glass work here in town,” Gammon said. “That kept on growing.”

Before long, it was a full-time job.

“We have good quality customers that come through that door every day,” he said.

The Gammons operated first from home and then from 110 N. Ash St. until 1976 when they moved to 214 S. Cedar St. where they are today.

“We needed more room,” Gammon said.

In 1981, the Gammon’s split the stain glass part of the company into Midwestern Stained Glass and moved it to 715 S. Alma St.

“We did a lot of traveling,” Gammon said. From new installs to restoration work, Gammon has traveled from Arizona to Florida, and from Texas to New York.

“We’ve been all over doing the stained glass while my two man crew did most of the flat glass here in Nevada and the surrounding area,” he said.

Gammon even worked on portions of the stained glass at the Missouri State Capital and the James River Assembly church in Springfield, Mo.

Gammon Glass is leaner now than in years past. Throughout the 1980s and 90s, Gammon said he would have more than a half dozen glaziers working on stained glass projects either in the shop or on the road.

“Stained glass has slowed down because I just don’t have the crew,” Gammon said.

Today, Gammon’s wife Judy runs the office. Brent Leonard is the lead glazier and has been with Gammon Glass since 1980. Sean Lukenbill has been with the company since 2007. Gammon’s son Jeff does the IT work and accounting and helps with installations.

“They’re just part of the family,” Gammon said. “They are Gammon Glass.”

For Gammon Glass, the years of experience pays off.

“I stay out of Brent’s way is what it amounts to,” he said.

After more than 40 years in business, Gammon said he doesn’t have to advertise anymore, repeat customers and word of mouth bring new customers in and old customers back.

“We pride ourselves on quality workmanship,” he said, explaining a “doing the job right the first time” attitude has resulted in few complaints over the years.

“We enjoy Nevada — it’s been good to us,” Gammon said. “For a small town business, it’s a pleasure be able to say that I could be here all these years and work and have a trade that the community needed and wanted.”

“As I grew up in the industry here in Nevada I have had a lot of mentors to help us out to keep things going in the slow times and the hard times,” Gammon said. “A lot of the old timers helped us out through those years and gave us advice on how to work and do business. They’re all gone — I’m the old timer now.”

When the Gammons first got started, they competed with Brown’s Sign Service

“Me and Brownie would buck horns on jobs all the time,” Gammon said. “He’d get one and I would get one … we had a good rivalry.”

Claude Speece of Speece Glass Company was another competitor.

“We bought a lot of his equipment he had when we moved over to this location,” Gammon said. “In fact we are still cutting glass — sheet glass — on his old original cutting table.”

“One thing that helped us keep things flowing and a steady income was that Franklin Norman at Norman Sheet Metal gave us a little contract that we would cut two inch by three and seven-eighths glass for [grave] markers.” Gammon said.

Gammon’s Glass would cut 20,000-30,000 pieces at a time depending on the contract.

“We’d do that every two or three months — a couple times a year,” he said

Over the years, the Gammons have ventured out into other areas — curved automobile glass, paint, wall paper — and most recently garage doors which they continue to sell and install.

Today the basics remain — flat glass, stained glass, insulated windows, and walk-through and garage doors.

Flat glass covers a range of products. On the consumer side, there are picture frames, table tops, mirrors, window screens and in the past — storm windows.

Commercial products range from large store front windows and doors to tractors and combines and other heavy equipment.

“Our ability to fix what they want fixed,” Gammon said has kept customers coming back over the years, sometimes decades after he first met them.

As the saying goes — all good things must end.

“We’ve enjoyed every bit of it. Don’t know where 40 something years have gone,” Gammon said. “About the best thing I can accomplish right now is to be with my grandkids as much as possible … I was gone so much when I was younger I did not have a chance to be with my boys as much as I need to be.”

Gammon, who primarily works on stained glass jobs, is retiring at the end of the year. His wife Judy said she is looking forward to him not being gone as much.

The news of his retirement has prompted several churches to finally have their stained glass windows restored while Gammon is still working.

As for letting go, Gammon said, “I didn’t ask the old timers how to let go when they were still around and I don’t have any old timers to tell me now.”

“I’m not ready for the rocking chair yet,” he said. “I love the trade so well I’ll probably stay in it to some degree.”

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