Captain Thew's shovel was a tremendous succcess. He couldn't keep up the demand for his new shovel, so he started the Thew Automatic Shovel Company with Elyria-based businessman F. A. Smythe. Soon after the new company was started, the Thew Shovel was replacing picks and hand shovels in mines and brick plants, on building excavations and new roads, and in hundreds of other uses across the nation. Before long, Thew's first plan, with its 50 employees, was turning out shovels at the rate of one per month.