Davey Tree: A Legacy of Trees

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“I think I was destined to work for Davey Tree Expert Company,” says Sandra Reid, VP of Corporate Communications and Strategic Planning. Reid grew up in Kent, attending Theodore Roosevelt High School, working summers at the former Oak Hill Golf Course, and always knowing about the company that would one day employ her for 31 years.

“ I am a fan of trees, and I’m a fan of the trees of Kent. I travel quite a bit for my job, and one of my favorite things is to come back into Northeast Ohio and see the changing colors in fall, the budding in spring, and the snow-covered trees in winter.”

Kent’s nickname is “Tree City.” The moniker did not come from its founder, Marvin Kent, the Portage County businessman who brought the Atlantic and Great Western Railroad—and its attendant development and prosperity—to town. Nor did it come from Kent’s son who donated the land for the original campus of Kent State University. “It dates back to John Davey, our company founder,” says Reid. “Many of the trees planted in Kent have roots with John Davey.”

A horticulturist from England, Davey planted hundreds of trees in the Kent area and taught people how to care for them, eventually publishing “The Tree Doctor” some 20 years after founding his eponymous company in 1880. “That was the first definitive text on the science of tree care,” Reid says. “135-plus years later, the company that is his namesake is still alive and well in Kent, Ohio.”

One of the most famous trees in Kent is a John Davey Oak planted by the company to honor its founder. “That tree is still standing at Standing Rock Cemetery, at his gravesite,” Reid says. Every February, the stately oak becomes part of another company legacy—The Davey Institute of Tree Sciences. The rigorous employee training program began in the early 1900s under Davey, himself, and continues today with students now coming from all over North America to learn the science behind good tree care and the history of their employer. “They climb that John Davey oak as part of their training, [as] a tribute to the legacy of John Davey.”

The company and the city have evolved together, entwined like branches, each feeding the other’s growth. From a small encampment known as Franklin Mills in 1805, Kent has become Portage County’s largest city with a population of nearly 30,000, per the U.S. Census Bureau. Davey Tree Expert Company has mirrored that. “From our original start with one person, we are approaching 9,000 employees across North America and $900 million in revenue,” Reid says. And that symbiosis was not an accident. “We had choices and time to choose where to be based,” she says, “but we’ve always been true to our Kent heritage and we’re proud of that.”

Owned by the Davey family for almost 100 years, Davey Tree Expert Company became employee owned in 1979 and is ranked 13th in the National Center for Employee Ownership’s Employee Ownership 100. As the company has grown, it has remained true to its roots in science, expanding to include not only tree care but landscape care and environmental consulting. “We have five operating divisions that touch on all aspects of anything green and growing,” Reid says. “It’s [also] important for us to be true to our roots in Kent. We’re proud of being a good corporate citizen [and] an active participant in efforts to keep Kent revitalized.” When the company outgrew its corporate headquarters on Mantua Street, they opened a facility in the new Fairmount Properties at Haymaker and Water streets. “That’s taking us full circle back to our roots,” she says, as their original offices were in downtown before 1985. They also renovated a 1950s building on Brice Road for their Ecological Consulting Services team. “It was part of our commitment to Kent: we took an asset that wasn’t being used, made an investment to renovate and used that for office space,” she says.

Much as Reid was destined to work for Davey Tree Expert Company, Kent was destined to be home for both her and her long-time employer. “We still call Kent home, and we’re proud.”

Tree Expert:

Scott Heim is the District Manager and a Certified Arborist with the Davey Tree Expert Company. Heim is a Kent native whose father was one of the original 125 employees who purchased Davey Tree Expert Company from the Davey family in 1979. The younger Heim began working for the company as a summer job in college 35 years ago. Though there are many trees in Kent, his favorite is the Dawn Redwood (metasequoia)—a deciduous conifer native to China that loses its needles in winter and grows to be upwards of 80 feet tall. It is the least tall of the three species of redwoods.

The Facts:

  • ≈ 7,000 trees in the city of Kent
  • 14% of Kent’s trees are red maples (acer rubrum)
  • 11% of Kent’s trees are Norway maples (acer platanoides)

Other varieties in Kent:

  • crabapples (several species of malus)
  • littleleaf linden (tilia cordata)
  • honey locust (gleditsia triacanthos)
  • blue spruce (picea pungens)
  • Norway spruce (picea abies)

Non-native species found in Kent:

  • Redwoods (sequoioideae)
  • cucumber magnolia (magnolia acuminata)

Why trees are awesome:

  • A mature leafy tree produces as much oxygen in a season as 10 people inhale in a year.

Trees:

  • intercept airborne particles
  • cool the air
  • absorb pollutants
  • increase property values
  • bring people together: data shows that neighborhoods with shady streets and parks create outdoor spaces that attract people.

Source: Scott Heim of Davey Tree Expert Company and Brad McKay, Urban Forester for the City of Kent