The origin of Plymouth's leading industry can be partially attributed to the union of two families when in 1919, John A. Root married the daughter of John D. Fate, paving the way for a merger of their two companies into the Fate-Root-Heath Company. John D. Fate, Sr. came to Plymouth in 1881 and a year later organized the Fate and Gunsaulus Company for the manufacture of brick and tile machinery. In 1898 his sons joined him in a partnership operation until taking over after his death in 1902. In early 1900, the now J.D. Fate Company began building trucks, buses, and numerous other vehicles including the original Plymouth car. The two sons, Harry and Harley Fate, operated the firm until their deaths. The Root Brothers Company was founded in Medina, Ohio by Clayton F. and George A. Root to manufacture cobbler's outfits. Charles E. Heath married Mabel Root, daughter of Clayton and acquired George's stock. The company had been buying castings from a Plymouth foundry when the Village of Plymouth offered a 30'x100' two-story brick building which had been the home of a failed wagon works as an inducement to the Root Brothers Company to move its operation to Plymouth. The company moved to Plymouth in 1895 and in 1904 became the Root-Heath Manufacturing company expanding their hardware line to include corn shellers, grist mills, and a machine to sharpen lawnmowers. After merging with the J.D. Fate Company in 1919, a period of considerable expansion ensued. Under the Root Brothers management the company prospered, manufacturing a wide array of products from industrial locomotives to pottery. In 1932 a farm tractor first named the "Plymouth" was developed. It was then that the Chrysler Corporation unsuccessfully sought to establish prior right to the Plymouth title and finally agreed to buy the trade name from the company. The tractor name was changed to the "Silver King" and over 8,600 units were sold before ending production in the middle of the 1950s. In 1966 the family owned Fate-Root-Heath Company was sold to Harold Schott of Cleveland and has reorganized and changed ownership several times since then.

The Root Brothers Company was founded in Medina, Ohio by Clayton and George Root in 1892. They manufactured and sold hardware items such as shoe lasts, corn shellers, even harnesses. Their catalog was an early Sears Roebuck. In 1896 the town of Plymouth offered them an empty brick building opposite the B. & O. Depot to house their expanding business if they would move from Medina. This was accomplished in two box cars on the Akron, Canton & Youngstown Railroad. George Root sold his half of the business to Charles E. Heath while Clayton and his three sons, John, Halse, and Perc, moved to Plymouth to run the new Root-Heath Manufacturing Company. They added a foundry to provide the castings needed and acquired rights to a lawnmower sharpening machine. The company prospered building the kind of products on display here until finally in 1919 they merged with their neighbor across the railroad tracks, The J.D. Fate Company, to become The Fate-Root-Heath Company.