Posted by Kevin Neilson on 12/14/2011

Harry Rolnick was operating a small hat factory in the early 1920’s, with a passion for fashionable high-quality hats. At about this time, he developed a working relationship with one of his customers, E.R. Byer, a young and wealthy investor.

Byer took such a liking to both the product and the man at the helm of this little company, that he decided to invest in Rolnick’s future. Byer sold his own business in Michigan and moved to Dallas, Texas to start up the new firm, Byer-Rolnick.

The two men focused on producing both Western hats and hats for dressier occasions. All of their hats were marketed as “Resistol Hats,” because they “resist all” weather conditions. In the beginning, marketing was limited primarily to Texas and Oklahoma.

In the late 1930’s, however, the company had grown beyond the capacity of their facility and had to pick up and move to a larger building in Garland, Texas, the location at which they still remain today. But that move was just the beginning.

The Resistol team was innovative in its manufacturing and distributing advancements. And, in order to maintain the quality standard they’d grown famous for, Byer and Rolnick opened up their own fur cutting plant and rough body plant. This eliminated some of the variables of supplier production as the company became the first manufacturer to create their felt hats from start to finish without any outsourcing.

The innovations and marketing successes of the Resistol team, continued snowballing forward. Today, the Byer-Rolnick company, as a portion of Hatco, Inc., is part of the largest hat manufacturing company in the world.