The history of "Howell Furniture" involves two distinct companies: the original W.H. Howell Company, a 19th-century Geneva, IL, foundry that evolved into a manufacturer of modern tubular steel furniture in the 1920s, and the Howell Furniture retailer, founded in Beaumont, TX, in 1959 by W. Thurman Witt. The original company gained fame for its modern furniture at the 1934 Chicago Century of Progress Exposition and eventually ceased operations in the late 1970s. The retail business, now in its third generation, continues to operate in Texas and Louisiana under the ownership of the Witt family and president Tom Schwaab.