Carl Sandburg's mother, Clara, strongly believed in maintaining a tidy household. With a husband and several children in residence, maintaining and keeping house was an on-going struggle.

An indispensable tool in achieving domestic cleanliness was the broom. The homely instrument was useful indoors, and could be employed out-of-doors. In all likelihood, the brooms used by the Sandburgs were locally manufactured by the Boyer Broom Company.

Aaron Boyer was born February 17, 1833, in York County, Pennsylvania. His parents were Daniel and Rosane Boyer. When he was six years old, his family moved to East Germantown, Indiana.

At the age of twelve Aaron suffered an accident which caused his eyesight to begin to fail. By the time he was seventeen years old, he was totally blind. He became proficient at making brooms and even supervised the teaching of the skill at the school for the blind in Indianapolis.

In 1856 he settled in Wayne County, Indiana, and manufactured brooms for a number of years. He started the business with $5 worth of broom corn, of which $2 was on credit. The business was moved to Crawford County, Illinois, in 1864, to Elmwood in 1866 and, finally, to Galesburg in 1868.

The broom factory employed twenty-five men by 1878 and produced 9,000 dozen brooms a year. In 1893 Boyer bought $12,000 worth of broom corn and manufactured between 15,000 and 18,000 dozen brooms that year. Many of the workers were Swedish immigrants. The factory had been powered by steam for a number of years.

The first Galesburg broom factory building was fifteen by twenty feet on two lots at the northwest corner of Prairie and Berrien Streets. The factory was twice destroyed by fire and rebuilt. Boyer also built a brick home near the factory.

Boyer was married to Elizabeth Buck in 1853. His wife and first child died shortly thereafter. In 1858, he married Sarah Harper. They had three sons and one daughter. The second Mrs. Boyer died in 1875. He married Julia E. Mitchell in 1877 and two sons were born to them. One son, Orrin E., served in the Galesburg Police Department for twenty-six years, retiring as chief in 1945.

Benjamin Franklin planted the first broom corn in the country. It is a member of the sorghum family.  Farmers later discovered that the crop grew very well in the Midwest. By 1850 more than a million brooms were being manufactured across the country. They were round, but performed better than bundles to twigs used by the pioneers. The Shakers, a religious denomination, were the first to make flat brooms and also invented the whisk broom.

Aaron Boyer invented and patented his own machines and sold them to others. G.D. Colton, of Galesburg, manufactured a broom corn press which cleaned and scraped the broom corn. The company also sold other agricultural implements. In 1897 Boyer retired from the business and leased the factory to others. In 1902 E.D. Aiken purchased the business.

Aaron Boyer died December 1, 1903, in his home. He was buried in the family lot in Hope Cemetery. His obituary included the following quotation: “Mr. Boyer was not only ingenious and industrious, but he was a good and upright citizen. He maintained pleasant and cordial relations with his men and personally was an agreeable man to meet. He was an active member of the First Methodist Church. What he has done here has earned him the admiration of citizens.”