Cincinnati Yellow Pages Recognizes 100 Years of Rose

TROY, Mich. — A lot has changed since 1860, when Solomon Rose founded Rose’s Rat Exterminator Company (which now goes by the name Rose Pest Solutions) in Cincinnati. The company, which now makes its headquarters in Troy, Mich., and advertises through such media as television, radio and the Internet.

But one thing hasn’t changed: The pest control company still advertises in phone books, and last month learned that it was one of the longest consecutive advertisers in the Cincinnati Bell Yellow Pages — 100 years, to be exact.

“It is the only name that has been in that directory since its inception 100 years ago,” said Russ Ives, president of Rose Pest Solutions, Troy, Mich.

Though the Rose name has existed in Cincinnati for a century, the company itself hasn’t been owned by the same people. In those intervening 100 years, Terminix, Waste Management and other firms have used the Rose name for their pest control companies in the Queen City, Ives said.

“There are several people who have paid the bills in the last 100 years,” he said.

But the company now is — sort of — back in the hands of its original family. Russ Ives’ grandfather Harlem Ives was a partner of Daniel Rose, the son of Solomon Rose. The elder Ives and Rose worked together in 1932, establishing the Detroit office for Rose’s Rat Exterminator Company.

The company has since dropped the older, if somewhat more vivid, moniker of Rose’s Rat Exterminator Company, instead opting for the more contemporary Rose Pest Solutions.

“Tradition’s not bad when you're 147 years old, (but the new name) was more consistent with the image,” Ives said.