Co-founder with his father of the Trane heating and air conditioning company.
His father created a novel low-pressure heating system to help with the state's brutal winters, and Reuben, just back from college studying mechanical engineering, helped him patent and sell it.
He and his father began selling some of the first air conditioners and soon moved into heating and cooling for ships, planes, trains, and factories.
His father James Trane was a Norwegian immigrant who opened his own plumbing shop in La Crosse, Wisconsin, in 1885.
He and Elmer Winter, co-founder of the Manpower staffing agency, were both Wisconsin-born entrepreneurs.
