Oliver Grover Cleveland Crawford, known as O.G. or Ollie, was born to Thomas and Anna Crawford on Christmas Day, December 25, 1884, in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, nearly a year after the death of Kane founder Thomas L. Kane. As a boy he moved with his parents to Kane, where he lived with his large family on Janeway Street. Shortly after the Spanish-American War, he entered a minority enlistment in the U.S. Navy aboard the USS Michigan in Erie on December 5, 1900, at the age of 15 years and 11 months. Over the next five years he served at sea on eight ships, ranging from wooden-hulled sailing ships to armored cruisers and battleships, and was honorably discharged on December 24, 1905, the day before his 21st birthday. In the following two decades he relocated to Erie and worked as a passenger car brakeman for the Pennsylvania Railroad on its Erie to Emporium run. There he met H.O. Hirt in 1917, and their acquaintance eventually led to the founding of Erie Insurance Exchange in Erie, Pennsylvania, now the principal insurer in the Erie Insurance Group. From 1922 to 1925, while both men were working as salesmen for Philadelphia Indemnity Exchange, they decided to go into business for themselves in the growing market for personal automobile insurance. On April 20, 1925, after raising $31,000 in start-up capital, they organized the Erie Insurance Exchange and its managing corporation, Erie Indemnity Company. Crawford served as Vice-President and Assistant Manager, while H.O. Hirt served as Secretary and Manager, and their partnership lasted until 1933, when Crawford retired from Erie Insurance. Though his time with the company lasted only eight years, his influence during its founding period was significant, and H.O. Hirt later said, "There never would have been an ERIE without Ollie." Crawford died on December 21, 1961, just short of his 77th birthday, and was buried at the Veterans National Cemetery in Los Angeles, California.