He used the garage behind his house on South Brown Street to work on automobiles and in April 1907 incorporated the Speedwell Motor Car Company.
Speedwell purchased and occupied a former Dayton Machine Tool Company factory on Essex Avenue in Dayton's Edgemont neighborhood, a site that later hosted a Delco factory.
The Great Dayton Flood of 1913 inundated the Speedwell factory, destroying machinery and automobiles, and the company proved unable to recover and entered receivership in 1915.
Schenck later became president of the Dayton Malleable Iron Company and turned his focus to adapting high silicon iron alloys to practical uses.
It prospered through high demand for its products generated by the First World War and employed 1,500 people, becoming one of Dayton's leading industries.