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Hevi-Duty
Electric Co
200 Hart
Street
1953
07 18 HEVI-DUTY ESTABLISHES WATERTOWN
PLANT
Announcement was made today of
plans to open a new industry in Watertown in the fall which will employ between
100 and 150 persons. The announcement
was made by Harold E. Koch, an official of the Hevi
Duty Electric Company of Milwaukee, following reports of a new industry which
have been in circulation here in recent weeks.
Negotiations have now been completed. Mr. Koch said that the company
will take over the building of the Perfection Table Slide Manufacturing Company
at 200 Hart Street and convert it into a plant for the making of electrical transformers
for electric furnaces which his company manufactures.
07 18 PERFECTION
PLANT SOLD TO HEVI-DUTY
11 19 Announcement
was made by Mrs. Muriel Thauer, president of Perfection Table Slide, that negotiations
have been completed for the sale of its equipment and inventor to the Watertown
Table Slide Corporation and for the sale of the Perfection factory building and
real estate to Hevi Duty Electric Company of
Milwaukee. It is expected that the Hevi Duty Company will take possession before the end of
this summer and thus bring to Watertown a substantial new industry.
1957
02 16 EXPANSION
Plans for a $75,000 addition to
the plant of the Hevi-Duty Electric Co. at 304-308
Hart Street were announced today. The
addition will extend west 66 by 316.5 feet, and north 68 by 231 feet, from the
present plant. The application for a
building permit was signed by Al Krause, local building contractor, acting as
agent.
07 21 The Hevi-Duty Electric Co., operating plants in Milwaukee and
Watertown, is playing an important part in bettering lighting controls at the
nation's airports and has just been awarded a $757,000 contract for 47 new
lighting substations by the Civil Aeronautics Administration. The newest type of regulators will permit
operators in control towers to vary the brightness of lighting with ease, at
the same time knowing from a control board whether the lights are operating at
the proper level. As a result, safe landings can be assured despite inclement
weather.
07 27 The
Froedtert Corp. of Milwaukee today announced the purchase of about 25,000
shares of common stock of the Hevi-Duty Electric Co.
of Milwaukee and Watertown. Froedtert
Board Chairman Anthony von Wening said the purchase
was the first step in the corporation's program of diversification through
investments. He said the purchase was
less than 10 per cent of Hevi-Duty's outstanding
common stock, but it was understood it made Froedtert the large single
stockholder of Hevi-Duty. Hevi-Duty, which
was incorporated in Wisconsin in 1924, had net sales of nearly 11 million
dollars in 1956. It produces electric
furnaces, current regulators and transformers.
1958
10
15 Officials of the Hevi-Duty Electric Co. announced production of a new
furnace for determination of the compression strength of coke and ore pellets
at high temperatures. This furnace is
the first commercially available machine which will accurately predict the
strength of coke at the temperatures encountered in the tuyere zone or high
temperature zone adjacent to it. This
furnace fulfills a need that has long existed in every plant with a blast
furnace or foundry, since tests previously used have shown little correlation
between room temperature strengths of coke or ore and actual characteristics at
furnace operating temperatures. WDT
1960
08
31 SALES AND ENGINEERING
Sales
and engineering personnel of the Hevi-Duty Electric Company,
a total of 70 persons, have taken up their quarters at the local facilities of
the company. The Hevi-Duty
plant and office is located in Hart Street. Approximately 40 engineers took up their
quarters here on Monday and today the sales force, numbering 30 persons, moved
in. Formerly the 70 were located at 30th
and Burleigh Streets, Milwaukee. WDT
1961
02
26 The Hevi-Duty
Electric Co., a division of Basic Products Corporation, Milwaukee, has
broadened its export market with its first shipment of a large gas-fired
conveyor furnace to the Orient. The
32-ton furnace is being transported by rail from Watertown to the port of Baltimore, and shipped from there to the Philippines. It will be used by Inter-Island Gas Service
Company, Manila, for heat treatment of metals under a licensing agreement with
Pressed Steel Tank Company, Milwaukee. WDT
04
07 A record-sized “Clean-Line”
heat-treating furnace, constructed with double chambers, has been built and
shipped as a unit by the Hevi-Duty Electric Company,
Watertown, for use in the processing of airplane parts. The fully automatic “Clean-Line” unit, so big
it required a special rail car for shipment, is the largest in size ever
constructed in one piece in the Hevi-Duty plant,
although bigger furnaces have been field-erected in customers’ works. Hevi-Duty, a
division of Basic Products Corporation, Milwaukee, used a 60-foot-long rail car
to ship the equipment to its destination in Ohio. WDT
1962 50TH ANNIVERSARY
CELEBRATION
03
02 The Hevi-Duty
Electric Company today instituted, as part of its 50th anniversary celebration,
a search for the oldest product of the company still usable. Hevi-Duty is a
division of Basic Products Corporation.
Elton E. Staples, Hevi-Duty president, said
the company has posted a reward of 50 silver dollars which will go to the
person who discovers the oldest product.
This product probably will be a tube or muffle furnace, a crucible
furnace, or a hot plate made by Hevi-Duty or its
predecessor company, Electric Heating Apparatus Co., which was formed in 1912
in New York City. The company owning the
oldest product found by Aug. 1, 1962, will receive, free of charge, a new Hevi-Duty unit having the same function as the older
unit. The 50-dollar reward for the
discovery of the oldest unit can be won by any person bringing to the attention
of Hevi-Duty the product which is found to be the
oldest still usable..
WDT
04
19 LAKE GENEVA PLANT
Basic
Products Corporation has commissioned Derald M. West,
architect of Lake Geneva, to design a new plant for its Hevi-Duty
Electric Division in that city. The
Watertown plant will continue to operate here.
Raymond G. Nordstrom, Basic Products vice president in charge of the
Lake Geneva and Watertown Hevi-Duty divisions, made
the announcement today. Nordstrom said
the 30,000 square foot plant is to be completed this fall. The Hevi-Duty
Electric Division, formed last month, will manufacture and market small
transformers. WDT
12
21 HEVI-DUTY CO COMBINED WITH
LINDBERG ENGINEERING CO
Basic
Products Corp., parent company of the Hevi-Duty
Heating Equipment Company of Watertown, has reached an agreement to acquire the
Lindberg Engineering Co., a major producer of heat treating
equipment and of ceramic products. Basic
will pay more than 3 million dollars cash for Lindberg’s assets. Lindberg’s annual sales volume currently is
at a 13 million dollar rate, representing
approximately a 20 per cent increase in annual sales volume for Basic
Products. WDT
1963
01
05 BOEING AIRCRAFT CORP
A
huge furnace which travels on rails to heat treat spars for helicopter rotor
blades has been delivered to Vertol Division, Boeing
Aircraft Corp., by Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment
Co. The 41-foot-long furnace travels on
more than 100 feet of rail to treat spars on two work platforms. The special order
installation was the result of a $200,000 contract awarded Hevi-Duty. Included in the installation are the
“traveling bell” furnace containing the electric heating elements, two
35-foot-long work platforms, two corrugated metal retorts which cover the work
platforms to seal in the nitrogen atmosphere used in the processing, and
electrical power supplies. WDT
10
03 EXPANSION FOR R&D
Most
of the nearly 5,000 square feet of additional floor space being added to the
plant of Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment Division, Basic
Products Corporation, will be utilized by the company’s research and
development staff, Elton Staples, president, said today. Construction got underway early in the fourth
week of September, with the work being done by Oliver Construction Company of
Oconomowoc. WDT
11
21 NATIONAL AERONAUTICAL AND
SPACE ADMINISTRATION
A multi-range
tube furnace for experimentation in the heat treating of space age metals has
been shipped to the National Aeronautical and Space Administration [NASA] by Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment Company of Watertown, a
metallurgical division of Basic Products Corporation. The furnace provides controlled operating
temperatures over a range of 200 to 3,300 degrees Fahrenheit. It is provided with atmosphere generating
equipment which allows the introduction of a wide range of gases into the
heating chamber. WDT
12
09 ITALIAN NUCLEAR ENERGY
AGENCY
A
special 2-furnace installation for the Italian Nuclear Energy Agency which will
be operated, serviced and maintained completely by
robot and mechanical manipulation has been designed and built here by Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment Company. The furnaces and an associated atmosphere
generator were built for the Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Company, Atomic
Energy Division, under contract to the Italian National Committee for Nuclear
Energy. They will perform an essential
role in a remote nuclear fuel reprocessing and refabrication plant now under
construction in southern Italy. WDT
12
20 FOREIGN ORDERS
Foreign
aid financed orders for $4,270 worth of electrical equipment sold in Pakistan
have been placed with Basic Products Corporation’s Hevi-Duty
Heating Equipment Division in Watertown, according to the Agency for
International Development. The Pakistan
purchases are financed under the U.S. economic development program in that
South Asian nation, including provision for import of goods and materials
needed for commercial and industrial development. WDT
1964
02
17 MEYER NAMED GENERAL MANAGER
Chester
E. Meyer, vice president in charge of manufacturing for Hevi-Duty
Electric Company, has been named general manager of Hevi-Duty,
succeeding Elton E. Staples, who has been named to a new position with Basic
Products Corporation, parent company of the local concern. Meyer has been associated with Hevi-Duty since 1952.
He was permanently assigned to the local plant in 1960. He is married and has three children, Mirian, 16; Kristine, 13, and William, 6. The family resides in the town of Delafield,
near Pewaukee Lake. WDT
10
24 “TOOLS FOR FREEDOM”
SHIPMENT TO TURIN, ITALY
When
the nuclear-powered S. S. Savannah leaves New York harbor Nov. 3 on its maiden
voyage, a laboratory furnace made in Watertown will be one of the items in its
cargo. The furnace, made by Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment Company here, a division of
Basic Products Corporation, is part of a “Tools for Freedom” shipment to Turin,
Italy. Early next year students from the
developing countries will begin using the furnace and other tools donated by
American businesses at the new Turin International Center for Advanced Technical
and Vocational Training. WDT
12
09 125-FOOT-LONG HEAT TREATING FURNACE
Officials
of the Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment Company today were
pondering means of shipping the 125-foot-long heat treating
furnace built at the plant in Watertown.
The furnace, built in sections, will be shipped on a combination of
lowboy trailers and railroad flat cars.
A photo of the huge furnace, largest ever turned out here, appeared in
the Daily Times on Wednesday. Hevi-Duty, a metallurgical
division of Basic Products Corporation, Milwaukee, says it’s the biggest roller
hearth furnace ever manufactured by the company, and also
the first of its type built here. It
will be shipped to the Stellite Division of Union
Carbide Corporation at Kokomo, Ind. WDT
1965
09
29 LARGEST OVEN EVER MADE
The
largest oven ever made by Hevi-Duty Heating Equipment
Company soon will be on its way to the Draper Corporation of Hopedale,
Mass. It is a two and a half ton
electric, vertical quench oven. The oven
is designed to do “solution heat treating” and “aging” of aluminum
castings. Five thousand pounds of
castings are loaded on a built in, hydraulically operated, elevator and raised
into the oven. When solution heat
treating, the aluminum castings (about 5,000 pounds) are loaded onto a
hydraulic elevator, heated to 1,000 degrees.
WDT
10
08 SOLA BASIC INDUSTRIES
Basic
Products Corp., of which the HeviDuty Heating
Equipment Co. of Watertown is a part, disclosed in Milwaukee that it plans to
change its name to Sola Basic Industries, pending stockholders’ approval at
their annual meeting Oct. 28. The
proposal came in the company’s annual report, which showed that earnings in the
fiscal year ended July 31 were 40 percent higher than fiscal 1964. Sales climbed 11 per cent. WDT
1966
06
14 STRIKE ENDS
The
strike at Hevi-Duty has ended. Work at the local plants, which have been shut
down due to the strike since June 1, will resume on Monday. Agreement on a contract was reached in
Milwaukee Friday afternoon in the office of William Kurtz, federal
mediator. The agreement was reached at a
negotiating session between representatives of Local 494, International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and a committee representing Hevi-Duty.
Approximately 450 workers were involved in the workout. WDT
1968
09
20 TWO STORY BUILDING TO BE
ADDED
The
strike at Hevi-Duty has ended. Work at the local plants, which have been
shut down due to the strike since June 1, will resume on Monday. Agreement on a contract was reached in
Milwaukee Friday afternoon in the office of William Kurtz, federal mediator. The agreement was reached at a negotiating
session between representatives of Local 494, International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers, and a committee representing Hevi-Duty. Approximately 450 workers were involved in
the workout. WDT
1969
02 28 JUNIOR ACHIEVEMENT COMPANIES
Junior Achievement Companies One Hundred Dollar Club
05 03 25,000 sq. ft. NEW BUILDING
A building with 25,000 square feet of
floor space will be erected by Hevi-Duty Electric to
replace the temporary rented facilities located at O’Connell and North Water
Streets, formerly owned by and occupied by the Otto
Biefeld Company. Transformers are
manufactured in the former Biefeld Company building. The decision to erect the building was
announced here yesterday by Frank H. Roby, president of Sola Basic
Industries. Plans for a new building
have been underway for a long time. Mr.
Roby yesterday reaffirmed plans to build the structure.
07 25 AUSTRALIAN VISITOR
James W. Barnett, managing director of
Sola Basic Australia Ltd., Clayton, Victoria, Australia, is visiting the
Watertown group operations of Lindberg Hevi-Duty. Met with Robert Hartwig, furnace tester at
the Watertown plant.
07 30 BUILDING TO BE CONSTRUCTED AT 1202 WAKOTA
Street View of this
location: https://goo.gl/maps/5m9TmQBrg6vCi4qD8. Became location of
Rock River Gymnastics.
09 13 NEW BUILDING CONSTRUCTION BEGINS
Hevi-Duty Electric, division of Sola Basic
Industries, Inc., will begin construction of a building with 25,000 square feet
of floor space in 30 to 45 days, an official of the firm reports. The building will be erected on property Hevi-Duty owns on Hart Street, directly south of the Hart
Street plant. When the building is
completed, operations of this division now in the former Biefeld property on North
Water Street will be moved to the new building.
09
13 MOVE TO WAKOKA &
WILLIAM STREETS
Groundbreaking ceremonies
for the new building to be constructed by Hevi-Duty
Electric, division of Sola Basic Industries will be held Tuesday, Sept. 16 at 1
p.m. The building will be built on
property Hevi-Duty owns at the intersection of Wakoka and William streets.
When the building is completed, operations of this division now in the
former Biefield property on North Water
Street will be moved to the new
structure.
09
17 NEW BUILDING GROUNDBREAKING
Ground was broken Tuesday afternoon
for the new building of 24,000 square feet which is to be erected by Hevi-Duty Electric, division of Sola Basic Industries, Inc.
The building will be located
on land south of the Hart Street Hevi-Duty plant
which Hevi Duty acquired a few years ago.
Representatives of industry
and business were present for the ceremony.
Directors and officers of both the Watertown Area Chamber of Commerce
and the Watertown Association of Commerce Promotive Corporation were present.
When the new building is
completed and ready for occupancy in January of next year employees of the
electrical division now working in rented quarters at O'Connell and North Water
Streets will be transferred to the new building.
Brief remarks at the
groundbreaking ceremony were made by Harry Eikenberry. head of the Sola Basic
electric. division.
Eikenberry, located at the
division's headquarters at Goldsboro, N.C., explained the necessity for setting
up a plant in Goldsboro for the electrical division. At the time the plant was opened in
Goldsboro, most of the electrical division's operations in Watertown were
ended. The remaining portion of the
division continued to operate in the rented quarters, and the entire Hart
Street facilities were turned over to the Hevi Duty
furnace division.
Eikenberry said the move to
Goldsboro was made because medium powered transformers were to be introduced by
the electrical division, and the plant was located in
Goldsboro to insure an adequate supply of labor.
Up to now, Hevi-Duty had leased 13,000 square-foot a facility in
Watertown at 118 [the “Biefeld building at 116-118] North Water Street, which
will be vacated. The new plant is
located at the corner of Williams and Wakoka streets. Hevi-Duty
Division had been headquartered in Milwaukee, prior to the Goldsboro move in
1967. The division also has a production
facility in Lake Geneva.
10 25 CONTRIBUTIONS FOR THE WATERTOWN COMMUNITY CHEST FUND DRIVE
Contributions for the Watertown Community Chest fund drive from the Hevi-Duty Co.
Presented to Fred Grimm, co-chairman of the fund drive, by Terry Pisarik
11 21 NEW BUILDING
FOUNDATION PREPARED
At 1202 Wakota St, on land south of the
Hart Street Hevi-Duty plant which Hevi
Duty acquired a few years ago.
1993
02
09 PLANT AND MANUFACTURING
IMPROVEMENTS
Lindberg,
a unit of General Signal, plans to spend more than $1.1 million on plant and
manufacturing improvements in Watertown this year. Malcolm “Mac” Moore, vice president and
general manager of the Watertown plant, said a restructuring of the facility
will enhance the firm’s position as a leading manufacturing of heat processing
equipment. “We are making a major
investment in and commitment to our Watertown operations,” Moore said. “In today’s intensely competitive economic
climate, our customers expect the highest quality, fastest delivery and, most
importantly, the best value. “We at
Lindberg are taking specific steps to ensure continued fulfillment of these
expectations,” he added. WDT
1997
05
04 ANNUAL RECOGNITION DINNER
The annual
Lindberg recognition dinner was held Wednesday at Home Plate Inn in
Lebanon. Two new members, Richard J. Kawka and James W. Joseph, joined
the club. Those with at least 30 years
of service are Fred Busier, Curtiss Buss, Tim Buss, Harley Draeger, Ruth Flath, Dennis Fosdal, Tom Gillis,
Ruth Hartwig, Robert Haseleu, Richard Hinze, Melvin
Kasten, Gene Kessler, Charles Lazzara, Joseph Schiferl,
James Werner and Earl Zimmerman . Members with at
least 35 years of service are Ervin Bankert, John Bill, Joyce Engelbrecht,
Donald Grulke, Donald Hartwig, Jerry Hilfiker, William Kaercher, Carl
Krueger, Ludwig Porzky, James Propp, Roger Rowlands,
Gerald Sell and Russel Tesch. Members with at least 40 years of service are
Robert Carter, Elmer Christian, Wieda Christian, Joe Cuccia, Fred Grulke, Shirley Grulke, David Kube, Philip Lenius and Steve Perez.
WDT
1999
05
04 COUPLE EMPLOYED 86 YEARS (combined)
A
Watertown woman who retired from a local company Friday was whisked to work on
her last day in a limousine, a tribute to her 44 1/2 years of service. Wieda Christian of
Watertown now joins her husband, Elmer Jr., in retirement from Lindberg/Blue M
Electric. Together, the pair worked for
the same company a total of 86 years. Married just two weeks after 18-year-old Wieda started work at the former Hevi-Duty
Electric, she took a day off for a honeymoon and then went back to the
plant. Her husband began work at the
plant a year later. He retired last
year. WDT
2004
12
15 CONSOLIDATION RESULTS IN
LAYOFFS
Lindberg
Industrial Furnaces Blue M Electric will be consolidating with three other
similar businesses in the country, all owned by SPX Corp., into one business
causing about half the employees at the Watertown plant to be laid off by the
end of the year. Lindberg is a unit of
SPX Corp. headquartered in Muskegon, Mich.
Lindberg makes and sells industrial ovens and environmental thermal
shock chambers. SPX Corp. has more than
75,000 industrial furnace installations worldwide and equipment with extensive
replacement parts inventory in the industry.
WDT
2014
02
20 FORMER LINDBERG HEVI-DUTY
BUILDING DETERIORATING;
BECOMING AN EYESORE
Watertown
city officials have reached out to the owners of the former Lindberg Hevi-Duty building in the hopes of starting the process to
either refurbish or tear down the building to make way for redevelopment. The building has been vacant for more than 10
years and is deteriorating at a rapid rate.
Lindberg Hevi-Duty went out of business approximately 15 years ago. The company produced industrial
furnaces. In its wake, Lindberg left
behind a 100,000-square-foot building at 304 Hart St., right in the heart of
the city. WDT
History of Watertown,
Wisconsin