Midland-Ross

On March 21, 1923, Parish & Bingham and the Detroit Pressed Steel Co. merged to form a new company, Midland Steel Products.[4] The merger was complete in mid-May 1923,[5] making Midland Steel Products the largest automobile frame manufacturer in the United States.[6] In 1927, the company invented the first four-wheel brake, and began to manufacture automobile and truck brakes.[7]

By 1954, Midland Steel Products had annual sales of $54.64 million ($520,197,175 in 2019 dollars), making it the 12th largest company with headquarters in Cleveland and the 458th largest company in the entire United States.[8] Three years later, it had annual sales of $72 million ($655,421,801 in 2019 dollars), and it ranked as the 428th largest company in the entire United States.[9]

On October 16, 1957, Midland Steel Products announced it was merging with the J. O. Ross Engineering Corporation, a designer and manufacturer of atmospheric control plants for factories; finishing and painting apparatus; coating and printing equipment for paper, sheet plastic, and tires; and a wide array of couplings, joints, valves, and similar fittings. Ross Engineering had sales of about $28 million in 1956.[10] The merger was approved by Midland stockholders on November 26, and the new company took the name Midland-Ross Corporation.[11] Ross Engineering brought several subsidiaries to the deal, including the John Waldron Corp.,[11] which manufactured paper processing machinery.[12]

By the end of 1957, Midland-Ross owned 11 manufacturing plants, in which it made automobile frames, brakes, miscellaneous automotive products, and atmospheric control devices for factories. It ended the year with $100 million ($910,308,057 in 2019 dollars) in sales. In March 1958, the company purchased the Hartig Engine & Machine Co. of Mountainside, New Jersey, for $1.2 million ($10,633,910 in 2019 dollars). The firm designed and manufactured thermoplastic extruding machinery.[13] Eight months later, Midland-Ross acquired the Transportation Equipment Division of Consolidated Metal Products Co.[14] The company made door controls and air- and pneumatic-powered doors for buses, railroad passenger cars, and subway cars.[15]

The automobile frame manufacturing business of Midland-Ross suffered significant setbacks. The company closed its plant in Detroit in 1959 after automaker Chrysler declined to renew a contract with the company to make frames for its Dodge and De Soto brands. About 1,400 employees were laid off.[12] Chrysler than canceled its contract with Midland-Ross to provide frames for its Chrysler cars and trucks. This forced Midland-Ross to close its Chicago, Illinois, plant a few months later and lay off 2,500 employees.[16]

In April 1959, Midland-Ross acquired Nelson Metal Products of Grand Rapids, Michigan, maker of zinc and aluminium die castings.[17] In November 1959, Midland-Ross Corporation bought Surface Combustion for $23 million.[18] The company, maker of industrial furnaces and heat treating equipment, was headquartered in Maumee, Ohio.[19] Sale of the company included its Janitrol and Janitrol Aero divisions, which made heating and cooling products for consumer use and aircraft and missiles, respectively.[15]

By 1961, Midland-Ross had 14 plants and about 6,000 employees. In February, it acquired the Industrial Rayon Corporation for $41 million ($350,782,851 in 2019 dollars). The company manufactured Tyrex, a rayon fiber used in automobile tires, and rayon fibers for use in industrial manufacturing and clothing.[15][20] Midland-Ross purchased the Fandaire division of Yuba Consolidated Industries in February 1962 and merged the company (which made air-cooled condensers and cooling products) with Surface Combustion.[15][19]

These acquisitions and mergers significantly changed Midland-Ross. In 1956, the company had annual sales of about $72 million and earnings of $2.8 million ($22,716,367 in 2019 dollars). The company then spent roughly $34 million acquiring other companies. By the end of 1961, Midland-Ross had annual sales of $137.6 million ($1,116,347,202 in 2019 dollars), and $5.4 million ($43,810,137 in 2019 dollars) in annual earnings. While nearly 100 percent of its sales came from the manufacture of automobile frames in 1956, this had changed significantly by 1961, with 33 percent of sales from consumer durables, 32 percent from capital goods, 30 percent from automotive products, and 5 percent from aircraft and missile components.[15]

Acquisitions continued. In January 1963, Midland-Ross acquired the J. Leukart Machine Company of Columbus, Ohio, manufacturer of precision machining equipment. In April, it acquired the Steel City Electric Co. of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a manufacturer of electrical cables, junction boxes, and other industrial electrical equipment.[21] That same year, it changed the name of its Midland Brake division to Power Controls. The company had significantly diversified its product line, and now primarily manufactured air and vacuum brake systems, air compressors, brake valves, treadles, and slack adjustors.[22] By 1965, Midland-Ross' sales had risen to a record $210 million ($1,911,646,919 in 2019 dollars). In February of that year, it acquired National Malleable and Steel Castings Co. (a company which made grinding balls, iron and steel castings, and railway equipment) for $30 million ($243,389,652 in 2019 dollars).[23] The purchase included two subsidiaries, Industrial Castings (an iron and steel casting manufacturer) and Capitol Foundry (maker of steel grinding balls for the mining industry).[24]

Midland-Ross continued to make significant acquisitions throughout the late 1960s, as well as consolidated a number of its divisions.

By 1966, Midland-Ross had sales of $344 million ($2,710,720,000 in 2019 dollars) and earnings of $17.6 million ($138,688,000 in 2019 dollars). In August 1967, it purchased Unicast, a maker of specialty steel castings, for $9.6 million ($73,609,581 in 2019 dollars).[25] The following November, it acquired the Reinforced Plastic Container Corp. of Roxboro, North Carolina. The company made commercial waste management disposal systems, container handling systems, liquid separators, and plastic containers.[26]

In March 1968, Midland-Ross began to consolidate some of its acquisitions into new, larger divisions. It merged Nelson Metal Products and Grand Rapids Bright Metal Co. (a manufacturer of bright chrome electroplating and other finishes) into a new division, named Nelson Metal Products.[27] The company also began to divest some of its assets. In April 1969, Midland-Ross sold Surface Combustion's Janitrol and Webster divisions to Laird, Inc. The sale did not include the Janitrol Aero division, which was retained by Surface Combustion.[28]

In June 1969, Midland-Ross formed a new division, Midrex, and constructed a plant for the new division in South Carolina. Midrex used a patented natural gas process to manufacture high-iron content metal pellets for use as ore by the iron and steel smelting industries.[29]

One of Midland-Ross' last acquisitions came in February 1970, when it gained control of Cameron Machine, a company that made winders, sheeters, and slitters for the paper, plastic, textile, metal, and rubber industries.[30]

Throughout the 1970s, Midland-Ross made a series of consolidations among its divisions and divested itself of assets. It consolidated Ross Engineering, Waldron-Hartig, and Cameron Machine into a new Machinery Division in February 1971;[31] sold Midrex to a West German steel manufacturer, Korf Stahl A.G., in January 1974 for $25 million ($129,605,263 in 2019 dollars);[32] merged Industrial Castings and Unicast into a new division called National Castings in July 1975;[33] spun off Capitol Foundry into a new division called Capitol Castings in July 1975;[34] sold Reinforced Plastic Container to the Youngstown Steel Door Company for $2 million ($9,502,783 in 2019 dollars) in December 1975;[35] and merged Nelson Metal and Grand Rapids Bright Metal into Power Controls in December 1977.

The new division focused on the manufacture of air horns, air reservoirs, control valves, bus door operating systems, load levelers, and aluminum and zinc ornamental and functional die castings like taillight trim, hood ornaments, and name plates.[36] Power Controls was renamed Midland Brake in 1980.[37]

The Midland-Ross Corporation was acquired by Forstmann Little & Company, a private equity investment firm, on July 1, 1986, for $450 million ($1,049,590,164 in 2019 dollars).[43] Midland-Ross ceased to exist, and many of its divisions were spun off as stand-alone companies or sold to other firms over the next two decades.[lower-alpha 1]