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MAKING BETTER PARTS FOR THE BETTER PART OF A CENTURY.
In 1919, W.E.C. “Cass” Clifford and David B. Jacobs founded a new forging enterprise in Urbana, Illinois. Within a few short years, the company bearing their name would become one of the most successful custom forging companies in the United States. But the road to success wasn’t always easy.
In 1923 a fire destroyed the original plant, and the company moved to its current location in Champaign, Illinois, temporarily conducting business operations out of a railroad boxcar. Six years later disaster struck again as the Great Depression hit, and production dwindled to a mere two days a week. At the lowest ebb, Jacobs and the partnership’s sole remaining employee personally completed an order of 300 service hubs for Chevrolet at fifty cents apiece. Together, the two men cut, forged and trimmed the parts, delivering them to the local train station by wheelbarrow to avoid additional shipping costs. Through courageous and persistent efforts the company survived, and the partners began to anticipate brighter days ahead.
As the ’30s drew to a close, the company ordered what was then the largest commercial forging hammer in North America — a 25,000-pound, steam-driven hammer, partially designed by D.B. Jacobs. The investment quickly proved its worth as America entered World War II, and the powerful machine hammered out thousands of tons of forgings for tanks, cannons and armament for the war effort. Among other things, the company forged a critical part for the 105-mm Howitzers that played a pivotal role in preventing Egypt’s fall to Rommel.
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By the end of the war, the company earned special recognition for its critical part in America’s war production efforts, but Clifford-Jacob’s commitment to national defense didn’t end there. Today, with thousands of American troops deployed around the world, Clifford-Jacobs continues to play a vital role in American defense. Clifford-Jacobs currently produces almost all of the transmission gear forgings for the Apache and Chinook helicopters, in addition to forgings for a variety of defense weapon systems, including the M-1 Abrams tank, the F-18 Navy Fighter and the F-22 Joint Strike Fighter.
As a new century unfolds, aerospace production is just one area of expertise in a plant producing quality forgings for companies whose products are competing around the globe. From the machines that harvest America’s renewable forests to giant equipment tunneling deep below the surface of the earth, you’ll find Clifford-Jacobs parts working hard to keep the global economy hard at work.
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