NYSE:TXT | |
Industry | Lawnmower Manufacturing |
Predecessor | Thor Machine Works |
Founded | c. 1921 Racine, Wisconsin, U.S. |
Founder | Knud Jacobsen |
Fate | Acquired by Textron, 1975 |
Headquarters | , England |
Products | Tractors, lawnmowers |
Jacobsen Manufacturing is a former U.S. lawn mower and light-duty tractor manufacturer, in operation there from the early 1920s until around 2020. It was located in Racine, Wisconsin, from 1921 to 2001, when It moved to Charlotte, North Carolina. In 2017, Jacobsen moved from Charlotte to Augusta, Georgia. In 2020, it would relocate to its sister factory of Ransomes-Jacobsen in Ipswich, England, UK. It has been owned by Textron since 1975.
Jacobsen Manufacturing was founded around the turn of the 20th century as a pattern-making shop by Knud Jacobsen, a Danish immigrant who came to Racine, Wisconsin, in 1891. A skilled woodworker, Jacobsen made patterns for automobiles, agricultural machines and electrical equipment. Jacobsen restructured his business as Thor Machine Works in 1917. In 1921 it released the 4-Acre mower, a gasoline-powered reel mower marketed through Jacobsen Manufacturing. Not long after the Greens Mower was released. In 1928 Jacobsen made a notable contribution to small engines by inventing the recoil start, by 1932 all Jacobsen mowers used recoil starters. The company continued to produce mowers for estates and golf courses throughout the 1920s and 1930s, and was not damaged by the Great Depression. Knud Jacobsen retired in 1939 and was succeeded as president by his son, Oscar Jacobsen. [1]
In 1945 Jacobsen Manufacturing purchased the Worthington Mower Company of East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, known for its gang mowers for golf courses, parks and airfields. [2] In 1949 the new subsidiary began making Model G tractors using Ford tractor components, mostly for use in parks and golf courses. [3] The company introduced new products, such as a tractor-mounted compressor in 1955. [4] It continued to make lawnmowers in Stroudsburg for golf course maintenance and for residential use until it closed around 1959. [2] Jacobsen manufactured under the Worthington brand until the mid-1960s. [3]
The company had purchased the Johnston Lawn Mower Company of Ottumwa, Iowa, and used this division to enter the residential mower market, offering reel-type and rotary-type mowers for this market in the 1950s. The Javelin riding mower came out at the end of the 1950s, and the Jacobsen Chief garden tractor was launched in 1961 with the 100A which was electric start with 7 hp Kohler K161 and the 100B which was rope start with 7 hp Kohler K161. [1] In 1965 Ford entered the garden tractor market with their two models, T-800 powered by an 8 hp Kohler K181 and the T-1000 powered by a 10 hp Kohler K241. In 1966, Jacobsen Chief Tractors started using a Peerless 2300 and steering was improved as well as a style change. Jacobsen made tractors for Oliver, Ford, Minneapolis-Moline, and White. Jacobsen also made light tractors aimed at the farm market, with innovative attachments to make the tractors more useful and to make them qualify for tax breaks. [5] Textron purchased Jacobsen in 1975, and still produces Jacobsen garden tractors and mowers today at their factory in Ipswich, UK. [1]
A lawn mower is a device utilizing one or more revolving blades to cut a grass surface to an even height. The height of the cut grass may be fixed by the design of the mower but generally is adjustable by the operator, typically by a single master lever or by a mechanism on each of the machine's wheels. The blades may be powered by manual force, with wheels mechanically connected to the cutting blades so that the blades spin when the mower is pushed forward, or the machine may have a battery-powered or plug-in electric motor. The most common self-contained power source for lawn mowers is a small 4-stroke internal combustion engine. Smaller mowers often lack any form of self-propulsion, requiring human power to move over a surface; "walk-behind" mowers are self-propelled, requiring a human only to walk behind and guide them. Larger lawn mowers are usually either self-propelled "walk-behind" types or, more often, are "ride-on" mowers that the operator can sit on and control. A robotic lawn mower is designed to operate either entirely on its own or less commonly by an operator on a remote control.
Textron Inc. is an American industrial conglomerate based in Providence, Rhode Island. Textron's subsidiaries include Arctic Cat, Bell Textron, Textron Aviation, and Lycoming Engines. It was founded by Royal Little in 1923 as the Special Yarns Company. In 2020, Textron employed over 33,000 people in 25 countries. The company ranked 265th on the 2021 Fortune 500 of the largest United States corporations by revenue.
Cub Cadet is an American company that produces outdoor power equipment and services, including utility vehicles, handheld and chore products as well as snow throwers.
Ransomes, Sims and Jefferies Limited was a major British agricultural machinery maker also producing a wide range of general engineering products in Ipswich, Suffolk including traction engines, trolleybuses, ploughs, lawn mowers, combine harvesters and other tilling equipment. Ransomes also manufactured Direct Current electric motors in a wide range of sizes, and electric forklift trucks and tractors. They manufactured aeroplanes during the First World War. Their base, specially set up in 1845, was named Orwell Works.
The Toro Company is an American company based in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota that designs, manufactures, and markets lawn mowers, snow blowers, and irrigation system supplies for commercial and residential, agricultural, and public sector uses.
Gravely, of Brillion, Wisconsin, is a manufacturer of powered lawn and garden implements which it describes as "walk-behind, zero turn and outfront mowers". It started as a manufacturer of "walk-behind" or two-wheel tractors.
Lennox International Inc. is a provider of climate control products for the heating, ventilation, air conditioning, and refrigeration markets. The company is based outside Dallas, Texas in the United States and has operations globally.
Dixie Chopper is a brand of industrial zero-turning lawn mower formerly manufactured in Fillmore, Indiana, relocated to Gibson City, Illinois for a short period of time, but returned to Greencastle, Indiana. Many of the original assemblers from the Fillmore (Coatesville) facility returned to Dixie Chopper. Dixie Chopper was founded by Hoosier Art Evans in 1980. In February 2014 Dixie Chopper was purchased by Jacobsen/Textron. However, on December 5, 2018, Textron notified dealers that they had ceased production of the Dixie Chopper.
Charles Campbell Worthington, or C.C. Worthington, was an American industrialist whose efforts were in part responsible for the foundation of the Professional Golfers Association. He invented the first commercially successful gang lawnmower for fairway maintenance.
Two-wheel tractor or walking tractor are generic terms understood in the US and in parts of Europe to represent a single-axle tractor, which is a tractor with one axle, self-powered and self-propelled, which can pull and power various farm implements such as a trailer, cultivator or harrow, a plough, or various seeders and harvesters. The operator usually walks behind it or rides the implement being towed. Similar terms are mistakenly applied to the household rotary tiller or power tiller; although these may be wheeled and/or self-propelled, they are not tailored for towing implements. A two-wheeled tractor specializes in pulling any of numerous types of implements, whereas rotary tillers specialize in soil tillage with their dedicated digging tools. This article concerns two-wheeled tractors as distinguished from such tillers.
Wheel Horse was a manufacturer of outdoor and garden power equipment, including lawn and garden tractors. The company's headquarters were in South Bend, Indiana, USA.
Roths Industries, Inc. (1945–1960) was a manufacturer of small garden tractors and other agricultural equipment founded by Herbert C. Roths in Alma, Michigan. The company manufactured Garden King Walking Tractors, BesRo Riding Tractors, and Till Ro Stalk Cutters.
Douglas Equipment Limited is an English manufacturer of aviation support vehicles such as tugs and tractors. The firm is headquartered in the Arle area of Cheltenham, England with manufacturing operations around the world.
Ingersoll Power Equipment is a garden and compact tractor manufacturer located in Portland, Maine. As of 2005, it is under the ownership of Eastman Industries.
The GE Elec-Trak was the first commercially produced all-electric garden tractor, made mostly between 1969 and 1975 at GE's Outdoor Power Equipment Operation under Bruce R. Laumeister. The previous work of Laumeister at GE on the experimental Delta electric car that debuted in 1968 helped pave the way for the production of the Elec-Trak. Despite the limited production and availability of the electric tractors, many Elec-Traks are still in use today and have a cult following among tractor and electric vehicle enthusiasts. They are an archetypal or seminal design that has influenced all later electric tractors.
The Worthington Mower Company, originally called the Shawnee Mower Factory, produced lawn mowers and light-duty tractors in the United States from the early 1920s until around 1959. Founded by Charles Campbell Worthington and run as a family business, in 1945 it was purchased by Jacobsen Manufacturing. It continued to produce tractors and mowers in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, until around 1959.
Shawnee on Delaware is an unincorporated community on the Delaware River, part of Smithfield Township in Monroe County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is situated just south of the foothills of the Pocono Mountains, 2.6 miles (4.2 km) southwest of the Shawnee Mountain Ski Area and approximately 75 miles (121 km) west of New York City.
The Worthington Automobile Company was a short-lived automobile manufacturer in the United States that made automobiles between 1904 and 1905.
A riding mower, also known as a ride-on mower, tractor mower or lawn tractor, is a type of lawn mower on which the operator is seated, unlike mowers which are pushed or towed.
Joseph Aloysius Roseman, Sr. was an American golf professional, golf course architect, and inventor of golf course mowing equipment. He designed at least 50 golf courses and made alterations on over 100 more. Roseman had two starts in golf majors – the 1919 and the 1920 PGA Championship.
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