In the 1950s and 1960s, Towmotor set out to capture a greater share of the market by introducing new models and acquiring companies with product lines that expanded lift capacity. The gasoline, diesel ...

When Caterpillar Tractor Co. closed its Mentor lift-truck plant in 1984, many of its 1,700 employees were devastated. Caterpillar had merged with the Cleveland-based Towmotor Corp. 20 years before, ...

John Miklitsch remembers the heyday of the W.S. Tyler plant in Mentor. “I started out doing soldering work in the sieve room. Later, I learned how to weld,” said Miklitsch, who landed a job with Tyler ...