Clark Filter history

Then, in 1951, Clark completed a 31,000-square-foot expansion of the Rockford plant.

In 1952, long-time employee Ralph Rosecrance replaced Harold Clark, who died the following year, as president of the company.

Under Rosecrance, the company made its first acquisition, buying the Liberty Can and Sign Company of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, in 1955 for $2 million.

By 1964, when the company made its initial public offering, sales had reached $23 million, with earnings of $1.2 million.

The newly public company next embarked on a string of acquisitions that not only raised its revenues to $82 million by 1976 but also allowed the company to diversify into a wide range of packaging materials.

1981: The company enters the filter field via the purchase of J.A. Baldwin Manufacturing Company of Kearney, Nebraska.

The Baldwin acquisition helped boost revenues to $174 million and net earnings of $16 million by 1984.

The 1993 acquisition of Airguard Industries had marked CLARCOR's first substantial move into the market for air filters for industrial and commercial customers--the firm having previously focused primarily on fluid filters.

Also in 1995 Norman E. Johnson was promoted to president and chief operating officer, with Gloyd remaining chairman and CEO.

Early in 1998 CLARCOR completed a minor though strategic acquisition, that of Air Technologies, Inc. (ATI) of Ottawa, Kansas, principally a producer of air filtration products to clean the air exiting out of painting operations.

By 1999 revenues had reached $477.9 million, with just 13 percent of the total coming from the company's founding consumer packaging operations.

A huge jump in revenues, to $652.1 million in 2000, resulted from this major acquisition.

In June 2001 CLARCOR spent about $29 million for several filtration management companies that together made up one of the leading distributors of filtration products to some of the largest firms in North America.