Edwards Electric history

1873 Rousseau withdrew from the partnership and his place was taken by Adam Lungen.

1880- Edwards Company left the basement of the Lungen family's jewelry store, moved into a three-story plant, and began manufacturing wooden conduits and housings for burglar alarms.

1886- Along with burglar alarms and fixture igniters, the Edwards catalog listed for the first time electrically wound clocks, program systems, and coils.

1896- Edwards stopped installing electrical devices and limited its activities to the design and manufacture of signaling, communications and protection equipment.

1900- Bell with horizontally actuated plunger devised.

The basic design is used for today's Edwards AdaptaBel . 1901- First national distributor of "electrical house goods" appointed by Edwards Company.

1903- New York Stock Exchange bell installed to start the beginning and ending of trading each day.

1917- Watertight bells and submarine detection devices built for the Navy, special telegraph apparatus developed for the Signal Corps.

1927- Holland Tunnel opened with Edwards emergency signaling installed in twin 2-mile tubes.

1936- New break-glass fire stations introduced to replace hammer and chain types.

1938- Edwards annunciators and signaling systems specified by Boeing Aircraft Co. for double-deck flying clipper ships.

1941- World's largest car ferry, the City of Midland, left its Michigan waterways equipped with Edwards watertight signals.

1948- Edwards-made fire alarms installed aboard SS President Cleveland and SS President Wilson, new round-the-world cruise ships.

Since 1950, the Ogallala has been pumped at six times the rate of recharge, effectively, a race to the bottom: use up as much of what is left of the aquifer as is economically useful until it’s gone, as long as one can afford the expense of an electric pump to pull up the harder-to-get-to water.

1951- Tear-drop fire alarm station introduced: called by Associated Press "a model of fool-proof simplicity."

1956- Manufacturing facilities for distributor products transferred to new Pittsfield, Maine plant.

Staub left the family hardware business to launch a remodeling business, a partnership called J.E. Staub & Co. (It was not incorporated until 1958.) Grossing just $3,000 in the first year, the company struggled for a number of years as it grew into a general contracting company.

1964- Edwards fire alarm system specified for world's largest structure, the 52-story Vertical Assembly Building at Cape Kennedy.

First he had to complete a law degree at the University of Mississippi, where he also received an ROTC commission in 1965.

Don and Ruth Edwards founded Edwards Electrical and Mechanical, Inc. in 1968.

Blaine was a full-service general contractor founded in 1969.

The business quickly grew and was moved to an old two-story house on East Street in 1970.

1971- JFK Center for the Performing Arts equipped with Edwards fire alarm system.

1976- Edwards introduces a new ionization smoke detector.

In 1978 Joe Staub retired and because older stockholders wanted to cash in, JESCO was sold to AMCA International Corporation, a Charlotte, North Carolina, company involved in the non-residential construction, energy, and industrial markets.

1979- Edwards introduces the new Greenline Series Fire Alarm Bells.

1981- Edwards incorporates state-of-the-art micro-processor technology into a new generation of "programmable" signals with the launch of the Adaptatone product line.

1986- A new, current technology photoelectric smoke detector is introduced by Edwards.

What really provided the spark that took Yates to an entirely new level was the decision by the Mississippi State Legislature in 1990 to legalize dockside gambling on the Mississippi River and along the Gulf Coast.

The EAA was created by the Texas Legislature in 1993, at the behest of United States District Judge Lucius Bunton.

1994- Edwards introduces highly advanced, multi-element sensor technology into the "Commercial" fire alarm market place.

In 1995 ownership of JESCO changed hands, when AMCA's successor, United Dominion Industries, elected to sell the company to the privately held investment group Eagle Ventures.

1998 - Edwards introduces a new line a stackable visual signals, LED flashing and steady visual signals and strobes.

The Yates Companies was involved in a number of major projects following the 1999 merger.

In the fall of 2002 Yates completed the first phase of a Toyota assembly plant in San Antonio, Texas, which involved the construction of a 2.6 million-square-foot plant.

It landed one of the largest construction projects in the history of Mississippi, a $930 million Nissan auto plant, located near Canton, Mississippi, completed in 2003.

2005 - Edwards acquired by General Electric.

In 2006 Edwards was purchased by the Management Team and once again became privately and locally owned.

According to available information, there were no reported projects in 2021.