04-03-2009, 09:49 PM
My home town was the home of the old Thew Shovel, a company that not only made a large internationaly used digging and heavy construction equipment, but also had a line of heavy Motor cranes, similar to some available from Walthers. When the family decided to retire, it was sold to Koehring. They used to get in box cars with small and medium parts and hardware, large diesel engines, hydraulic pumps, flats and gondolas of heavy castings, milled shapes for booms, and I believe may even have recieved raw metals to do their own specialty castings. Some of their moto-cranes had one engine for the vehicle frame, and another heavy diesel for the crane mechanism. I have seen their products in Brasil, Lybia, and Trinidad. They shipped finished products, replacement parts, and gondolas of scraps from their machining processes. On a number of occasions, I saw in-plant switching being done by a crane similar to the powered crane Walthers used to sell. They also had at least one 6 wheel drive moto-crane fitted with knuckle couplers.
We also had a shipyard that built ore boats and even a number of naval ships ranging up to 1000'. Recieved lots of heavy sheet steel, huge diesel engines, motors, generators, bearings, electronic equipment, and probably only shipped out machining scrap.
At the mouth of the river, we had a coal facility that loaded lake boats with West Virginia coal from an elevating rotary car dumper. Across the slip from this, there were a set of bucket gantry cranes that emptied iron ore and taconite from the boats. Both facilities were torn down in the 1980s.
Also had an auto plant that recieved dozens of Box cars per day, and shipped out finished double racks of Vans and triple racks of passenger cars.
We also had a shipyard that built ore boats and even a number of naval ships ranging up to 1000'. Recieved lots of heavy sheet steel, huge diesel engines, motors, generators, bearings, electronic equipment, and probably only shipped out machining scrap.
At the mouth of the river, we had a coal facility that loaded lake boats with West Virginia coal from an elevating rotary car dumper. Across the slip from this, there were a set of bucket gantry cranes that emptied iron ore and taconite from the boats. Both facilities were torn down in the 1980s.
Also had an auto plant that recieved dozens of Box cars per day, and shipped out finished double racks of Vans and triple racks of passenger cars.