The company today known as the A. O. Smith Corporation was founded in 1874 by Charles Jeremiah Smith as
C. J. Smith and Sons, a baby carriage and bicycle parts manufacturer. It began forming steel tubing from sheet metal to make
bicycle frames. In 1904, the company incorporated in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, as A. O. Smith Company. In 1913, Lloyd Raymond Smith took over, and in 1914, the company introduced the
Smith Motor Wheel, a gasoline-powered device for bicycles. In 1915, it began manufacturing the
Smith Flyer automobile, which it later sold to
Briggs & Stratton of Milwaukee. In 1916, A. O. Smith was incorporated in New York. In the 1920s, company engineers developed the
coated welding rod which they used in manufacturing until 1965, as well as the world's first fully automated automobile frame factory, with the capability of making a frame every eight seconds, until 1958, the first arc-welded, high-pressure vessel used to refine oil, which the company produced until 1963, and
oil supply line pipes, until 1972. In 1933, the company used the process of
fusing glass to steel to make a large single-piece glass-lined brewery tank. Over the next 32 years, it made more than 11,000 glass-lined tanks. In 1936, the company patented the glass-lined water heater. Three years later, it began mass-producing residential water heaters, but shifted all production to war-time use during
World War II. By 1945, the company had built 4.5 million
bombs, 16,750 sets of
landing gear, and 46,700
propeller blades. It also built nose frames for the
B-25 bomber, water heaters, jeep frames, and components for the atomic bomb project. In 1946, it built a 400,000 square foot residential water heater plant in
Kankakee, Illinois. From this plant, it also made water heaters with the Kenmore name. In 1948, it entered the commercial water heater market after acquiring The Burkay Company of
Toledo, Ohio. In 1949, the company began producing
Harvestore, a glass-fused-to-steel silo, targeted at dairy and livestock operations. In the 1950s, A. O. Smith acquired Whirl-A-Way Motors of
Dayton, Ohio, and consolidated its electric motor manufacturing operations there. The motor division later introduced the
hermetic motor, a critical component of air conditioning and refrigeration compressors. Its water heater division introduced the first glass-lined commercial water heater, the
A. O. Smith Burkay B-65, and later the company established a
glass fiber division to replace steel in many applications. It also expanded into supplying oil field pipe and pipe for service stations, eventually becoming
Smith Fiberglass Products in 1986. In the early 1960s, the company opened a commercial water heater and boiler plant in
Stratford, Ontario, Canada. In 1965, the Motor division invented the enclosed canopy, two-compartment motor, a design that improved the reliability in pool pump motors by separating the switching components from the
motor windings. In 1967, fourth generation Smith family member, Lloyd B. Smith, was elected chairman and chief executive officer of the company. By 1969, the company had produced its 10 millionth residential water heater, and by 1972 had expanded to Europe. In 1974, the
Conservationist line of residential water heaters was introduced. In 1976, the Motor division opened a plant in
Bray, Ireland, to supply hermetic motors. In 1978, A. O. Smith began manufacturing storage tanks, beginning with
Aquastore, a glass-fused-to-steel tank. By the early 1980s, the Automotive Products unit had manufactured over 100 million passenger car frames, and 50 million truck frames, in Milwaukee, and soon after the company opened its first electric motor assembly operations in
Ciudad Juárez and
Ciudad Acuña, Mexico. In 1990, it developed the first hermetic motor insulation system compatible with
R-134a non-ozone-depleting refrigerant. In 1995, they acquired Peabody TecTank of
Parsons, Kansas, allowing A. O. Smith to enter the bulk dry storage market. That same year the company expanded into Asia through joint ventures:
Smith Fiberglass Products and
Harbin Composites Corporation to make fiberglass pipes for China's petroleum industry, as well as
Water Products Company and
Yuhan Water Heater to manufacture residential water heaters. In 1996, the Water Products division introduced the
Cyclone XHE commercial water heater. In 1997, after 90 years in the automotive industry, A. O. Smith sold its Automotive Products Company to
Tower International. In 1997, they acquired UPPCO, Inc., making A. O Smith the world's leading manufacturer of C-frame
subfractional horsepower motors. In 1998, they acquired
General Electric's domestic compressor motor business, as well as the electric motor division of
Magnetek. By the end of the decade, Water Products Company had bought out its joint venture partner in Asia, and had opened a plant in
Nanjing, China. In the 2000s, A. O. Smith made a number of acquisitions, by acquiring State Industries, Inc., and its subsidiary APCOM Inc., Shenzhen Speeda Industrial Co. Ltd., and Athens Products, a supplier of hermetic motors for
scroll compressor applications, as well as The Changheng Group of
Changzhou, China, a manufacturer of fractional horsepower motors for
HVAC applications, Taicang Special Motor Company, Ltd., of
Suzhou, China, Yueyang Zhongmin Special Electrical Machinery Co. Ltd., Lochinvar Corporation, a manufacturer of high efficiency condensing boilers for hot water and
hydronic heating applications, and in 2006, GSW Inc. a water heaters manufacturer for the Canadian market, and The American Water Heater Company, the exclusive supplier of water heaters to
Lowe's, carrying the
Whirlpool brand. In 2009, the company entered the
water purification industry with a new venture,
A. O. Smith (Shanghai) Water Treatment Products Co. Ltd. In 2010, A. O. Smith opened a 76,000 square foot residential water-heater manufacturing plant in
Bengaluru, India, which later expanded to 297000 square foot operation with expansion to manufacture of water purification products. Takagi Industrial Company's North American operations were acquired in 2010. In 2011, A. O. Smith sold its electric motor business to
Regal-Beloit. On August 8, 2016, A. O. Smith, acquired Austin-based water filtration company Aquasana (previously known as Sun Water Systems) from L' Catterton for $87 Million. ==A. O. Smith Foundation==