Aerial View of Die Cast Factory - Peasley 1962

Aerial View of Die Cast Factory - Peasley 1962

This aerial photo is taken from the east and shows the Auto Lite factory in 1962, shortley before a major expansion. Clay Street runs along the side of the factory with the American Legion building at the left. The water tower has Eltra painted on it since Eltra owned the Auto Lite company. The original Oliver Typewriter office building is immediately to the right of the water tower and the original brick factory is seen from the side next to the office. St Mary Junior High is above and to the left of the tower with Grace Lutheran Church near it on Washington Street. Employees are parked across the tracks. A portion of the Knoll Grain Elevator is at the top right.

Woodstock--Die Casting Timeline
Predecessors:
1893 Woodstock Public Improvement Committee offered a $20,000 bonus to attract industry
1894 Tappan & Wheeler Steam Pump Company moved from Chicago; produced pumps for Procter & Gamble, Colgate and other soap manufacturers.
1896 Oliver Typewriter Company produced typewriters sold all over the world. As the major employer of the area (1,400 employees), the company had a band, fire department, semi-pro baseball team and major social events such as a summer picnic in the Fox River Grove picnic grounds. The Oliver typewriter allowed the user to see the letters as they were typed, rather than raising the bar to read the copy. It went out of business in 1927 when it was deemed too costly to retool the factory. It stayed open a few years offering repair services.
1928 Alemite Die Casting & Manufacturing of Chicago produced aluminum cookware, parts for Hamilton Beach, Speed Queen, Whirlpool; electric trains and toys; and many other items. Their fireproof storage room held over 4, 000 different precision molds.
1935 Electric Auto-Lite made automobile parts and accessories, including door handles, grilles and hood ornaments for Ford Motor Company and Packard and others. It had over 2,000 employees in 1949.
1963 Woodstock Die Casting, (the name was bought from its parent company, Eltra Corporation) manufactured automotive, appliance and industrial fittings
1964 A five-year building and renovation project added 100,000 square feet to the complex
1979 Allied Chemical Corporation acquired Eltra.
1980 Allied merged with Signal Corporation and became Allied-Signal Corporation.
1985 Woodstock Manufacturing Corporation purchased the plant and named the company Woodstock Die Cast Corporation. Despite the name, the company was located in Southfield, Michigan.
1988 United Auto Workers Local 922 went on strike. The dispute over pay, pensions and safety issues lasted over two years.
1990 Woodstock Die Cast plant closed on June 29 with a loss of 757 jobs.
1992 Mary Ann Talbert and Pauline Gray convince officials to let them remove historical documents from the company vault the day before the building was closed-down and locked for good. Mary Ann donated the items to the McHenry County Historical Society.
1997 The 400,000 square -foot plant was demolished; the 204-foot smokestack was the last to go in May 7.

Don Peasley

1962