Back in the year 1946, Wally Johnson began to create the markets for both the scaffold towers and aerial work platforms all by himself. He accomplished this by starting a company that was known as UpRight. Mr. Wally Johnson was an extremely gifted mechanical engineer who hailed from Berkeley, California. He stumbled upon access machinery when he started looking for a a way to paint his home.
Mr. Johnson found it hard to search for capable scaffolding when he started a home painting project. Current scaffolding was not able to handle the uneven terrain on his land. After being extremely discontented with his choices, he decided to design his very own aluminum scaffold tower together with adjustable legs.
During that same year, the Snorkel Company was founded within St. Joseph, Missouri. The company was responsible for introducing a revolutionary new elevating boom lift to the market. The equipment was produced for firefighting and rescue work. In less than 2 decades, the technology had developed into self-propelled boom lifts.
During 1977, Snorkel sold its very first self-propelled lift. This specialized product line did not take long to become the main business for the company.
It did not take long for Wallace Johnson to catapult to the top of the industry and attain global dominance with his scaffold. When he had accomplished this field, he decided to start all over and make the world's first self-propelled aerial lift.
In 1972, Mr. Johnson opened a new factory within Selma. There he manufactured the "Flying Carpet" scissor lift. After this new and exciting equipment exploded onto the marketplace, the innovative product soon out-ranked the scaffolding component as the company`s main source of revenue.
In 1980, Wallace Johnson passed away, while the company, UpRight Inc. was sold at that time also. Mr Johnson's inventive and pioneering spirit did continue to live on. During the year 1994, UpRight launched the world's first micro-scissors. They went on to pioneer the self-propelled mast lift, the TM12.