Encyclopedia Dubuque
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Affiliated with the Local History Network of the State Historical Society of Iowa, and the Iowa Museum Association.
A.Y.MCDONALD MANUFACTURING COMPANY
A Y. MCDONALD MANUFACTURING COMPANY. Dubuque-based innovative manufacturer of plumbing and petroleum-handling equipment. The company was founded in 1856 by Andrew Young MCDONALD. His small plumbing shop benefited from the local gas works because of his specialization in plumbing and gas fittings.
Discontinued when McDonald entered the CIVIL WAR, the company reopened when he returned to Dubuque in 1865. McDonald also began selling pumps for a Seneca Falls, New York, firm. His sales success encouraged him to expand production into the manufacture of pumps.
McDonald's first factory was located in rented quarters on the upper story of a building at Sixth and Iowa STREETS. The equipment in the factory consisted of one lathe and a four horse-power engine. McDonald began manufacturing pump cylinders that he bought as rough castings and finished himself using an automatic polisher he invented.
McDonald employed no salesmen but advertised his product with postcards sent throughout the United States. He announced his company would also send samples, at no cost, to interested customers. When McDonald found that it was difficult to sell cylinders without the pump heads, he decided to completely enter the manufacturing sector of the business.
In 1877 McDonald's first factory, a three-story building on Iowa Street between Fifth and Sixth Streets, was constructed. In 1880 he purchased an adjoining lot on Fifth and Iowa streets and constructed a four-story factory. An additional story was built in 1881 in response to the enormous amount of orders. A brass foundry was added in 1882 along with a finishing shop. The firm was then producing four hundred pumps per week. The number of employees, two including himself in 1865, stood at 125 by 1882. A. Y. McDonald products were sold to all the western states and eastward to Ohio. A Chicago office was opened in 1882 to handle business east of Dubuque.
The A.Y. McDonald Manufacturing Company was incorporated on May 1, 1888. Due to his declining health, caused in part by being shot in the chest by burglars at his home, McDonald resigned as president in 1889. Since his sons were inexperienced, his nephew John Morrison II was elected president. Upon McDonald's death, Morrison was sold one-fourth interest in the company, and the name of the company was changed to A.Y. McDonald and Morrison Manufacturing Company on December 30, 1892.
Despite poor nationwide economic conditions, the company began acquiring land. Property at 12th and Pine was the scene of the company's relocation with a new iron foundry being constructed and later a new machine shop. A new four-story warehouse was made necessary due to a scarcity of wholesalers and the need for the company to stock items needed to service customers. Items sold to plumbers led to the growth of McDonald's wholesale distribution system.
In 1909, the corporation charter expired. Disagreement over whether to renew it led the McDonald family to repurchase John Morrison's stock, and A.Y. McDonald II became the company president. I.G. Whitney, a son-in-law of McDonald, joined the company at about this time and was responsible for stimulating the wholesale growth of the company into other cities including Omaha (1915); Minneapolis (1917); Des Moines (1923); Kansas City (1926); and Sioux City, Iowa; Lincoln, Nebraska; and Denver, Colorado (1929). He later served as president from January 25, 1935, until his death on June 11, 1944.
Standard Oil of Indiana's request for special oil equipment led to A.Y. McDonald's specialty line of valves and fittings. One of the heralded advances the company brought to the industry was the flexible swing joint replacing similar joints which usually leaked. The business was re-incorporated under the laws of the State of Iowa on September 1, 1915.
McDonald's manufactured a complete line of plated brass goods for many years. These products included trim for kitchen sinks, lavatories, and cast and tubular products. The company, one of the first to adopt the chrome-plating process, was licensed by the Chromium Corporation of America.
During World War II, A.Y. McDonald worked under government contracts. Water supply equipment was still considered essential to the war effort, but the company also produced brass valves and bilge pumps for the Navy. The U.S. Army ordered stationary gear carriers for bomb fuses and parts for bombs. Drain cocks and shut-offs were manufactured for the U.S. Air Corps, and the U.S. Army Engineers and Air Corps purchased gate valves, swing joints, throttle valves and hose nozzles.
On March 27, 1945, Delos L. McDonald was elected the company president. He served in this role until January 14, 1959, when he became chairman of the board. John M. McDonald served as president from January 14, 1959, until April 10, 1962 when he was elected chairman of the board. Russell T. Walker, the first non-family president of the corporation, left the company on September 25, 170. It was during his term in 1964 that the A.Y. McDonald Manufacturing Company received the seventh annual "Wholesaler of the Year" Award from Supply House Times. In 1964, A.Y. McDonald's acquired the Brock-McVey Companies, a successful independent wholesaler with diversification in plumbing, heating, electrical products, and refrigeration lines. On September 25, 1970, Joseph R. Schmitt was elected the company president.
In 1946 construction was begun on a new manufacturing plant at 12th and Pine Streets. The first metal was poured in 1950. Land for the factory had been purchased in 1894, but the move from the plant on Iowa Street was gradual. Although the first building at the new location had been constructed in 1896, the complete move from the old factory was not accomplished until 1900. The new plant employed an estimated five hundred workers in the manufacture of plumbers' brass goods, drainage fittings, electric motors and equipment for the oil industry. This, however, accounted for only 10 percent of the materials sold by the nineteen A. Y. McDonald branches.
The A. Y. McDonald plant at 12th and Pine Streets was the first property demolished for the relocated Highway 61 link to the DUBUQUE-WISCONSIN BRIDGE. By going through the property instead of around it, the highway project saved an estimated $10 million in construction costs. A. Y. McDonald sold the plant to the Department of Transportation in 1982 for $4.25 million. That money, in addition to $5.5 million in government low-interest money and federal loans, was used to relocate the pioneering Dubuque manufacturing company to the then newest of the DUBUQUE INDUSTRIAL PARKS west of Dubuque. The company unveiled its new plant on Chavenelle Road in August 1983. The brass foundry and main manufacturing plant are located in this facility. In 1996, the foundry was expanded to provide for increased production of brass castings.
The first location outside Dubuque was opened in 1989 in Albia, Iowa. This plant produces various products for the waterworks and high-pressure gas industries. An addition was completed in 1994. A second location opened in 1999 in Elizabethton, Tennessee. This facility serves as a distribution center for A.Y. McDonald plumbing products, and products primarily used in the eastern U.S. The third location opened in 2000 in Sparks, Nevada. This facility serves as a distribution center for A.Y. McDonald plumbing products and products primarily used in the western U.S.