Back in 1946, Wally Johnson started to create the markets for the aerial work platforms and scaffold towers all by himself. He accomplished this by starting a business that was referred to as UpRight. Mr. Wally Johnson was a very gifted mechanical engineer who hailed from Berkeley, California. He stumbled upon access machinery when he began searching for a a way to paint his home.
Mr. Johnson found it hard to look for capable scaffolding when he started a house painting project. Existing scaffolding could not deal with the uneven ground on his land. After being really discontented with his choices, he decided to design his own aluminum scaffold tower together with adjustable legs.
In that same year, the Snorkel Company was established in St. Joseph, Missouri. The company was responsible for introducing a revolutionary new elevating boom lift to the market. The machine was made for firefighting and rescue work. In less than 2 decades, the technology had developed into self-propelled boom lifts.
The first self-propelled lift was sold by Snorkel in 1977. This specialized product line did not take long to become the main business for the company.
Wallace Johnson quickly catapulted to the top of the business with his new scaffold. Once he had attained this field, he decided to start all over and make the world's very first self-propelled aerial lift.
Mr. Johnson in 1972, opened a factory within Selma, where he produced the "Flying Carpet" scissor lift. After this new and exciting equipment exploded onto the marketplace, the ground-breaking product soon out-ranked the scaffolding component as the company`s main source of revenue.
In the year 1980, Wallace Johnson passed away, while the company, UpRight Inc. was sold at that time as well. Mr Johnson's inventive and pioneering spirit did continue to live on. In 1994, UpRight introduced the very first micro-scissor within the globe. They went on to pioneer the TM12, that is the self-propelled mast lift.