Back in 1946, Wally Johnson began to create the markets for the scaffold towers and aerial work platforms all by himself. He attained this by establishing a company that became UpRight. Mr. Wally Johnson was an extremely skilled mechanical engineer who hailed from Berkeley, California. He stumbled upon access machines when he began looking for a solution to painting his house.
While Mr. Johnson was embarking on his home painting project, he had a fruitless search for scaffolding which can handle the uneven ground which surrounded his home. After being extremely unsatisfied with his options, he decided to design his own aluminum scaffold tower complete with adjustable legs.
In that very same year, the Snorkel Company was established within St. Joseph, Missouri. The company was responsible for introducing an innovative new elevating boom lift to the market. The machinery was produced for rescue and firefighting work. In less than 2 decades, the technology had developed into self-propelled boom lifts.
During the year 1977, Snorkel sold its first self-propelled lift. 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 industry with his new scaffold. After he had accomplished this field, he decided to start all over and make the very first self-propelled aerial lift in the world.
During 1972, Mr. Johnson opened a new factory within Selma. There he produced the "Flying Carpet" scissor lift. After this new and exciting machine exploded onto the marketplace, the ground-breaking product soon out-ranked the scaffolding component as the main source of income of the company.
In the year 1980, Wallace Johnson passed away, while the company, UpRight Inc. was sold at that time also. Mr Johnson's pioneering and inventive spirit did continue to live on. During the year 1994, UpRight introduced the world's very first micro-scissors. They went on to pioneer the TM12, that is the self-propelled mast lift.