Description:
This undated photograph captures assembly line workers at Clark Equipment's Springfield plant, probably in the 1950s and or early '60s. The manufacturer of industrial trucks, machinery and equipment set up shop in the area in the 1920s, employing a couple dozen workers. In the company's heyday in the 1960s, about 3,500 worked at the Springfield plant. The company, then headquartered in Buchanan, celebrated its 50th anniversary in 1972 with a family day picnic at its Springfield plant, which at the time manufactured a line of 130 forklift trucks and special use vehicles. More than 4,000 attended. A decade later, Clark announced the consolidation of lift-truck assembly work, eliminating 400 jobs, and by 1987 had ended all production in Springfield. The plant was demolished in 1992.
