NACCO INDUSTRIES, INC. - The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

NACCO INDUSTRIES, INC. evolved from the North American Coal Corp., once a major supplier of coal in the Great Lakes region. FRANK E. TAPLIN† founded the forerunner of North American Coal, the Cleveland & Western Coal Co., in 1913. Originally a coal-selling agency, it subsequently established itself as a coal shipper, with large dock properties in Milwaukee, Duluth, and other Great Lakes ports by the 1920s. Although the company purchased its first underground coal mine in 1917, it was not until the firm's reorganization in 1925 as the North American Coal Corp., that the company moved into coal mining seriously. North American Coal Corp. acquired coal lands near Powhatan Point, OH, where its mine became the first in Ohio to be completely mechanized. It purchased additional mines in West Virginia in the 1930s, and later in Pennsylvania. In the late 1960s, the firm began operations in the West, opening its first lignite coal mine in North Dakota in 1957. By the late 1970s, in joint ventures the company began to explore and mine the lignite fields of eastern Texas. The increasing emphasis on these western operations for the company was reflected in a major restructuring, which resulted in the relocation of North American Coal to Dallas, TX, in 1987, while the parent company, NACCO Industries (formed the previous year), remained in Cleveland.

The relocation of the coal business and the formation of the new parent company marked the company's continued efforts to diversify. These efforts began in earnest in 1985, when the company acquired interest in Yale Materials Handling Corporation, a maker of lift trucks. In 1989, NACCO acquired the Hyster Company, which, along with Yale Materials, formed the firm's materials handling division. NACCO spun off the Hyster-Yale division in September 2012. At that point the division was generating revenues of nearly $2.5 billion. Alfred M. Rankin, Jr. President and CEO of NACCO continued in that capacity for Hyster-Yale.

NACCO's other main division-the retail housewares division-was formed after the company acquired WearEver-ProctorSilex and the specialty retailer, the Kitchen Collection, in 1988. NACCO shed WearEver in 1989, and merged ProctorSilex with Hamilton Beach in 1990. In 1996, NACCO added several large European warehouse equipment makers to its materials handling group and in 2000, the company purchased a number of coal operations previously operated by Phillips Coal Company. By 1995, the company's subsidiaries employed over 11,000 workers and had a net income of $42.1 million. By 1999, NACCO Industries topped the PLAIN DEALER top ten list of performing companies in Northeast Ohio with total revenues of $2.5 billion. Headed by Alfred M. Rankin, Jr., NACCO Industries was headquartered at 5875 Landerbrook Dr. in MAYFIELD HEIGHTS in 2013 at which time the company employed 9,300 (of which 5,400 worked for Hyster-Yale). Combined revenues as of 2012 stood were in, excess of $3.8 billion with net income of approximately $140 million.

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