90+ Years of Family Design and Development
In 1929, after leaving Tennessee and his father’s construction company, my grandfather, Ed, visited Oklahoma City for an air show. Deciding to stay in town, he moved into an apartment above the local movie theatre. He supported himself during the Depression by building displays for the theatre and other local businesses and then he moved to Burbank, California in 1946. For the rest of his life, he supported his family by making sophisticated models for Hollywood films, multinational companies, world’s fairs, and the US military and space programs.
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My father, Jim, learned mechanical and design skills in Ed’s shop from the moment he was old enough to stand. Ed’s warm personality and extraordinary skills couldn’t help but rub off on Dad. After going to industrial design school, Dad worked at companies such as Black & Decker and TWA. Starting in 1969, he ran his own successful company producing various industrial components for the next thirty years.
The family cycle of passing knowledge continued when I was born in 1974. Many of my skills stem from nights, weekends, holidays, and summers spent at my dad’s business. By the time I was fourteen, I was his mold maker and machinist. After graduating with a master's degree in mechanical engineering, I designed and tested products for the consumer, energy, and biomedical fields.
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I have always created products for my family when we could not find complete solutions to meet our needs. In 2009, I started selling these products to help other families. Due to demand, I left my job as a R&D Design Engineer to focus solely on new product development and production.
Our goal is to provide innovative and high-value products, made in the USA when possible, that make it easier for you to be self-sufficient. We use our own products in our daily life: each of our labels are personal pictures related to each product group. For instance, you can see us here starting our first hive - which led to us designing beekeeping products.
Our interests are wide, and we are always expanding our product offerings, so please check back regularly to see what is new! Additionally, we invite you to be part of the process: feel free to reach out to us with something that you need, but can't find, and we will see what we can do to create, design, and develop a solution.
Best,
Grant
