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Beloit would manufacture Passavant's line of water and waste water 
equipment. The second was Beloit-Kleinwefers agreement with Kleinwefers 
of Krefeld, West Germany in which Beloit would make 
manufacturing equipment for United States and Canadian textile industries. 
Both deals were made with family owned corporations anxious to 
expand to the United States.

The Beloit-Passavant agreement seemed to make a great deal of 
sense in 1966. As a papermaking machine manufacturer Beloit was very 
familiar with the problems of waste water and pollution in general. 
More importantly, environmental issues were becoming increasingly 
more important in the late 1960's, and by getting in early, Beloit might 
be able to ride the crest of a wave and make money off of a popular 
and vital issue.

Originally the company was located in Janesville, Wisconsin, but 
after the Woodlands fiasco made Woodlands' Birmingham, Alabama plant 
available, it moved there in late 1972. During the 1966-1971 period 
Harry Moore was consistent in his belief that this would be a money-making 
operation. After red ink for the first 3 years, it did make 
money in 1970, and projections for continued growth were favorable. 53 
In the meantime, it built the Janesville and Beloit sewage treatment 
plants. 54 

Beloit-Passavant counted on the United States government to 
provide funds to state and local jurisdictions to control pollution. 
Because of public and Congressional interest, they expected these 
funds to rise rapidly in the late 1960's and early 1970's. 55 This 
never happened and the company was a consistent loser after its one 
good year -1970. 

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By 1972, Beloit and Passavant combined to make on operational 
study of their joint company. The study recommended organizational 
changes and a new influx of capital by both partners. More studies 
followed and Moore's faith began to waver. By early 1973 Beloit 
Directors were told that each company might have to contribute another 
$400,000 of equity and that the joint venture was a "troublesome" area. 
Within 5 months Beloit disposed of the company by selling its interest 
to Passavant. 56 The sale brought some needed cash into the corporation 
and temporarily improved its financial position, but overall the company 
lost a small amount on Beloit-Passavant. 57 

Beloit-Passavant's market had never developed like both companies 
had expected. There was no boom in the treatment of sewage, and where 
the federal government did get involved, there were long delays due 
to red tape. Also the new sewage plant designs often did not meet 
with the approval of the consulting engineers who tended to favor the 
old, proven ways. Even when turnkey contracts were received as in 
Janesville and Beloit, Beloit-Passavant had to buy 85% of its equipment 
from outside suppliers. As a result, profits, if made, would be low. 
Beloit was fortunate to get out of this business when it did as its 
effort was not worth the cost. 58 

Beloit-Kleinwefers Corporation followed a path similar to Beloit-Passavant 
although its lifetime was slightly shorter. Soon after the 
joint venture began Beloit built a new facility for the company in 
Pendleton, South Carolina in order to serve the textile industry in 
that part of the country. Since the Kleinwefers Corporation had experience 
in making papermaking machine equipment and textile machinery in Germany, 
it seemed to be a natural alliance that would promote the strengths of 

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both companies. After the plant was finished Beloit furnished the 
manufacturing personnel and sales staff while Kleinwefers was responsible 
for the engineering technology and know how. 59

 By early 1968 the company already was in financial trouble. Sales 
were flat and drastic reductions were made in personnel. By May, 1968 
orders had increased and a slight profit was predicted for fiscal 
1967-1968. The Beloit Board of Directors was told practically the 
same thing in 1969. They were also told that there was "some doubt 
about the potential of this organization. 1160 Beloit had quickly 
soured on Beloit-Kleinwefers and its relationship with that company 
was put under review. 

By February, 1970 the review was completed. It recommended that 
the Beloit Corporation spend no further funds at B-K and that it would 
be best if Beloit got out of textiles since it was not a growth 
industry. Late that spring Beloit Directors discussed the possibility 
of selling B-K to Kleinwefers. After about a year of procrastination, 
Beloit was spurred by further losses and negotiations began. By early 
1972 they were completed and Beloit's 50% equity was sold to Kleinwefers. 
While Beloit was glad to get out of this deal when it did, the result 
hurt financially. Moreover, the losses in this division were com-pounded 
by the closing of the Beloit Eastern plant at Downingtown and 
the failure of the Woodlands Division. When the large write downs for 
these 3 areas were totaled, fiscal 1971's profits dropped from millions 
of dollars to only a few hundred thousand. 61

In retrospect, Beloit's decision to set up a Special Products 
Division in 1958 to pursue diversifications had turned disastrous by 
the late 1960's and early 1970's. 62 Every attempt at a new product 

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line had cost the company money. The move to Beloit Woodlands cost 
Beloit the most money, but both Beloit-Kleinwefers and Beloit-Passavant 
also lost money. Beloit retained its interest in plastics that began 
with the DeMattia acquisition, but it continued to lose on this as 
well. Even the lesser projects of the Special Products Division such 
as its special drying machines for the printing industry did not work 
out very well. Beloit's biggest mistake was that it sought to diversify 
by starting new product lines instead of buying out successful companies 
that had well received products.63

Even when Beloit expanded in its area of expertise in the 1960's, 
the results were often mixed at best. A good example was Beloit Integrated 
Projects formed in 1963 to handle turnkey projects for the paper 
industry. 64 Its greatest success was the first major project it 
handled -the complete mill for the Orient Paper Mills Ltd. of India. 

This episode, while profitable, taxed the strength of Beloit 
employees from the time the contract was negotiated until the complete 
mill was turned over to Orient. Finalizing the contract required 20 
days of negotiations at the Waldorf Astoria Towers in New York between 
John Franz and Robert Davies representing Beloit and Hari Singhi and 
his team of attorneys and engineers representing Orient. The negotiations 
were long and debilitating as both sides stubbornly held their ground 
issues. Neither side originally knew the limits of each flexibility but Davies and Franz soon found that one of the Indian negotiators was a teetotaler or a vegetarian. Consequently they often had drinks and dinner with him.  
The more he drank the looser his tongue became. One night they 
learned that Orient's boss wanted the contract finished by the-following 

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Saturday because he was coming to New York and wanted to sign it. 
The next day the Indians pushed hard for settlement but wanted certain \ 
performance guarantees that Beloit did not want to include in the 
contract. 

Franz and Davies had a plan to counteract this pressure. After 
a few harsh words were spoken, Davies threatened to leave the meeting 
and return to Beloit. Negotiations continued until Davies suddenly . 
exclaimed that his integrity had been questioned and that he was 
leaving. He left but Franz stayed right where he was. The Indians, 
knowing that their boss was coming soon implored Franz to bring Davies 
back. In return they would agree not to demand any further production or performance guarantees., Franz said he would try and left the meeting 
ostensibly to find Davies. They met at a prearranged spot and spent a 
leisurely afternoon traveling on a tourist boat around Manhattan Island. 
When they returned to the negotiating table t hat night, the Indians were so relieved that the contract was quickly finalized. It turned out to be 500 pages long, and when Harry Moore signed it that Saturday, he had not had time to read it. 65

Nevertheless, this project was well handled and when it was completed 
in the mid 1960's, it was lucrative for Beloit. Don Simonds, 
the Vice-President and General Manager of the Integrated Projects 
Division, was an experienced and innovative leader in this area. 
Despite his Division's expertise and the translation of this expertise 
into paper machinery sales around the world, no other turnkey project 
made money. 

By the late 1960's Integrated Projects was involved in a number 
of other large operations including one with the Port Huron 

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Paper Company of Port Huron, Michigan. Besides this Simonds spent 
thousands of dollars making surveys for pulp and paper mill projects 
-in hopes of getting turnkey contracts. By l? arch, 1969 the Division 
was under review by Beloit's Board of Directors. 66

The review was completed in May, 1969 and it noted that Integrated 
Projects had accumulative losses of about $300,000. By fall the Board 
decided to phase out the Division, but because it was then involved in 
3 major projects, these would be finished first. 67 

While Integrated Projects did not make profits for itself, its 
salesmen did help sell other machines. Its exact contribution in this 
area was difficult to account for, but it was significant. Never the-less, 
it tread on the toes of engineering companies who did not like 
its competition, and it often got bogged down with its own contractors 
which sometimes resulted in long delays. Perhaps the Port Huron 
Paper Company deal was the last straw in this regard because Beloit 
got blamed for other companies' failings. By 1970 it seemed to make 
sense both from the point of view of profits and safety to phase out 
the division. Many of the people involved transferred to the Paper 
Machinery Division and Don Simonds became Vice-President of it. Thus, 
the Division ended after less than a decade with mixed feelings on its 
level of success. 68 

Control Systems Division was another division with an even shorter 
lifetime but with similar ideas of improving the paper industry. It 
was begun in 1967 in Beloit with John Redgrave at its head. Its 
purpose was to supply total process control systems (computer controls) 
to the paper industry. 

It got off to a fast start, and by February 1968 it was approximating 

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its projections. It had a major order to computerize the Bowaters 
Paper Mill 'in Tennessee and was in the process of getting other orders 
that enabled it to bring its services to governmental bodies. Unfortunately, 
this fast start was not maintained and by March, 1969 it was 
under review by the Board of Directors. At their next meeting they 
noted that while the division was almost $500,000 in the red since 
its inception, a small profit was expected in fiscal 1969 69

By the autumn the division was again under scrutiny and its 
purposes questioned. This procrastination went on for almost a year 
while new reports were completed. Finally in the summer of 1970, 
the division was phased out because it could not be operated profitably. 
Beloit found out the hard way that, although computers for papermaking 
machines were the wave of the future, paper companies preferred to deal 
directly with computer companies. 70

Beloit also tried to make money from its own computer during this 
time. In 1965 the Beloit Computer Center was formed as a wholly owned 
subsidiary. Its purpose was to sell the unused computer time of Beloit's 
data processing department to Beloit area businesses. In the long 
run the results were disappointing. 

Its leaders usually projected yearly profits, but when they 
reported toward the end of the fiscal year, they had toned down their 
optimism and a deficit usually resulted. Another trend was that the 
computer center always seemed to need to sell more computer time in 
order to make a profit. By 1971 Beloit's Board of Directors was so 
disgruntled with the computer center's lack of profits that it was a 
topic of discussion at each board meeting. In 1972 the center began 
to cut back on personnel, and its director tried to renegotiate downward 
Beloit's computer leases. 3y late autumn 1972, a profit was projected, 

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but at the next board meeting this was scaled down to the center 
"may break even." This apparently was enough for the Board because 
they sold the computer center to Axia Systems, Inc. in the spring of 
1973.71 

The computer center fiasco was not a serious loss to the corporation. 
But it was a consistent irritation not worth the time involved 
in running it. It lasted the longest of all the 1960's companies and 
divisions where Beloit sought product diversifications. They all 
failed or were absorbed. In retrospect they all were drains on Beloit's 
resources and talents. They often cost a great deal to get going and their 
profit projections never materialized. Perhaps the greatest mistake 
was the assumption that Beloit could successfully go beyond its area 
of expertise in the pulp and paper machine fields and blaze new trails 
in areas where there was heavy competition. 

When Beloit stuck to its original plans of going foreign or 
investing in paper related companies in the United States the results 
were usually much better. Two mid 1960's projects have been especially 
successful in the long run. 

The first was a 1966 decision to acquire the Wheeler Roll Company 
of Kalamazoo, Michigan. Wheeler was the leading supplier of filled 
calendar and embossing rolls used in the paper industry. This small 
addition turned out to be Beloit's star performer even though its volume 
is only a tiny percentage of Beloit's total capacity. 72 Particularly 
in the context of the real problems Beloit had with its subsidiaries 
in the 1960's and early 1970's, Wheeler stands out as a real winner. 
It succeeded where others failed because it was an established, 
successful company before Beloit bought it. Equally important Beloit 

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the expertise, the sales staff, and the customer network to improve 
its products and sell them. 

The second successful expansion was Beloit's 1964 acquisition of an 
interest in a papermaking machine manufacturer in Valladolid, Spain. 
Beloit acquired a 50% ownership of Beloit and Segura with the Segura 
family holding the other 50%. With this acquisition, Beloit believed 
it was prepared to serve the world's market for paper-making machines. 
The small plant in Spain served the domestic market, Portugal and Latin 
America although machine widths were restricted because of the limited 
capacity of the plant. Beloit's other foreign affiliates and licensees 
covered the earth: England concentrated in the Commonwealth and the 
Scandinavian Countries; Italy, the Common Market, Near East and Eastern 
Europe; Canada, its own considerable domestic market; and the Mitsubishi 
License served the Far East. Beloit even owned land in Brazil on which 
it hoped to build a manufacturing facility, but internal political problems 
in Brazil discouraged Beloit from building in the 1960's. 73 Beloit also 
had sales offices in a number of countries.

Beloit had to have a plant in Spain in order to be competitive 
because Spain? import duties effectively kept out foreign competition. 
Moreover, if a machinery builder built 25% of an order in Spain, it 
could ship in the balance without duty. 74 This allowed Beloit to import 
components especially from Italy and in doing so become even more 
competitive.

The Beloit and Segura acquisition was seen as the capstone to 
Beloit's goal of becoming the world leader in the paper machinery 
business. 75 In less than a decade from the acquisition of Beloit 
Italia, the company had made major inroads in world paper machine sales. 

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Since 1957 they had gone from one plant in one country to many plants 
in 5 countries; and from occasional foreign visitors and an occasional 
foreign order to foreign and domestic recognition that Beloit's re-search 
facilities and Beloit machines were the best in the world. 
This recognition resulted in many foreign orders that Beloit's network 
of companies used to their individual and group advantage. 
It was this business that Beloit concentrated on and, in fact, 
it was the success of the domestic papermaking machine operations and 
the overall success of the decision to go foreign that allowed Beloit 
to get involved in so many losing non-papermaking ventures in the 1960's. 

Fortunately, the company realized these peripheral areas were detrimental 
and eventually dropped them. In the meantime, they concentrated on the 
domestic market for papermaking machines and on methods to help their 
affiliates improve their quality and performance. As time went on, 
Beloit's goal was changed in order to achieve total or near total 
ownership of their foreign affiliates. This would lead to closer 
relationships, better marketing plans, and eventually some successful 
attempts to trade off orders to take advantage of better financing and 
export incentives. 

The road to total or near total ownership was one filled with 
doubts and uncertainties. The main advantage, decisions could be 
made without consultation with other owners was obvious. However, 
serious questions arose about such things as whether the affiliate 
was doing well enough for Beloit to want total control, whether the 
political situations in certain countries warranted Beloit's further 
interest, and whether Beloit had expanded too fast to handle the in-creased 
responsibilities profitably. 

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From the mid 1960's to the mid 1970's Beloit was in the paradoxical 
position of being the recognized industry leader while its sales were 
flat and profits were weak. This was due primarily to market factors. 
within the very cyclical worldwide paper industry that Beloit had 
traditionally been so dependent upon. Ironically, Beloit tried to 
diversify in the 1960's to avoid the effects of these cycles only to 
learn the hard way through bad diversifications that made the cycles' 
effects even more pronounced. Unfortunately for Beloit, the paper 
industry had over expanded by 1965. Thus the company did not participate 
in the Vietnam War prosperity of the late 1960's although it got caught 
in the massive inflation that was one of its results by the 1970's. 
In the meantime, Beloit struggled to improve its product line in order 
to show potential machine buyers that their return on investment would 
be high with a Beloit machine. 75 The manufacturing of quality, 
industry-leading paper machines was one area where Beloit never wavered 
during these otherwise difficult times. Moore knew that this was 
Beloit's traditional strength and that Beloit's future depended upon 
the company's retention of research, development, and product superiority. 
This superiority was the major cause of optimism in the otherwise 
difficult Johnson-Nixon years. The war in Vietnam and the domestic 
political and racial unrest had the attention of the nation by the 
late 1960's. These issues continued into the 1970's, but other major 
concerns were added, such as the energy crisis, worldwide inflation, 
and political unrest. Within the company the major issues were the 
increased level of foreign competition, sky rocketing interest rates, 
and a recession that made it particularly difficult to persuade paper 
companies to buy new machines or upgrade others. 

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Beloit survived these difficult years and by 1975, Harry Moore's 
last year as President before he became Chairman of the Board, the 
company was entering the most profitable period of its history. This 
turnaround was due to a number of reasons including the fact that 
demand for paper products was increasing faster than capacity and 
that mill owners realized they could make money by taking advantage 
of innovations that made better paper in less expensive ways. 

Beloit had been the leader in product innovations at least since 
the 1920's, had accelerated that lead after World War II, and with the 
establishment of the Research Center in the 1950's, had continued to 
improve its position in relation to domestic machine makers. Domestic 
competition was in decline during the 1950's and 1960's, but as this 
occurred foreign competition began to take its place. Beloit stayed 
ahead because its products were better, but to stay ahead required 
continued improvements on the post World War II paper machine. 
With Lloyd Hornbostel in charge of research until the establishment 
of the Research Center in the late 1950's, Beloit consistently 
led Black-Clawson, its major domestic competitor, in the number of 
patents granted each year. After the Research Center was in operation, 
this lead rapidly increased so that in some years both Hornbostel and 
E. J. Justus individually had more patents each year than all the 
engineers at Black-Clawson. By the mid 1960's the Beloit Corporation 
often had 5 to 7 times more new patents each year than its competitors. 76 
These innovations translated into a large number of major product 
improvements.

Significant changes have been made in all the sections of a 
paper machine since the early 1950's. Beloit has been a leader in 

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nearly all areas and a dominant force in some. From the headbox, 
through the Fourdrinier, the presses, the dryers, and the calendar 
stacks, to the reel and winder, Beloit engineers, sometimes in con-junction 
with paper mill engineers, have improved the paper machine 
and in doing so changed Beloit from the leading domestic manufacturer 
for papermaking machines to the world leader. 

At the wet end of the paper machine, Lloyd Hornbostel had invented 
the Air Cushioned headbox in 1949.77 This invention made Beloit 
competitive in headboxes, an area where previously Beloit had lagged 
behind other manufacturers. The Air Cushioned headbox replaced the 
high open headbox and allowed higher speeds because the stock was under 
air pressure rather than gravity. 78 

Beloit engineers continually improved these headboxes in the 
1950's and early 1960's. Stock control was continually improved, and 
flow patterns made even. For its time, the air cushioned inlet was a 
major breakthrough because it enabled paper to be made faster and with 
higher quality. Beloit took advantage of this hard fought development 
and by the mid to late 1950's was dominating the headbox market. 79 
Despite their success Beloit engineers were not satisfied with 
the Air Cushioned headbox and after extensive research begun in the 
early 1960's, Joe Parker, Dick Hergert, and Les Hill invented the 
Converflo Headbox. This invention was introduced to the paper industry 
in 1968 and resulted in a breakthrough of major magnitude. It made 
the Air Cushioned headbox obsolete, and it remains the headbox in 
current use. Beloit has sold more than 200 of them. 80 

The Converflo headbox solved a major problem because it resulted 
in low turbulence and uniform dispersion. In conventional headboxes 

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large scale turbulence was necessary for adequate fiber dispersion, 
but turbulence was limited to the amount that could be tolerated in 
the headbox discharge through the slice. The Converflo avoided this 
problem by dividing the headbox into several full width converging 
streams. This provided for good dispersion of the fibers but without 
a great deal of turbulence in the discharge jet. 81 Once the sheet 
began to develop on the Fourdrinier wire it was much freer than was 
possible with older boxes. Streaks and disturbances on the sheet 
like those caused by rectifier rolls or shower water were virtually 
eliminated and formation was improved.

Thus the Converflo headbox was a radical departure from previous 
designs. Because it was the only cross-machine restriction known 
which could be kept from plugging, the rectifier roll had dominated 
headbox designs for decades. Now it was obsolete. In its place was 
a headbox over 50% lighter in weight. Higher machine speeds were 
possible and the resulting process was more efficiently done with a 
Converflo. In fact, for large, high speed machines the cost of the 
headbox was cut almost in half. 82 

The Converflo has been a great financial success for Beloit, 
Although it is still protected by strong Beloit patents, Beloit 
competitors have emulated it and patent litigation is a likely result. 83 
The Converflo was the first successful hydraulic headbox, and 
its only possible drawback is easily remedied. This problem is caused 
by pulsations from the screens, fan pumps, and other pulse generators 
in the stock systems. These are common to all kinds of headboxes. 
Beloit's research developed hydraulic pulse attenuators which are 
essential to the utilization of hydraulic headboxes. These attenuators 

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take pressure pulses out of the flow. 84 

One bonus of the Converflo design was not apparent until later. 
Beloit engineers discovered that multiple stocks could flow through 
the headbox and discharge in a stratified jet to make a stratified 
sheet of paper or board. This resulted by the mid 1970's in Beloit's 
Strata-F10 headbox which is a multistock version of the Converflo.. 
This modification allows the making of laminated sheets of paper. Only 
a few are in operation in 1979, but the process holds great promise 
for the future as virtually all kinds of paper can be made with a 
Strata-Flo. 85 

Beloit forged to the lead in headbox design because Lloyd Hornbostel's 
genius in the pre-research center days was later combined with a very 
active research and development team in the 1960's and 1970's that 
emphasized fluid mechanics. Young Ph. D. 3 experienced in fluid dynamics 
were hired from universities and paid well to tackle the very difficult 
problems of headbox design. The result paid off for Beloit since a 
superior headbox is a great impetus to the sale of a paper machine. 
After the paper stock leaves the headbox through the slice, it 
enters the Fourdrinier section of the machine. This is a moving wire 
screen in the form of an endless conveyor belt stretched between 2 
large rolls -the breast roll situated under the headbox slice and 
the couch roll at the opposite end. The Fourdrinier is the forming 
area of a conventional paper machine and it is the place where water 
begins to be rapidly removed. Drainage of the paper stock through 
the wire screen is induced by several forces. In the early slow speed 
machines, gravity was the principal force. Later as speeds increased, 
table rolls which support the wire and rotate with it began to play an 

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important part in drainage. However, these were inadequate for the 
modern, high speed machine. So were other innovations like wet boxes, 
suction boxes, vacuum boxes and forming boards. These all helped, 
but something else was needed to get better dryness. 
Fourdriniers were getting longer and wider throughout the 1950's 
and 1960's, and all parts of the machine were running much faster. 
Yet all the paper machine manufacturers, including Beloit, lagged 
behind other companies on the issue of how to get better drainage 
off the Fourdrinier, Companies like the Johnson Wire Works and the 
Appleton Wire Works believed that foils could solve the problem. Foils 
are stationary, rigid, hydro dynamically shaped deflectors set on an 
angle to the Fourdrinier wire. They support the wire but also exert 
a pumping action through the wire screen that helps drain the water. 
For years foils did not receive wide acceptance because manufacturers 
lacked a suitable blade material. Blades nicked and the stock streaked 
because of this. Finally by the mid 1960's, new plastics and the 
availability of exotic plating materials made foils commercially 
feasible. 86 

By this time Beloit had caught up with the other companies and 
was actively researching and promoting the use of foils. The success 
of foils was the major innovation in the Fourdrinier section of the 
machine in the post World War II period, Table rolls were incompatible 
with high speeds and reduced the quality of the paper so foils were 
-necessary at over 2000f. p. m. As speeds continued to increase, the 
value of foils has been enhanced. By 1972 Beloit had applied more 
foils to machines running over 2500 f. p. m. than any other machinery 
manufacturer in the world. In fact, at that time Beloit was the only 

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builder to have applied foils to machines operating at speeds over 
3000 f. p. ml. 87 

The only other important improvement made in the Fourdrinier 
section during this time that involved Beloit was E. 3. Justus' 
invention of the Flo-Vat. This was an improvement of the Rotabelt 
(Rotary suction unit) -a machine development that dated from the 
1930's. The Flo-Vat enhanced the drainage on Fourdriniers by rotary 
suction through the use of a flotation principle. By doing so it 
allowed higher speeds. A number of these were installed beginning 
in the late 1950's. 88 

After the stock leaves the Fourdrinier section it enters the press 
section. Improvements in the press section have become increasingly 
significant as energy costs rise since it is far cheaper to remove 
water mechanically from the web of paper in the press section than by 
evaporation in the dryer section. A good press section will change 
the wet paper web from 4 to 5 parts water to 1 part solids to 1 l/ 2 
to 2 parts water to 1 part solids through squeezing and suction. 
Like the headbox and unlike the foils, Beloit has traditionally 
dominated innovations in the press section. Beloit's dominance began 
with the Dual Press. Lloyd Hornbostel's Suction Pickup, first installed 
in 1949, added to this domination and remains significant in 
the late 1970's. No high speed paper machines are built without 
suction pickups. 

Beloit again increased its dominance of this section with the 
innovation of the Twinver-press vacuum transfer arrangement in the 
1950's. This combined with the Suction Pickup was the most advanced, 
well-thought-out press section from the mid 1950's to about 1970. 89 

The Twinver-press eliminated the need for a suction transfer press 

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and replaced the conventional first and second presses. It consisted 
of a center roll, usually hard surfaced, with rubber covered suction 
rolls on diametrically opposite sides of the center roll. The entire 
assembly was then canted to an approximate 45" angle. This assembly 
used less machine space, improved the drying capabilities, allowed 
increased speeds, and resulted in better quality paper. Combined 
with the newly developed air-bleed principle for the second and third 
suction presses, the Twinver-press further improved sheet dryness 
which allowed reduced steam pressures and saved money for the paper 
rni11. 90 

The very successful Twinver-press with its many configurations 
dominated the market. In fact, customers were so confident in Beloit 
technology that about 15 were ordered before the first was actually 
running in a paper mill. Competitors extensively emulated it and 
litigation occurred in the late 1950's and 1960's. One common result 
of this litigation was cross licensing where various competitors and 
Beloit would trade licenses rather than taking their chances on long 
drawn out, expensive court cases. 

By the late 7960's, Beloit engineers had invented the Tri-Nip 
press which in the 1970's became the preferred suction-pickup press 
section configuration. It too had been widely emulated and litigation 
is likely. 91 

Within both the Twinver-press and its successor, the Tri-Nip 
press, one component, the Venta-Nip press roll, had a revolutionary 
effect on the making of paper. The Venta-Nip or grooved press is 
basically a plain press that has helical grooves cut in one of the 
press rolls. As maximum compression is attained, water is forced into 

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felt as on any press, However, in the Venta-Nip the grooves 
provide a place for the expressed water to go, and because of the 
grooving pattern the Venta-Nip provides almost unlimited water 
handling capacity. This increased water removal occurred because 
the Venta-Nip press vented the water on the back side of the felt 
and because higher nip pressures were attainable. 92 

Research on the Venta-Nip began at the Beloit Research Center in 
the late 1950's after some unpublished research by Jan Bergstrom 
encouraged E. J. Justus that a better press roll could be developed. 
Initial trials were not successful and the whole project was almost 
abandoned. Fortunately when the trials were repeated using a different 
grooving pattern, the engineers discovered they were on the right 
track. In 1963 the Venta-Nip was introduced to the industry, and its 
significance was immediately seen. Since then over 4000 of these 
presses have been put into operation throughout the world, and it 
has become almost the universal press. Ironically because the 
original idea did not lead to complex configurations, the patents 
were extremely difficult to police, and many manufacturers copied 
the idea. Thus, compared to its significance in the paper industry, 
Beloit got relatively little in terms of a financial return. 93 

Venta-Nips remain highly significant in the late 1970's. Their 
use has led to higher dryness, large energy savings, higher speeds, 
and lower costs to build and operate since they do not require the 
vacuum pumps that suction rolls did. Most important, Venta-Nips are 
readily incorporated in existing press sections. This feature has led 
to a large amount of rebuild business because a small increase in 
efficiency in the press section can mean a big difference in return 

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to the mill. For example, a 1% increase in dryness out of the press 
section can increase production by 4% to 5% because the machine can 
run faster. Steam production needs for drying will also be reduced. 94 
The culmination of the suction pickup, Twinver, Tri-Nip, and Venta-Nip 
established Beloit's dominance in press design, worldwide. Beloit 
really built better and more efficient machines. As felts have improved 
and as the Venta-Nip has been perfected, Beloit has been the leader of 
high nip pressure presses. Pressures have increased from 250 pli to 
1500 pli in the past 20 years. The net result has been high strength 
papers with much improved dryness as the paper enters the drying section. 
The result is a great energy saver during a time when energy 
costs have skyrocketed. 95 

Another early 1960's invention that is used in the press section, 
as well as practically everywhere else on a paper machine except the 
dryer section, is Controlled Crown Rolls. These met the need for 
wider, high speed machines and also improved paper uniformity. In 
contrast to the relatively slow development of the Venta-Nip idea, 
Controlled Crown Rolls were developed very rapidly in 1963 and 1964 
by a research group led by E. 3. Justus. The idea for the Controlled 
Crown Roll originated in 1959, but it was not developed until Kusters 
Corporation, a textile machinery company of Germany, introduced its 
swimming roll in the early 1960's and licensed it to the Farrel 
Corporation of the United States, The Kusters swimming roll had an 
impact on the market but Farrel had difficulties with deliveries and 
there were also design limitations. Consequently, Beloit's Controlled 
Crown Roll improved the Kusters roll and entered the market in 1964 at 
a very receptive time for sales to paper mills. 96 

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Controlled Crown Rolls are hydraulically loaded hollow rolls for 
presses, breaker stacks, calendars, and super calendars. The major 
advantage of the roll is its versatility in obtaining uniform nip 
pressure by adjusting the crown as conditions require. Controlled 
Crown Rolls eliminate the speed compromise necessary with old fashioned 
crown rolls and result in a more accurately running machine in all 
sections. 97 

Controlled Crown Rolls were so successful that Kusters and Farrel 
brought litigation against Beloit. The law suit lasted 5 years with 
only the lawyers enriching themselves. Ultimately the dispute was 
settled out of court after Beloit offered a nominal royalty even though 
they never believed they had infringed upon the Kusters' patent. 98 

During all this time and afterwards as well, Beloit's Controlled 
Crown Roll made a tremendous impact on paper machine technology and the 
paper machine market. By the late 1970's Beloit has sold over 1000 
of these rolls at a high profit level. Beloit was the only paper 
machine builder to have its own design for crown rolls. This gave 
it an advantage over its competitors both on new machines and on 
rebuilds and often forced Beloit competitors to buy Controlled Crown 
Rolls directly from Beloit.

The impact of Controlled Crown Rolls has been especially important 
on wide paper machines. In fact, it is nearly impossible to design paper machines much over 300 inches wide without using adjustable crown rolls. The addition of this innovation complemented the other capabilities of the company and underlined its position as the most complete, highest technology company in the paper machine industry. 

Page 213

This high technology continued into the dryer section. Lloyd 
Hornbostel had invented enclosed gear dryers which were cleaner and 
well suited to high speed machines. Better use of alloy irons and 
better steam fits both allowed higher steam pressure in the dryer 
section. 5y the late 1950's, Beloit introduced the Beloit High 
Velocity Air Caps for Yankee dryers. These allowed about a 20% 
increase in production on tissue machines but Beloit never captured 
the market. 100 

Since more energy is required for drying than anywhere else on 
the machine, improvements in this area are usually very significant. 
One major improvement is pocket ventilating systems of which the Beloit 
Pocket-Ventilating Roll patented by E. J. Justus in 1963 and introduced 
in 1964 is a leader. These rolls along with associated P-V ducts 
provide an abundant and uniform supply of hot, dry air everywhere in 
the dryer pocket. This effectively removes water vapor, dead, air 
pockets, and reduces vapor pressure in the pockets. The end results 
are greater overall drying and an improved moisture profile. This 
improved machine uniformity leads to better paper and board at lower 
costs to the paper mill. P-V systems are now an essential part of 
high speed drying systems since they increase dryness 10-25X. Beloit 
has sold a great number, without litigation, at good prices. 101 

After passing through the dryers, virtually all paper grades are 
calendared. Ordinary calendaring involves the high pressure passage 
of the paper web between metal rolls. This high pressure irons the 
paper sheet and causes both a bulk reduction which often is not 
desired and surface smoothing which is desired. For years calendars 
were rather standard pieces of equipment and no machine manufacturer 

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could claim his was superior. However, with the new high speed 
machines of the 1950's and 1960's, calendar improvements were needed. 
By the early 1970's, E. J. Justus and his research associates 
invented the Beloit Versa-Cal which, because of its versatility, has 
now become a standard component on wide, high speed, light weight 
paper machines and is widely copied by competitors. Versa-Cals use 
Controlled Crown Rolls in very advantageous ways. Double shoe Controlled 
Crown Rolls act like a hydraulic shock absorber which limit 
the vibration that causes bar marking across the paper. Because of 
Controlled Crown Rolls a range of nip pressures can run within the 
calendar stack. This is the outstanding feature of the stack. Finally 
Controlled Crown Rolls produce a uniform temperature profile across 
the face of the rolls. This excellent heat transfer proves very 
effective in preventing irregularities in caliper caused by temperature 
streaks in the sheet. Thus the Versa-Nip increases machine efficiency, 
helps produce better paper, and remains the premier design in the late 

From the calendar stack the newly formed paper enters the winder. 
At this end of the machine the new paper is wound into a full machine 
width roll. When it reaches a certain diameter the roll is removed 
from the paper machine, unwound, slit, and rewound into rolls of the 
proper width and diameter for shipment or use. 

Beloit built the best winders in the United States and dominated 
the large winder market during the 1950's. Small improvements like 
tension control helped improve the standard winders in the 1950's and 
1960's. Beloit winders were the first that could keep up with 2000 
f. p. m. news machines, and they continued to improve as machine speeds 

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increased. By the early 1970's Beloit brought out its highly productive, 
competitive Super L winder. This modular designed winder 
allows maximum visibility, accessibility and safety and can be used 
for either shaftless and shaft winding. Despite customer acceptance 
of the Super L Beloit has strong competition from the Jagenberg 
winders from West Germany. 103 

To run these huge paper machines requires very sophisticated 
drives and control systems. Lloyd Hornbostel's Differential Drive, 
a mechanical drive, was the premier system throughout the 1950's and 
for the first half of the 1960's. Its strength was its ability to 
run the various parts of the machine at different speeds for each 
section and at a very high accuracy rate. These differing speeds 
were necessary to take into account the shrinkage of the paper and to 
maintain proper tensions in the tender paper web as it moves through 
the machine. !1echanical drives, which use a common line shaft to tie 
together all parts of the machine, were promoted by Beloit for years 
as superior to electric drives. They were superior until the mid 
1960's but after that with the advent of solid state regulators and 
transistors, electric drives have surpassed them. Computer controls 
have also become important. By the 1970's Beloit engineers did not 
see a way to enhance mechanical drive capabilities and reduce its 
costs in comparison to electric drives. As a consequence, Beloit's 
customers usually buy drives from General Electric, Reliance or 
Westinghouse to run their new machines, 104 

Many printing grades of paper and paperboard are coated to provide 
a smoother surface, to control the penetration of inks, and to improve 
the appearance, brightness, and opacity of the product. Coating can be 

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applied to one or both sides of the sheet on or off the paper machine. 
Coating received its greatest impetus when on-the-machine coating 
became a commercial reality in 1935. Peter Massey had the original 
idea and Beloit engineers led by Earl Berry designed the first machine 
to meet the requirements of the inventor and the Consolidated Water 
Power and Paper Company, in whose plant it was installed. From this 
successful beginning other roll coaters were developed and Beloit made 
many, of them. By the 1950's, Beloit was the predominant coater 
designer. 

In the late 1950's Ralph Mahoney developed the Flooded Nip blade 
coater to compete with the Rice, Barton, and Fales puddle type blade 
coater. Mahoney's invention became the recognized standard of the 
industry and was widely copied and modified. It remains the best 
coater for publication grade papers, and it is continually being 
modified and improved, 105 It improved on the puddle type because 
it was able to run at higher speeds and the coating could be removed 
from the sheet without dumping the coating supply if a sheet break 
occurred. 106 

In the early 1960's Beloit also developed a high speed air knife 
coater to join its competitors in the heavy weight board and carton 
market, Beloit's innovation here was not the original coater but 
the improvement in design that made it practical at higher speeds, 
This was significant because it increased in speed from about 1200 
f. p. n. to 2000 f. p. m. With continual improvements this design is 
still being made in the late 1970's, but it, like the Flooded Nip 
coater, is now receiving a great deal of competition from Finnish 
and German machine manufacturers who have emulated Beloit's successes in this area. 107 

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By the late 1970's, Beloit had developed, rebuilt, and extended 
a pilot coating line at its Research Center in Beloit, This sophisticated 
research coating line can duplicate most of the commercially 
acceptable practices for coating paper and paperboard grades. It 
includes a Gate-roll coater, an Air-knife coater, a Flooded Nip blade 
coater, and a Twin-Flex coater. The latter one may be the coater of 
the future as it is capable of applying coating to both sides of a 
web simultaneously. It uses opposing blades and since the sheet is 
run upward, it requires minimum space. The Twin-Flex also increases 
dryer efficiency by drying both sides of the web together. Research 
is continuing on this new development. 108 

While coaters have regularly improved paper quality, paper machines 
for the first century and one half of their existence were either of 
the Fourdrinier type or cylinder type. The Fourdrinier had the single 
continuous wire on which the stock began its transformation to paper. 
The cylinder machine consisted of a large cylinder on which the same 
process occurred. No revolutionary changes occurred for all these 
years until the development of twin wire forming in the 1960's which 
most experts say has revolution% zed the making of paper. Pressure 
formers seem destined to take the place of the conventional Fourdrinier 
and cylinder machines. 

Beloit's twin wire forming ideas originated from the success of 
Inverform, the first multi-wire experimental machine designed and 
built by the St. Anne's Board Mill of Bristol, England in 1951. After 
4 years of tests on the experimental machine, St. Anne's decided to 
have a production unit built and Walsmley's built it for them. By 

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the late 1950's, the machine was working successfully and both 
Walmsley and Beloit were licensed to build them. 109

Inverform was a successful attempt to merge the advantages of 
the Fourdrinier and cylinder machines while discarding the disadvantages 
of each. Cylinder machines had low speed potential and 
Fourdriniers could not make a high-quality, multi-ply sheet. Inverform 
had no speed limitations and could make high quality multi-ply sheets. 
In both Fourdrinier and cylinder machines the paper web is formed by 
draining the water from a fiber-water suspension through a fine mesh 
wire screen which causes the fibers to mat together, However, the 
Inverfom method sandwiches the fiber-water suspension between top 
and bottom wires. As a result the water is removed both by drainage 
and upward extraction, and the web is formed very quickly. Where 
Inverform is used to make a multi-ply sheet there is more than one 
top wire section and each succeeding section applies a layer of stock 
on top of the preceding layer. In this case most of the water is 
removed upward through the top wire. 110 

Beloit was enthusiastic about the process and began to study it 
and similar possibilities in the new research center, In the meantime, 
the company built the second Inverfom units and installed them on 
existing Fourdrinier machines at the National Gypsum Company, Newburg, 
New York in November, 1960. Shortly thereafter, other Inverforms 
were installed in Australia, Connecticut, and England. 111 
Using and improving on the St. Anne's example, Beloit, under the 
research leadership of Joe Parker and David Gustafson, quickly became 
the leader in twin wire developments on paper. Inverfom had been 
used successfully in the production of board grades. Beloit's new 

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Twinverform concentrated on twin-wire formation for use on paper grades. 
The research department built an experimental machine in the early 
1960's, and three years of tests determined that high quality paper 
could be formed from the same kind of highly turbulent, rapidly 
drained fiber suspension found on the Inverform board machine. 112 

In the spring of 1964 after seeing a demonstration in Beloit, 
Kimberly Clark purchased a Twinverform designed for book paper for 
its Niagara, Wisconsin mill. It went into operation in September, 
1965 and gains were immediately seen. Normal operating speeds were 
1600 f. p. m. before the conversion and 1750 to 1850 f. p. m. afterwards. 
SoL? e successful trials temporarily increased the speed to 2100 f, p. m. 
Quality gains were equally as important and included better control 
of formation, less wire marking, fewer bursts, and better uniformity 
from run to run. 113 Drainage was rapid on the Twinverform with about 
2/ 3's of the water removed in a space of about 3 feet. This produced 
a better quality paper since the sheet formation took place on both 
wires simultaneously with the water being removed in both directions. 
The original Twinverform at Niagara is still in operation in 1979, 
and it now makes the paper for Playboy magazine. 114 

Twin-wire formers gradually evolved and improved throughout the 
1960's and many of Beloit's competitors developed their own versions. 
To meet and beat the competition Beloit used its research facilities 
to concentrate separately. at first, on fiber dispersion and on headbox 
design. From this research the Converflo headbox developed at the same 
time that the Bel-Baie idea for forming evolved. This was serendipity 
rather than planned research and development but the two projects were 
quickly married. The result was the Bel-Baie former with a Converflo 

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headbox -a superior method of making paper. 115 
The experimental work on the Bel-Baie former was conducted on 
the pilot machine at Beloit's research center and was carried out in 
cooperation with the Ontario Paper Company. The furnish used for 
the trials was supplied by Ontario Paper's newsprint mill at Baie 
Comeau, Quebec. After extensive trials it was clear that the Bel-Baie 
former would provide superior sheet qualities at very high speeds on 
a wide range of paper grades, 116 The first Bel-Baie was installed 
over an existing 262 inch Fourdrinier at Baie Comeau in late 1969, 
The results were so good that the company ordered a completely new 
machine equipped with a Bel-Baie former the following year. 
After selling five of the original Bel-Baie's, further experiments 
revealed that a position change in the headbox and forming area could 
improve the machine even more, This modification dropped the headbox 
and forming area down into a nearly vertical position so that the 
stock jets upward from the Converflo into the nip between the twin-wires. 
This position was cleaner, controlled the air better, took up 
less space, and promoted longer wire life. The new machine is called 
the Be1 Baie II and it remains in the late 1970's the worldwide accepted 
superior standard for high speed newsprint machines. 117 More Be1 Baie 
II's have been sold than machines from any other manufacturer. 
Twin-wires are rapidly making Fourdrinier newsprint machines 
obsolete as no wide, high speed Fourdrinier newsprint machines have 
been sold worldwide since 1976. While Beloit's competitors have all 
developed their own newsprint formers none can match the Be1 Baie II 
in speed. In fact, the three fastest newsprint machines in operation 
in 1979 are all Be1 Baie 11's. 

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As experiments continue on twin-wire formers, they should quickly 
become the standard design for all kinds of paper from tissue through 
newsprint, tablet and fine papers to linerboard. Beloit has recognized 
this and continues to lead these developments. Beloit's future 
competitiveness depends on its ability to retain technical superiority 
in twin-wire formers, and this area represents a major portion of the 
company's expenditures for research and development. 119

While the Beloit Corporation's research center in Beloit has concentrated 
on Bel-5aie's and on Beloit Tissue Farmers, its overseas 
counterpart, Beloit Walmsley, was working on two innovations at its 
Bolton, England research center. The first of these is called the Be1 
Bond former. It is a marriage of the excellent plybond features of 
the Inverform with the superior forming system features of the 
Converflo-Bel-Baie twin-wire former. It is capable of 3000 f. p. m. and 
is built for placement on top of a Fourdrinier wire. It originated 
in 1970-1971 in a joint venture of the Australian Paper Manufacturers 
Ltd. (APM) and Beloit Walmsley to increase the dewatering and load 
carrying capacity of a standard Invevform machine. After joint re-search 
at Bolton, APH constructed a curved, inverted suction box and 
installed it on its own experimental machine. This worked and it is 
now being made at Beloit Walrnsley. It bridges the gap between cylinder 
machines and the higher speed multistrata fomers, and it has improved 
board formation and plybond. Its capabilities are still being discovered 
but Bel-Bond rebuild installations appear very promising. 120 

Walmsley has also developed the Be1 Vat former, a compact suction 
former which fills a void in the market between the lower speed conventional 
vats and the high speed, high production Inverform machines. 

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The unit is operational in Europe at speeds of 490 to 1150 f. p. m. and 
it improves board quality. It was conceived in the late 1960's by 
Beloit Walmsley as an outgrowth of the Beloit hydraulic former, and 
by 1973 a prototype design was constructed on the research machine 
at Bolton. By 1976 a commercial design was developed and the Be1 Vat 
top former was born. It is a lower cost, compact former designed for 
installation over a Fourdrinier wire. It solves problems associated 
with underfelt formers, and it is successfully operating in a number 
of companies in the late 1970's. 121 

Another area where Beloit continues to excel1 in the 1970's is 
the company's development of the world's fastest Bel Baie twin-wire 
tissue former. Beloit has long been the industry leader in making 
tissue machines going back at least to the 1950's when it used Harry 
Ostertag's patented suction breast roll to make machines for Scott 
as well as for other companies. 121 

For a short time in the 1950's and early 1960's, Beloit also 
built a few tissue machines based on the Stevens former, invented by 
Samuel Stevens at the Erving Paper Mills, Erving, Massachusetts. 
These were small specialty machines, 5 of which were bought by 
Crown Zellerbach for installation on the West Coast far from its 
supplying mills. 122 Beloit and Crown Zellerbach got a lot of initial 
publicity on this venture, but the Stevens former had limited uses. 
It could not go fast; formation was not good; it was expensive, and 
it was hard to keep running. It was supplanted by the Ostertag suction 
breast roll which in turn was made obsolete by Beloit's twin-wire 
tissue former. 

By the mid 1970's, Beloit twin-wire tissue formers were designed 

Page 223

for over a mile-a-minute speeds and were well received within the 
country. Georgia-Pacific's mill at Crossett, Arkansas was the first 
mill in North America to have one and it increased the mill's capacity 
by 50,000 tons per year. By 1977 Beloit had 2 tissue machines running 
faster than any of its competitors' machines. 123 

The major reason for Beloit's success is its desire to be the 
technological leader in the field. To be the technological leader 
the company has to combine superior research and development with a 
willingness to take a chance and to stand by failures and make them 
right. This has been costly sometimes but customer confidence has 
been the result, This customer confidence has allowed Beloit to get 
a jump on its competitors by selling various innovations even before 
they are running commercially. For example, in the 1960's 20 Twinver 
presses were on order before one was running, and in the 1970's 7 
twin-wire tissue machines were sold before the first one was set up 
in a mill. 124 This will continue only so long as the practices that 
have made Beloit the world leader in technology continue themselves. 
Fortunately, despite increased competition, Beloit shows no signs of 
letting up.

Page 224

1 All financial figures were from an E. H. Neese letter dated Xay 15, 1979.

2 Harry Moore interview, October 17, 1979.

3 E. H. Neese, Jr. interview, October 30, 1979.

4 In 1948 Hornbostel, Don Ely and others experimented with an up side down suction press on the riverbank behind the plant. Don Ely interview, November 1, 1979.

5 E. H. Neese, Jr. interview, October 30, 1979; Don Ely interview, November 1, 1979.

6 Black-Clawson acquired the engineering, the patents, and the engineering personnel. Both sons had joined the company in 1941 and after service in World War II. 

7 Both were rapidly rising in the company's management. In 1955 Alonzo was Secretary and Elbert, Treasurer. In 1975 Elbert succeeded Harry Moore as President.

8 E. H. Neese, Jr., "The Future of the Company," speech dated March 4, 1959, Beloit Corporation Archives. 

9 It did decline in the late 1960's and early 1970's but was on the up-swing again by the mid 1970's.

10 Neese, Jr., "The Future of the Company," speech dated March 4, 1959.

11 In the mid 1960's long term borrowing finally became necessary.

12 Neese, Jr., " Future of the Company," speech dated March 4, 1959.

13 Ibid 

14 John Franz interview, March 7, 1959.

15 This premium would slowly reverse itself until in the late 1970's it was cheaper to make machinery in the United States than in Western Europe.

16 Later Beloit acquired 100% ownership.

17 H. E. Tower interview, November 5, 1979.

18 E. H. Neese, Jr., Future of the Company," March 4, 1959.

19 A Salute to Beloit Italia," Partners Magazine, Winter, 1978, p. 5.

20 Harry Moore address to University of Maine, Orono, Maine, August 5, 1960, Beloit Corporation Archives.

21 Harold E. Tower interview, November 5, 1979. Beloit-Nippon, Ltd., was set up in 1958 in part to handle that portion of the royalties that were in restricted yen and therefore could not leave Japan.

Page 225

22 Dwight E. Jones, The The Jones Story 1845-195, Jones Division, Beloit Corporation, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, 1966, pp. 30-31.

23 Ibid., pp. 32-34.

24 Details of this will be discussed later.

25 Bill Goessel interview. July 26, 1979.

26 Neese and Dundore, p. 147.

27 E. H. NNeese, Jr., "Future of the Company," March 4, 1959.

28 H. E. Tower interview, November 5, 1979.

29 John Franz interview, October 31, 1979.

30 This turned out to be inaccurate especially after Beloit completed its overseas subsidiaries.

31 Harry Moore speech to Sales Meeting, January 20, 1966, Beloit Corporation Archives.

32 Harry Moore address, University of Maine, August 5, 1960; Partners Magazine, Autumn, 1967. p. 2.

33 " Walmsley's Report on a Year of 'Great Activity'," The World's Paper trade Review, December 13, 1962, pp. 2075-76.

34 Henri Olivier, "Speech to Kiwanis Club of Beloit," April 26, 1967, Beloit Corporation Archives.

35 Ibid

36 Our Partners in Sorel," Partners Magazine, Autumn, 1967, pp. 7-9.

37 E. J. Justus interviews, July 20, 1979 and July 25, 1979, Justus believes that  Beloit rose to engineering leadership because Neese and Moore sought innovative, entrepreneurial-minded engineers and gave them a climate in which they could flower. Beloit then paid royalties on patents made by their engineers but has since phased out the policy--a decision that  Justus regrets.

38 Ibid 

39 Jan Bergstrom interview, July 25, 1979. Bergstrom, now Director of the Research Center, was a Swedish student in 1958. At the time he believed that the "ultimate, exciting, valuable idea" was to get to Beloit to use their research lab. He made it as an exchange student then, and in the early 1970's returned as an employee. 

40 Justus interview, July 25, 1979.

41 Justus to Moore, speech draft March 8, 1963, Beloit Corporation Archives; Harry Moore speech to H.A.P.I.., March 13, 1963, Beloit Corporation Archives.

Page 226

42 In 1963, Beloit Integrated Projects Ltd. was set up at Beloit-Walmsley.

43 One of the most obvious was size. Beloit had 3,100 employees in Beloitin 1961 and countless others elsewhere. From a one Vice-President of operations, Beloit had grown to have more than 10 by the early 1960's.

44 On a slightly frivolous level, Dustin Hoffman in 1967's The Graduate was told to go into plastics.

45 Bill Goessel interview, July 26, 1979; E. H. Neese, Jr. interview, October 30, 1979; H. E. Tower interview, November 5, 1979.

46 A random selection of meetings proves this. See Minute Book, 1969-1978.

47 H. C. Moore letter to shareholders, December 11, 1969. 

48 Ibid., December 11, 1970, June 22, 1971. 

49 Ibid., February 8, 1972.

50 According to Beloit Treasurer Hal Tower, letters to Beloit from its ineffective dealers often reminded him of the hilarious 1950's Earthworm Tractor Company articles in The Saturday Evening Post.

51 H. E. Tower interview, November 5, 1979, John Franz interview, October 31, 1979. 

52 Minute Book, Special Meeting of Board of Directors, November, 1971.

53 Moore letter to shareholders, December 11, 1970, February 8, 1972, Beloit Corporation Archives. 

54 Any random sample of Beloit's citizens would note that while the sewage plant has worked effectively its odor has regularly been nauseating.

55 Minute Book, May 21, 1968.

56 Minute Book, May 24, 1972, August 23, 1972, March 21, 1973, August 15, 1973.

57 Bill Goessel interview, July 26, 1979. 

58 John Franz interview, October 31, 1979; Harry Moore interview, August 2, 1979. Passavant reorganized the company and put five million more into it. They have since lost money every year but one. 

59 John Franz interview, October 31, 1979.

60 Minute Book, February 23, 1968, May 21, 1968, May 15, 1969.

61 Minute Book, 20, 1970, February May 21, 1970, September 23, 1970, November 4, 1971, January 31 and February 1, 1972; Harry Moore letter to stock-holders, February 8, 1972.

Page 227

62 The name of the division was changed to the Industrial Machinery Division in 1966.

63 Harry Moore interview, August 2, 1979.

64 Later this was also called Beloit Projects, Inc. 

65 John Franz interview, October 31, 1979. This contract was four times longer than the longest Beloit had ever signed.

66 Minute Book, February 23, 1968, March 12, 1969, February 20, 1970.

67 Minute Book, May 15, 1969, October 16, 1969.

68 Minute Book, May 21, 1970; Harry Moore interview, August 2, 1979; Hal Tower interview by phone, November 15, 1979. Turnkey projects were very risky and although Beloit did not handle these after the demise of Integrated Projects, it continues to handle machine house projects through Walmsley and Italia. In these, Beloit furnishes all the machinery for an empty building but does not handle land acquisition or the building of the plant.

69 Minute Book, February 23, 1968, March 12, 1969, May 15, 1969.

70 Minute Book, October 16, 1969, September 23, 1970; Hal Tower phone interview, November 15, 1979; John Franz interview, October 31, 1979.By the late 1970's Beloit was looking at computer companies as possible investment opportunities.

71 Minute Book, November 4, 1971, January 31, 1972, November 15, 1972, January 17, 1973, May 15, 1973. Even this turned out to be a fiasco. Axia failed; Beloit had to foreclose on the Axia promissory note, and the computer center returned to Beloit. It was sold the second time in 1975 to Analysis and Programming Corporation, Minute Book, July 15, 1975.

72 Harry Moore letter to stockholders, December 11, 1970, February 11, 1977.

73 The plant is now being built and will be in operation early in 1980.

74 Harry Moore speech, February 24, 1965.

75 Harry Moore letter to shareholders, December 11. 1969.

76 Undated Beloit Corporation graph showing patents between 1956 and 1968, Beloit Corporation Archives.

77 See previous chapter for more details. Another name for this was the air-loaded rectifier roll headbox.

78 William "The First 145 Years of the Paper Machine in the U.S.," PTJ, May 27, 1972, p. 148.79 Ibid.; E. J. Justus interview, November 15, 1979; Ed Beachler was deeply involved in the 1950's and 1960's improvements of the headbox.

Page 228

80 Beloit Group International Marketing Bulletin, Vol. I, No. 2, August 15, 1972, 1973; e. j. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

81 Converflo means Converging Flow. Joe Parker and Dick Hergert, "Simultaneous Convergence--A-New Concept of Headbox Design," TAPPI, October, 1968, p. 425. John C. Evans and Charles G. Waelde, "Significant Trends in Paper Machine Design and Operation II, " August 16, 1971, p. 42. 

82 E. J. Justus, "Static-element Headbox Developed to Handle Increasing Width and Speed," Pulp and Paper, October, 1978, p. 187. 83 E. J,. Justus interview, November 20, 1979. 

84 Ibid. 

85 Ibid. 

86 R. A. Daane, " Papermaking and Finishing Machinery," unpublished paper, dated June 21, 1971; A. C. Roecker, "Evaluation of Fourdrinier Foil Designs," TAPPI Annual  Meeting, February 22, 1965, both in Beloit Corporation Archives. 

87 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979; Beloit Group International Marketing Bulletin, Vol. I, No. 2, April 15, 1972, p. 67. 

88 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979; S. W. Forstrom, "Rotabelt Installation on a Kraft Specialty Machine," unpublished manuscript, Beloit Corporation Archives. 

89 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

90 Don Curtis, "Recent Developments in Fourdrinier Paper Machines, "TAPPI, Vol. 39, No. 12, December, 1956, pp. 185-86.

91 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

92 L. A. Burnham, "Mechanical Water Removal," Paper Industry, March, 1965, pp. 58 and 61.

93 C. Neil Rampel, "Factors Influuencing Venta-Nip Press Water Removal Efficiency," PTJ, December 27, 1971, p. 28; E. J. Justus and Dennis Cronin, "The Venta-Nip Press," TAPPI, August, 1964, Vol. 48, No. 8, p. 493; E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979; Harry Moore inter-view, October 17, 1979.

94 Laurie Wicks, "Press Section Rebuilds Can Give Existing Machines New Vitality," Pulp and Paper, November, 1977, p. 1967. 

95 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979. 

96 Jack Diltz,  Domestic Sales Meeting-Market Planning Report," January 20, 1966 Internal  Speech, Beloit Corporation Archives; Robert Hurms, "What's New in the Technology of Paper Making Machinery," speech, March 16, 1965, Beloit Corporation Archives.

Page 229 

97 E. C. Lever, "International Paper Luncheon Speech, "February, 1965, Beloit Corporation Archives.

98 Harry Moore interview, October 17, 1979.

99 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

100 'Harry Moore interview, October 17, 1979.

101 William Becker, "First 145 Years...," pp. 148-149; R. A. Daane, "Paper-making and Finishing Machinery," June 21, 1971; E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979. R. A. Daane has spent much of his career at Beloit working on improvements in drying.

102 E. J. Justus interview November 20, 1979; Beloit Group International Marketing Bulletin, Vol. I, No.-4, April 15, 1973, p.59, E. J. Justus and Alan Sorenson, "Today's New Calendar Stacks," TAPPI  First Paper makers Conference, June 5 -8, 1972, Beloit Corporation Archives. 

103 Beloit Group International Marketing Bulletin, Vol. 2, No. 1, July 1973, p 42; E. J. Justus Interview, November 20, 1979. 

104 R. A. Daane, "Papermaking and Finishing Machinery," speech, June 21, 1971, Beloit Corporation Archives; E. E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979. 

105 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979. 106 Jack Diltz, "Flooded Nip Coaters and Their Operation," PTJ,  November 12, 1962, pp. 40-41.

l07 E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

l08 Robert Carlson and Gerald Garde, "New Pilot Coating Line Offers Wide Flexibility for Research," Pulp and Paper, May, 1977, pp. 153-55.

109 Beloit bought 23% of Walmsley's in 1959-1960. The license was an immediate benefit of that relationship.

110 "Inverform Wet End Shows Promise," Paperboard Packaging, February, 1960, pp. 52-53; Don Curtis interview, October 29, 1979.

111 R. D. Bartlett, " Inverform Progress Report" ,  speech given at TAPPI meeting, April 18, 1963 Beloit Corporation Archives.

112 David R. Gustafson, "Twinverform: High Points of Design and Development," Pulp and Paper, February 28, 1966, p. 33.

113 Dexter L. Wolfe, "The Twinverform Kakes It's Debut," Pulp and Paper, February 28, 1966, p. 32. 114 Jack Diltz, International Beloit Luncheon Speech, February 23, 1966, Beloit Corporation Archives; E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

Page 230

115 Robert j. Mustro, "Twin-wire Formers Seen Expanding into Heavy Paper, Board, An Interview with E. J. Justus, "PTJ, October 15, 1975, p. 33.

116 David Gustafson and Louis Dennis, "Be1-Baie Former," speech at TAPPI annual meeting, February, 1969, Beloit Corporation Archives.

117 "Successful Bel-Baie Former Now Further Improved, " PTJ, February 15, 1971, p. 45; E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

118 E. J. J.. Justus interview, November 20, 1979.

119 Ibid.

120 "Be1 Bond Former is said to Cut Costs, Improve Output and Quality of Board," PTJ, " July 15, 1977; Gary W. Johnston, "New Approaches to Multi-ply Board Forming Now Coming Out of England," Pulp and Paper, September, 1977, pp. 108-109.

121 "Multi-ply and Stratified Web Forming Systems," (Beloit-Walmsley Seminar) Paper, May 23, 1977, pp. 575-576.

122 See Previous chapter for details on Ostertag and his invention. Bill Goodwillie interview tape, May 30, 1979; "Five Little Machines," Pulp and Paper, July, 1959, pp. 70-74; E. J. Justus interview, November 20, 1979; Don Curtis interview, October 29, 1979.

123"Georgia-Pacific Starts Up New Tissue Former at Crossett Mill," Pulp and Paper, August, 1977, pp. 54-58; Beloit Group International Marketing Bulletin, Vol. 5, No. 2, June , 1977, p 22.

124 Harry Moore interview, August 2, 1979.

Advance to: THE ELBERT H. NEESE, JR. ERA 1975 - 1979

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