History
Emerson was established in 1890 in St. Louis, Missouri (USA) as Emerson Electric Manufacturing Co. by Civil War Union veteran John Wesley Emerson to manufacture electric motors using a patent owned by the Scottish-born brothers Charles and Alexander Meston. In 1892, it became the first to sell electric fans in the United States. It quickly expanded its product line to include electric sewing machines, electric dental drills, and power tools.
During World War II, under the leadership of Stuart Symington, Emerson became the world's largest manufacturer of airplane armament. Symington went on to become the first United States Secretary of the Air Force from 1947-1950, a Democratic U.S. Senator from Missouri from 1953-1976, and a candidate for the Presidency of the United States in 1960.
In 1954, W.R. "Buck" Persons was named company president. Under his leadership, Emerson diversified its business portfolio by acquiring 36 companies. When he retired in 1973, the company had 82 plants, 31,000 employees and $800 million in sales.
Charles F. Knight served as CEO from 1973 to 2000, and was chairman from 1974 to 2004. His tenure was marked by development of a rigorous planning process, new product and technology development, acquisitions and joint ventures, and international growth.
David N. Farr has served as CEO since 2000 and as chairman since 2004.
On January 30, 2008, top executives from Emerson had meetings with the Costa Rican President and government authorities to open an operation for Latin America based in Costa Rica. They are planning to hire more than 500 engineers in a period of 4 years.
On July 26th, 2011, Emerson announced it would locate its Latin America headquarters in Sunrise, Florida.
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“You treat world history as a mathematician does mathematics, in which nothing but laws and formulas exist, no reality, no good and evil, no time, no yesterday, no tomorrow, nothing but an eternal, shallow, mathematical present.”
—Hermann Hesse (1877–1962)
“It is the true office of history to represent the events themselves, together with the counsels, and to leave the observations and conclusions thereupon to the liberty and faculty of every man’s judgement.”
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626)