Wally Johnson, back in 1946, created the markets for both aerial work platforms and scaffold towers all by himself. He accomplished this by establishing a business which was referred to as UpRight. Mr. Wally Johnson was a really skilled mechanical engineer who lived in Berkeley, California. He stumbled upon access equipment when he started looking for a solution to painting his home.
While Mr. Johnson was embarking on his house painting project, he had a futile search for scaffolding which can handle the uneven terrain that surrounded his house. After being very discontented with his choices, he decided to design his own aluminum scaffold tower complete with adjustable legs.
During that very same year, the Snorkel Company was established in St. Joseph, Missouri. The company was responsible for introducing an innovative new elevating boom lift to the market. The machine was made for rescue and firefighting work. In less than 2 decades, the technology had developed into self-propelled boom lifts.
During 1977, Snorkel sold its first self-propelled lift. This specialized product line did not take long to become the main business for the company.
Wallace Johnson rapidly catapulted to the top of the industry with his new scaffold. After he had attained this field, he decided to start all over and create the world's first self-propelled aerial lift.
In 1972, Mr. Johnson opened a new factory in Selma. There he created the "Flying Carpet" scissor lift. After this exciting and new equipment exploded onto the marketplace, the ground-breaking product soon out-ranked the scaffolding component as the main source of revenue of the company.
Wallace Johnson passed away during the year 1980. At that time, the company UpRight Inc. was sold but his inventive and pioneering spirit lived on. In 1994, UpRight launched the world's very first micro-scissors. They went on to pioneer the self-propelled mast lift, the TM12.