If you were in the door hardware industry in 1952, you knew the name Lockwood. It stood for prestige, quality, and American industrial might. The Lockwood Hardware Manufacturing Company operated five regional sales offices and six manufacturing plants across the United States. It had furnished buildings all over the world: apartments, hotels, hospitals, colleges, embassies, and federal facilities.
Its products were used in high-security government sites, including post offices, military installations, and even the U.S. Embassy in Havana. And perhaps most impressively, Lockwood hardware was installed in two of the most high-profile projects of the mid-century: the Atomic Energy Plant in Paducah, Kentucky—at the time, the largest contract ever awarded by the U.S. government—and the United Nations Headquarters in New York City.
At the company’s 1952 sales convention, there was a sense of unstoppable momentum. Lockwood had survived the Great Depression, pivoted to war production during WWII, and emerged in the postwar boom stronger than ever. Yet today, more than seventy years later, the Lockwood name is a ghost in the American hardware industry. So, what happened?
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