Simplicity Manufacturing Company is an American company based in Port Washington, Wisconsin that builds lawn and garden equipment under various brands. The company was founded by William J. Niederkorn in 1922, and started building walk-behind two-wheeled tractors in 1939. Between 1941 and 1945, due to

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, Simplicity Manufacturing temporarily halted production of lawn and garden products, and manufactured electric fence controllers and external surface grinders to satisfy the

War Production Board The War Production Board (WPB) was an agency of the United States government that supervised war production during World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt established it in January 1942, with Executive Order 9024. The WPB replaced the Su ...

. Simplicity built is first riding tractor in 1957 which was the model Wonderboy. The company rapidly expanded its product line in the sixties to meet the demands of the population shift to American suburbs.

Allis-Chalmers Allis-Chalmers was a United States, U.S. manufacturer of machinery for various Industry (economics), industries. Its business lines included list of agricultural machinery, agricultural equipment, heavy equipment, construction equipment, electric ...

purchased the company in 1965, and Simplicity's management bought it back in 1983. Simplicity Manufacturing celebrated its 75th anniversary in 1997 with a special 75th anniversary tractor model. The tractor featured a special blue paint scheme with chrome Harley-Davidson lights and muffler. Sometime after AGCO Corporation purchased Deutz-Allis from Deutz-Fahr and KHD, Simplicity took over building and selling the Deutz-Allis lawn equipment. The name was later changed to Agco-Allis, and then to AGCO to reflect the changes within the AGCO Corporation. After AGCO purchased

Massey Ferguson Massey Ferguson is an agricultural machinery manufacturer, established in 1953 through the merger of farm equipment makers Massey-Harris of Canada and the Ferguson Company of Ireland. It was based in Coventry then moved to Beauvais in 2003 when ...

, Simplicity began building and selling the Massey Ferguson lawn equipment. Simplicity bought the Snapper company in 2002. Snapper had built Massey Ferguson lawn tractors many years before. Over the years, Simplicity has also built lawn and garden tractors for J.C. Penney,

Montgomery Ward Montgomery Ward is the name of two successive U.S. retail corporations. The original Montgomery Ward & Co. was a mail-order business and later a department store chain that operated between 1872 and 2001; its common nickname was "Monkey Wards". ...

, Viking (part of Stihl), Homelite Corporation and Rapid. Hinomoto/Toyosha built some of the larger compact tractors sold as Simplicity, Deutz-Allis and Allis-Chalmers. * 1989, purchased the Middlesworth company of Greentown, Indiana, a manufacturer of

zero-turn mower A zero-turn riding lawn mower (colloquially, a ''z-turn'' or ''zero turn'') is a standard riding lawn mower with a turning radius that is effectively zero when the two drive wheels rotate in opposite direction, like a tank turning in place. D ...

s * 2000 Simplicity announced that it had agreed to purchase Ferris Industries * 2000 purchased Giant-Vac * 2002, purchased the Snapper company * 2004, was purchased by

Briggs & Stratton Briggs & Stratton Corporation is an American manufacturer of small engines with headquarters in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. Engine production averages 10 million units per year as of April 2015. The company reports that it has 13 large faciliti ...

References

External links

Official website

{{Allis-Chalmers Lawn and garden tractors Manufacturing companies based in Wisconsin Agriculture companies of the United States