Ward Pattern & Engineering Company → Ward Aluminum Casting, Inc. → Ward Corporation (Ward Corp.)

1964 – today

Founded: 18 May 1964, Fort Wayne. The company's own history timeline states the day: "May 18th, 1964 — Marion and Vern Ward opened the doors of WARD Pattern & Engineering Company as a small pattern shop with three employees and 1,500 sq. ft.," with first-year sales of $90,000 and Vern Ward named Indiana's outstanding Small Businessman of the Year that year. The Journal Gazette's 2018 profile of the founders (Janet Patterson, 9 Sept 2018, as summarised by ACGSI) agrees the Wards "started their business in 1964," and the company's current brochure agrees ("Growing from a small workshop in 1964"). No incorporation record was retrieved, so the exact day rests on the company history and is not confirmed by a primary record. On the conflicting accounts: a Facebook comment carried on ACGSI's Wayne Knitting Mills page claims "in the late 1940's the Ward Aluminum Company began operation at that site." That is contradicted — Wayne Knitting Mills operated at the Growth Avenue site until 1960 (entry 29), Ward was not founded until 1964, and Ward Aluminum did not exist until 1978 (below). Site occupancy has been conflated with founding.

Founders: Marion Ward and Vern Ward — (company timeline; the 1983 city bond application below names Marion Ward as president and Vern Ward as vice-president of Ward Aluminum Castings, Inc.). The Journal Gazette profiled the couple in 2018, then in their 90s and still involved with the firm.

What it did (first company): A pattern shop — Ward Pattern & Engineering made the patterns and tooling from which foundry castings are produced — begun in 1,500 sq ft of the former Wayne Knitting Mills building on Growth Avenue (the Journal Gazette account: the business began with 1,500 sq ft "in the same building"; the company timeline puts the later divisions at 642 Growth Avenue). The casting side arrived in two documented steps: in 1969 Marion's brother Gail Cole started an aluminum foundry, Cole Precision Castings, making prototype and short-run sand castings for aerospace and automotive customers; in 1978 Ward Aluminum Casting, Inc. was formed by assuming the assets and liabilities of Cole Precision Castings, by then grown to 40 employees and 15,000 sq ft (company timeline; the Journal Gazette gives the same 1978 figures — 40 employees, 15,000 sq ft — for Ward Aluminum Casting Inc.). The company's two dates therefore reconcile, and are not a conflict: the current Ward brochure's "providing aluminum castings since 1978" dates the aluminum casting business; 1964 dates the firm. A 1983 city record independently fits the 1978 date: Ward Aluminum Castings' application in Fort Wayne Ordinance R-83-09-35 (economic development revenue bonds, $931,040, for its 642 Growth Avenue project) states the applicant had been in operation in Allen County for 5 years — as a contemporaneous city record (application as filed, 1983).

Course: Growth by buildings and divisions, per the company timeline: in 1980 Ward bought the previously rented three-story, 120,000 sq ft building at 642 Growth Avenue (Building #1), housing both Ward Pattern and Ward Aluminum Casting — the Journal Gazette's "buying the entire 120,000-square-foot building where they started their business; what was once Wayne Knitting Mills became Ward Corp." is the same growth told without the purchase year. Additions followed in 1984–85, including the purchase of the 130,000 sq ft warehouse at 641 Growth Avenue (Building #2, run for years as the Tracon Warehouse Division), permanent molding added to the sand-casting operation, and casting machining brought in-house. In 1986–89 Ward Production Machine became a separate division and Ward Heat Treat was built as a 25,000 sq ft facility four miles north of the main plant (Building #3; the Journal Gazette places Ward Heat Treating on Opportunity Drive). In 1999–2001 the company bought the 100,000 sq ft building at 730 Growth Avenue (Building #4) and received ISO 9002 / QS-9000 certification. It survived the 2008–09 recession and, on its own account, doubled sales from 2008 to 2014; a 16,000 sq ft addition to the casting building began in 2015.

Fate: Still operating, family-owned, in Fort Wayne. Ward Corporation today comprises four divisions — Ward Pattern & Engineering, Ward Aluminum Casting, Ward Heat Treating and Ward Production Machine — at 642 Growth Avenue, with, on the company's current brochure, over 250 employees across the four divisions and over 300,000 sq ft of manufacturing space; a vendor listing of the company's own description gives over 200 employees in the same four divisions. Flagged and not followed: an unclaimed ThomasNet profile carries "company is out of business / no longer at this location" flags; those flags conflict with the company's own current brochure and listings and do not outweigh them — an unclaimed-profile status flag is not a closure record.

Sources:

1. Ward Corporation company history timeline, as published in the company's Glassdoor company description (18 May 1964 opening of Ward Pattern & Engineering, three employees, 1,500 sq ft, $90,000 first-year sales; 1969 Gail Cole foundry; 1978 formation of Ward Aluminum Casting, Inc. from Cole Precision Castings, 40 employees / 15,000 sq ft; 1980 purchase of the 120,000 sq ft 642 Growth Avenue building; 1984–85 Tracon Warehouse purchase and additions; Ward Production Machine and Ward Heat Treat divisions; 730 Growth purchase 1999–2001; recession survival and 2015 addition) — https://www.glassdoor.com/Overview/Working-at-Ward-EI_IE1314491.11,this history
2. Ward Corporation current brochure (aluminum castings since 1978; growing from a small workshop in 1964 to over 300,000 sq ft; over 250 employees across four divisions; 642 Growth Avenue) — https://online.flipbuilder.com/dvak/qnbg/files/basic-html/page7.html
3. Journal Gazette, Janet Patterson, "Owners put stamp on decades-old firm," 9 Sept 2018, as summarised on ACGSI (started their business in 1964; in 1978 Ward Aluminum Casting Inc. at 40 employees and 15,000 sq ft in the same building where the business began with 1,500 sq ft; buying the entire 120,000 sq ft building; "what was once Wayne Knitting Mills became Ward Corp."; Ward Heat Treating on Opportunity Drive; the late-1940s Facebook comment appears on the same page and is a misidentification in this entry) — https://www.acgsi.org/genweb/fort-wayne/wayne-knitting-mills-fort-wayne-indiana.html
4. City of Fort Wayne Ordinance R-83-09-35 (1983), Ward Aluminum Castings, Inc. bond application (642 Growth Avenue; aluminum casting manufacturing; 5 years in operation in Allen County; Marion Ward, president; Vern Ward, vice-president) — https://archive.org/download/FWCityCouncil-Ordinance-R-83-09-35/FWCityCouncil-Ordinance-R-83-09-35.pdf
5. Ward Corporation vendor listing (four divisions named; family-owned group; grown from three to over 200 employees; 642 Growth Ave) — https://www.ndt.org/vendor.asp?ObjectID=46881