Quality and Service since 1942

The History of IHT

« Back to Home PageIn 1941, the United States was in the midst of World War II. Manufacturing companies were expanding and older more established businesses were losing employees to these expanding companies. The Boston Consolidated Gas Company was no different. Five young men that had worked for Boston Gas decided they could help save jobs. They established a service department that would employ men from Boston Gas. As a result, Industrial Services of New England was born.

After a successful stint as a service company they decided to focus on commercial heat treating. Heat treating was in great demand due to the war, and the men were very familiar with the gas powered equipment that was required to perform the heat treating. The men immediately started building a furnace in one of their garages. Equipment was obtained from discarded equipment from businesses that had closed. They purchased kilns and other equipment from a local junk yard. The equipment was repaired, renovated and refurbished until they were once again operational.

Aluminum was becoming more and more popular and Industrial Services of New England was one of the first commercial heat treaters of aluminum in the area. To this day Industrial remains one of the largest aluminum heat treaters in the Northeast.

On December 5, 1942 the name was changed to Industrial Heat Treating, Inc. Walter Ebersteen became President and Willard Davis became the Secretary/Treasurer. Industrial Heat Treating had established itself as a competitive commercial heat treater. Walter and Will purchased a building on Densmore Street in North Quincy and moved the company out of the cramped, one-car garage into a newer larger facility. The extra space allowed for the addition of more furnaces with greater capacities and they were now able to offer their customer additional processes.

By the early 1960’s the building had continued to expand as did the processes available to customers. These processes included annealing, stress relieving, hardening and tempering, carburizing, cyanide and lead hardening, induction hardening and the heat treating, annealing and stress relieving of aluminum. Industrial’s industry base had expanded to include automotive, aerospace and industrial hardware for the government and private sector. During this time, Industrial also began heat treating components for a new invention…the computer. Today, Industrial is involved in every aspect of the manufacturing industry.

During the late 1960’s and early 1970’s Will began to buy out many of the share holders of the company and in 1972 he became the sole owner of Industrial Heat Treating, Inc. In 1984, Will resigned as President of Industrial, but remained as CEO. Sadly, Will passed away in April, 1986.

Industrial has been through many changes since 1986. The largest of those changes was in September 1998. Will’s youngest daughter, Lynne Davis, became the owner of Industrial Heat Treating.

Today, Lynne believes in the same philosophy and values that her father did…”Be fair and honest with your employees and your customers. Respect each individual for their talent and diversity.”

All of the employees, especially managers, have a long history in this industry. Their expertise is invaluable not only to Industrial, but to our customers as well. They often work directly with the customer in determining the best material needed for their product. Industrial encourages interaction between a company’s engineering team and our heat treating experts.