During the Vietnam War, Mercury made the hinges and hasps for a million
ammunition boxes. Each
kit required 12 stampings. When
people asked Jack's wife, Evelyn, what Mercury built, she told them
sky hooks and skeleton closets.
"We made the hooks that went on the winches on the helicopters,
and then made the cabinets that the skeletons went in which were made
in Gatesville at Medical Plastics," Jack said.
One of Jack's projects over the years included manufacturing
play money - an endeavor that almost got him into trouble with the law.
In the 1950s, Jack, his brother, Herbert Richards,
Wallace Rusch and Rudy Nails started a company called Texatoy to make
play money, hobby horses, sheriff's badges and spinning ropes.
The play money included a copper penny.
They were careful not to make the penny the same size as a real
penny, in compliance with the law, but unbeknownst to them, the play
copper penny was the same size as the New York City subway tokens.
"One day, two of the biggest guys I ever saw came in with
guns and badges, from the Treasury Department, and confiscated all the
copper for making the coins, and all the coins we had," Jack said.
The company was paying women to package the money in their homes,
and all of those packages had to be unpacked, as well. "It was
scary," Jack said. "We
thought, 'Oh, we're in big trouble.'"
Today Mercury Tool fills a complex of six buildings.
At peak times, it employs more than 90 workers, and true to Jack's
vision, the company remains diverse.
"We do welding, precision machining, precision sheet metal,
stamping, tool and die and assembly work.
We make motor houses for DC motors and will be making AC motor
housings shortly." The list goes on: Round mirrors on UPS trucks,
chairs for Superior Chaircraft, book boxes for school desks, pumps and
valves. Recently, Mercury
got an order for 1.7 million sample chips for Wilson Plastics.
Jack's son Jack is vice president of manufacturing for Mercury; Bob
is plant manager; and Janice is human resources, payroll and insurance.
Richard has his own business interests now - from used building
materials and insulation installation to multi-level nutritional marketing
- but for years he operated Mercury's go-cart shop.
The machines at Mercury today differ greatly
from those the company started with 50 years ago.
Employees now tend to be technicians rather than true machinists,
Jack said. "The work
ethic has changed over the years - loyalty, and I think the desire to
do something well," Jack said. "Before, we always figured
we could do it faster or better."
Jack still enjoys the daily challenge of working at Mercury.
"I think I'm pretty good at what I do," he said.
"I take the whole project.
Like this last one I took, I found the punch press, we designed
and built the die, we buiilt an automatic robot to feed it through a
rolling machine, we built the twin spindle welder, and then tooled the
expander to make a motor shell."
"When you figure 60 years in the business, if I don't know
it now, I better quit," Jack laughs.
In 1985, Evelyn had a heart attack,
followed by double bypass surgery in 1992.
She lost the use of half of her heart, and gradually congestive
heart failure took over. She
died June 30, 1998, at the breakfast table in their home on Crestwood
Drive, where she and Jack had lived for nearly 30 years
and were looking forward to celebrating their 60th anniversary
in September. "She was a very spiritual woman," Jack
said. "She held out
for everybody to come to the Lord.
She was always super-sensitive.
She thought of everyone else before herself.
And that kind of inspires you."
