Texas Industries Inc History

Texas Industries, Inc. (TXI) is a major producer of steel and cement/concrete products for construction. In the steel segment, the company's products include reinforcing bar, structural beams, and merchant quality rounds. Texas Industries' steel operations are carried out by Chaparral Steel Company, an 81 percent-owned subsidiary. Chaparral's raw materials consist largely of scrap steel, much of which is produced by shredder operations at its Midlothian, Texas, steel mill. A major source of the scrap steel for shredding is crushed auto bodies that are purchased on the open market. The bulk of Chaparral's customers are steel service centers, steel fabricators, forgers, and equipment manufacturers. The company's products are used primarily in the construction, railroad, defense, automotive, and energy industries.

TXI's cement/concrete operations produce a variety of construction materials, including cement and aggregates, ready-mix, pipe, block, and brick. The company's Midlothian cement facility is the largest cement plant in Texas, with a capacity of 1.2 million tons. Another cement facility is located in Hunter, Texas, near Austin. About one million tons of finished cement were shipped to outside trade customers by TXI in 1992. The principal marketing area for the company's cement products includes Texas, Louisiana, Colorado, Oklahoma, and New Mexico. TXI's aggregate facilities are located in Texas and Louisiana, where sand, gravel, crushed limestone, and lightweight aggregate are produced. Texas and Louisiana are also home to the company's 29 ready-mix concrete plants, which use a sizeable amount of the cement and aggregates produced at the company's other facilities in their own operations.

Texas Industries, Inc. was formed in 1951 as the successor to the Texas Lightweight Aggregate Company. Texas Lightweight Aggregate Company had been organized in 1946 to meet the increasing postwar demand for construction materials in the southwestern part of the United States. This company had a sales volume of $30,000 in 1947. In 1949, Texas Lightweight Aggregate attracted the attention of Ralph Rogers, the former president of Cummins Diesel Engine Corp., who had recently retired to the Dallas area. Texas Lightweight Aggregate was one of the first companies to burn shale and clay in special rotary kilns, producing a unique building material. Noting the potential of this product, Rogers decided to invest in the company. By 1950, the allegedly retired Rogers was elected company president. The following year, Texas Industries was formed, with Texas Lightweight Aggregate and another firm, Texcrete Co., as its core. Texcrete Co., also formed in 1946, was a maker of concrete products that included pipe, joists, and masonry units. In its first year, Texas Industries earned $35,000 on sales of $217,000.

By 1953, Texas Industries had grown explosively, reporting sales that year of $5.8 million. The company had four main product lines at that time: Haydite, the lightweight expanded clay and shale aggregate that had first interested Rogers; concrete products sold under the Texcrete trade name; ready-mixed concrete, sand, gravel, and crushed stone; and Sakrete, the trade name for its dry-mixed concrete. Haydite was the company's most important early product. Because it was as strong as conventional concrete while 40 percent lighter, Haydite quickly became popular in the building industry. By 1954, TXI had expanded to 28 plants. These included the newly acquired Fort Worth Sand & Gravel Co. and a new Haydite subsidiary, the Oklahoma Lightweight Aggregate Company in Choctaw, 12 miles from Oklahoma City. The company's total of six Haydite plants made it the nation's largest expanded clay or shale lightweight aggregates producer. 1954 also marked the completion of a new research and testing laboratory at TXI's Dallas facility.

TXI continued to grow at a rapid pace through the later part of the 1950s. A nine-month expansion and rebuilding program took place in 1955 and 1956 at the company's Texcrete plant in Dallas. In 1958, TXI acquired all outstanding shares of Texcrete Structural Products Company, which had just finished work on a modern new prestressed concrete plant. The plant's initial output was bridge girders to be used in highway construction. Dallas Lightweight Aggregate Company became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Texas Industries the following year.