Category: 2024

The respect and admiration that leaders across the aggregate industry have for Virginia-based Luck Stone is almost palpable. As the nation’s largest family-owned and operated producer of crushed stone, sand and gravel, Luck Stone has set countless examples throughout its 101-year history on how to treat people. From community relations and employee management to safety and even technology, the Luck Stone approach has long been one to watch. Other producers aim to emulate it, but replicating the Luck Stone way is impossible without one key ingredient: the DNA, which has now passed through three generations of company leadership. That third generation of leadership is represented by Charlie Luck IV, who joins his father (Charles Luck III) and grandfather (Charles Luck Jr.) this month in the Pit & Quarry Hall of Fame. “All of the Lucks are people-focused,” says John Pullen, chief growth officer at Luck Stone. “It’s in their DNA. They have a tremendous care for humanity. It’s genetic in the Luck family.” When Pullen first went to work for Luck Stone in 1993, Charlie’s father headed the company. But as Pullen reflects, many of the characteristics that made up the father are innate in the son. “The things that were so important to Mr. Luck were equally important to Charlie,” Pullen says. What matters most to Charlie Luck is people – and not just the company’s own, but those in the communities it serves and others it impacts (i.e., customers, vendors). “The biggest thing that makes Charlie stand out along with the other generations of Lucks that have been inducted [to the Pit & Quarry Hall of Fame] is it starts with the perspective of people,” Pullen says. “I sit on a lot of boards, and I interact with a ton of companies. Our approach is very different – not only in our industry, but in American business in so many ways.”

Igniting Potential

With a mission to ignite human potential through Values Based Leadership (VBL), Luck Stone encourages its associates to explore and bring their potential to life while helping others to do the same. “If you’re a leader in this company, you have to start with the belief and mission of igniting human potential,” Pullen says. “Then, you find leaders who believe in that. When you find leaders who embrace that, they behave in a way that inspires people.” Values don’t always translate from one generation to the next in family companies, though. It’s possibly why so many stumble from the first generation to the second, or from the second generation to the third. But the Luck sons clearly heeded the words of their fathers. From Pullen’s view, that continues to this day at Luck Stone. “I think Charlie – like his dad did for him and his grandfather did for his dad – has spent a tremendous amount of time on succession and development of the next generation with Richard [Luck],” says Pullen referring to Charlie’s son. “Richard is just so expertly prepared for the leadership of the company when Charlie’s ready for him to have that role. Just in general, the Luck family has done an amazing amount of work to create succession development that ensures all of this generational growth. I think they do some of the best work in the world in that space.” The true impact of such a succession effort is massive, Pullen adds. “Charlie has done that for Richard, which sustains the company, which impacts thousands and thousands of people,” he says. “It’s just another element where you could say Charlie’s led this VBL model. That impacts customers, communities and vendors into the thousands of people who’ve been engaged with that system.”

Additional Perspective

Like Pullen, Paul Mellott Jr. has seen Charlie in action. And he’s a believer in the model Luck Stone deploys. “In 2005, Charlie had me come down [to Virginia] because he wanted to show me something,” says Mellott, who was enshrined in the Pit & Quarry Hall of Fame in 2013. “He met me at the airport when I landed. He took me into a room and told me all about Values Based Leadership. He was working with his company to learn what Values Based Leadership was. He said it was working and that I should think about this.” s company ultimately adopted Values Based Leadership. Now, Mellott swears by it. “It changed our company culture,” he says. Luck Stone’s industrywide impact extends beyond its people, though. Throughout its history, Luck Stone has pressed limits in terms of what’s possible technologically and what’s not. That mindset continues under Charlie’s leadership. “He has people constantly looking for better ways to do things,” Mellott says. “They just are unbelievable. He’s not afraid to try anything. He has really great people. I think that’s the best thing he has done, and that’s the best thing you want to be known for is hiring people who love your company and will never leave.”

Crushing. Screening. Portable processing. Louis Johnson, the founder of El-Jay Manufacturing who introduced the Rollercone roller bearing cone crusher and the triple-shaft horizontal screen more than a half-century ago, made an impact on all these critical industry areas. The equipment Johnson brought forward remains highly relevant today. “Mr. Johnson’s inventions and companies helped to revolutionize the aggregate-processing industry – especially portable aggregate-processing equipment,” says Cade Seeley, director of purchasing at Kimball Equipment Co.” For instance, before the Rollercone, bushing-style cones like the Symons had less of a rival. “His was the first that used roller bearings,” Seeley says of Johnson’s Rollercone. “If your cone’s properly maintained, then those roller bearings can last infinitely. The benefit is they last a lot longer than a bushing style. The drawback is the expense of having to fix them.” That several of today’s equipment manufacturers offer a version of Johnson’s crusher is a testament to the effectiveness of his model. “The Cedarapids MVP cones are roller bearing crushers, and so are the JCI Kodiaks,” says Seeley, adding that Kimball Equipment decades ago was the second dealer to represent El-Jay Manufacturing. “Also, Superior’s Dakota is a roller bearing cone crusher.” Johnson’s triple-shaft horizontal screen remains an industry staple, as well. “Superior makes it,” Seeley says. “Trio, which is now Weir, makes it – as does JCI. McLanahan makes one. Every ConExpo, somebody else is making one.”

The Early Years

While Susan Moorhead, the last living child of Louis Johnson, isn’t familiar with the intricacies of the equipment El-Jay Manufacturing produced, she had the unique experience of growing up around the company and seeing her father in action. Now 70, Moorhead says her father and grandfather acquired a gravel pit in Glenwood, Oregon, near Eugene in the late 1930s. The two focused on producing gravel – not machinery, at the time – but Johnson learned how to work on rock crushers from manufacturers like Symons and Telsmith. After World War II broke out, Johnson joined the Navy. His dream of developing a crusher of his own, however, was manifesting. “While he was in the Navy, he started to imagine what design he might be able to come up with,” Moorhead says. Alongside his wife Anne – a Navy veteran herself whom Johnson met during the war – a business was established in Eugene. “Mom worked alongside him,” Moorhead says. “Their apartment was a part of the building. You walked out the apartment door, and there was the office.” Reflecting on the past, Moorhead says she realizes her parents’ business had become a successful one in the 1960s. “It probably was in 1965, says Moorhead, recollecting how El-Jay licensed a company in France to build El-Jay equipment. “My father went over in 1965 and spent about six weeks with them. The following year, our family went over for the summer. He worked with the people in Grenoble, France.” As Moorhead describes, her father was a tireless worker. “He started working young, and he worked hard,” she says. “He only knew hard work. That was just part of the fiber of his being. And so, he worked until he died. He was 91.”

Johnson’s Later Years

After selling El-Jay Manufacturing in the mid-1970s, Johnson took on a few other ventures. Moorhead says he started a company called JLB alongside his son, Bruce. “They built the Ultracone cone crusher,” she says. By 1984, Johnson was on to another venture involving something completely different. “He started what was called Fore-Ward Golf,” says Moorhead, adding that her dad was an avid golfer. “He had come up with an idea of fabricating custom golf clubs. They had a swing machine where the individual’s swing was analyzed. Then, the club was custom fitted to him.” While the concept was cutting-edge, Moorhead says the business did not prove viable. Later in life, Johnson ventured into crushing one final time with a business called Durable Crushers. “My memory is that started in 2004,” Moorhead says. “He called [the crusher] the Duracone. He did get a patent for the Duracone.” In all, Johnson earned more than 50 patents. And he makes clear in his memoir that his success and happiness very much derived from his wife. “He held her in high regard, both as a wife and as a person for her abilities and contributions,” Moorhead says. “He mentioned in his memoir how he so appreciated her willingness to let him do what he wanted to do [and] that she didn’t ever reign him in.”

Neil Hise has been around construction nearly his entire life. Hise, the second-generation owner and longtime president of Cemco, emigrated to the U.S. in 1947. Settling in New Mexico with his family, he was regularly around road construction camps, crusher pits and other jobs. While his father did work building two- and four-lane highways, Hise’s family lived in a 12-ft. trailer in a construction camp on a Navajo reservation. “In 1954, we got a 35-ft. mobile home and were towing it with a dump truck to the next crusher pit,” Hise says. “[There], my sister and I were playing in the stream 100 ft. from a twin Commander roll crusher plant.” Soon thereafter, Hise’s father began to work for an oil company. Eventually, his father got tired of working for someone, and he bought a company of his own: Crusher Service Co. That company ultimately became Cemco. “It was primarily for maintaining roll crushers and building jaw plates,” Hise says. “Back in that period of time, you couldn’t get them, so you’d have to rebuild them.” Hise doesn’t mince words when it comes to roll crushers. As he puts it, he despises them. This feeling came primarily from the fact that he and his father constantly repaired and rebuilt the plates for these crushers, given the hardness of the material in New Mexico. “This rock out here is decomposed granite or terrible hard river granite,” Hise says. “You could spend Friday night to Sunday night working around the clock – and I did that many a weekend because I was in high school at the time – and by the next Friday, they’d be worn out because the rock is so hard and the customer is perturbed. All your hard work is wiped out in a week.” With Hise and his father frustrated, they realized there must be a better way to crush the hard rock. And from that frustration, Hise’s version of the vertical shaft impact (VSI) crusher was born.

Creating A Crusher

At Hise describes, the concept of a VSI crusher already existed at the time. But it didn’t work well due to the quality of the castings. Hise and his father worked with West Coast Alloy – whom they were already working with for welding rods – to make wear cast parts for Cemco. Taking the same material makeup they used on their welding rods, Hise manufactured his first VSI in 1967. Initially, it wasn’t an easy sell. “We [dragged] it all over New Mexico trying to sell it,” Hise says. “It just didn’t sell because it wasn’t simple. It was not a simple thing [you could] turn on, go get your lunchbox and let it crush rock for a long time. With VSIs, you can’t do that. You have to look at them daily or weekly.” Eventually, the first VSI sold to a mine in 1969 – and it is still in service. Cemco’s first VSI export came in the mid-1970s, when the company sold one to an operation in England. Hise took over as president of Cemco in 1981 following health issues that forced his father to step away. Under his leadership, Cemco greatly improved the technology and quality of its VSI crushers. Jennifer Hise-Trujillo, Hise’s daughter and former owner of Cemco prior to the company’s sale to Superior Industries, was present for much of that growth. Along with the VSI, Cemco went on to offer additional equipment for aggregate processing, recycling, precious mineral extraction and clean energy applications. “I’m seriously blessed,” Hise-Trujillo, when asked about the opportunity to work with her father. “[My parents] involved myself and my sister in the family business before we were even walking.”

Preserving A Legacy

Hise stepped down as president of Cemco in March 2022, taking on an advisory role as chairman of the board. Hise-Trujillo took over in his stead. Last October, Superior acquired Cemco and rebranded the company under its name. One thing that won’t change, however, is the “Cemco” name on Superior’s VSI crushers. “That was very important to all of us as a family,” Hise says. “I think it’s important to the industry because of our success. The reason we are successful is the people working at Cemco.” Allowing the Cemco VSI name to live on was equally important to Hise-Trujillo. “It was something we as a family have all been discussing and wanted to make sure things are sustained,” she says. “I wanted to make sure the VSI [name] continued and the Cemco team had a place [at Superior].” Upon hearing her father was selected for induction to the Pit & Quarry Hall of Fame, Hise-Trujillo was ecstatic. “I was thrilled, excited, so proud – all of that combined,” she says. “I am truly excited and thankful for this recognition. It continues my dad’s legacy.”

As Tom Hill puts it, his start in the aggregate industry came totally by chance. Hill, the founder and former president and CEO of Summit Materials, finished his bachelor’s degree in 1978 and was ready to start law school. Ultimately, though, Hill decided that was not the path he wanted to take. Instead, Hill got his MBA at Trinity College Dublin, where he did his third year of undergraduate and completed his degree in 1980. As it turned out, the director of his MBA was also a director at CRH, who presented him with an opportunity in aggregates. “I was hired Jan. 1, 1980 by the U.S. CEO of CRH,” Hill says. I was sent to Ogden, Utah, to CRH’s first acquisition – a company called Amcor, which was a pipe and precast business.” Hill, who spent 28 years with CRH, was named head of the materials division at Oldcastle, CRH’s North American arm, in 1992. From 1992 to 2006, Hill helped to increase sales at Oldcastle from $100 million to $7 billion. A large part of that growth was due to mergers and acquisition. “We built up these contacts with the object of when it was time for business to sell for various reasons, they call us instead of JP Morgan,” Hill says. “That was tremendously successful. Between 1992 and 2006, we did 187 acquisitions. We got pretty good at it.” Hill took over as Oldcastle CEO in 2006. In 2008, after nearly three decades with Oldcastle and with a young family at home, he decided it was time for a new venture.

Starting Summit

Hill founded Summit Materials in 2009, calling upon friends from the industry and former CRH co-workers to make up his management team. One of those co-workers was Damian Murphy, who worked with Hill at CRH from 2006 to 2008. Murphy, who currently serves as CEO of Peckham Industries, joined Summit as regional president and remained with the company until 2018. “Tom always had a vision of where he wanted to go with things,” Murphy says. “Having the ability to reach for the stars is a good skill set to have. Having a mission and enthusiasm [is great], but [Hill] also delivered by getting there. Working closely with him was a great experience for me.” Founding Summit was a blast for Hill, even when weathering the challenges that came with it. “Getting [Summit] started was the most stressful thing I’ve ever done,” Hill says. “But I must say, stepping back and starting over from scratch, I found invigorating. Going back to doing the things I really love … that I hadn’t done in 10, 15 years – calling on companies, looking for things to build a business – was great.” Hill served Summit as president and CEO until 2020. During nearly 12 years there, he transformed the company from a small, private construction company into a public company with annual net revenues of $2 billion.

Staying Involved

Murphy had nothing but praise for Hill as he reflected on the many things his friend accomplished in aggregates. “[Tom] had a stellar career with CRH and then turned around and started selling materials from scratch,” Murphy says. “Throughout that time, he’s been a positive force in the industry. As somebody who has been around for so long, his name is synonymous with the industry.” Murphy says Hill’s induction into the Pit & Quarry Hall of Fame is a testament to the reputation Hill holds. “When you’re in mergers and acquisitions and you do as many transactions as Tom has done, to maintain a positive profile is a testimony to the quality of the man,” Murphy says. “I’m pleased that the industry had a positive view of his contributions.” More than three years removed from Summit, Hill currently serves on an advisory board at Foley Concrete Products, a pipe and precast business based in Georgia, with locations throughout the U.S. Still, Hill doesn’t see his involvement in the industry as over quite yet. “I will get involved in the industry in some manner over the next couple of years,” he says. “My No. 1 focus is family, so I’m not going to do anything like Summit again. But I do want to stay involved in the industry because I love it so much.”