This firm was established in 1904 by Stanley and Edwin R. Motch and George Merryweather. It began as a resller of machine tools. In 1924 they expanded their machine rebuilding operations, and sometime around World War II they began manufacturing new machines. At some point they acquired Avey Drilling Machine Co., for their line of drill presses, which were then manufactured under the name "Avey Division, Motch & Merryweather Machinery Co."

The company became publically traded in 1968, and was then acquired in 1979 by Swiss firm Oerlikon-Buehrle, which renamed Motch & Merryweather to the Oerlikon-Motch Corp. In 1989 Oerlikon sold Motch to German firm Pittler, GmbH., when it became the Motch Corp. In 1997 the Motch Corporation was acquired by Park Corp. of Cleveland. In 2002 it became a division of DeVlieg Bullard II, Inc.

Information Sources

• A page in the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History provides a summary of Motch & Merryweather's history:

  The MOTCH CORP., formerly Oerlikon-Motch, is one of the nation's leading designers and builders of special turning and grinding machines. The firm originated in Cleveland in Sept. 1904 when brothers Stanley and Edwin R. Motch and Geo. Merryweather formed the Motch & Merryweather tool manufacturers.

  Starting with 6 employees at its offices at 711 Lakeside Ave., the company originally represented 5 machine-tool builders in Ohio and eastern Michigan. In 1924, the firm acquired and remodeled a plant on E. 70th St. for machine rebuilding. By World War II, Motch & Merryweather gained an international reputation for quality rebuilt machine tools and the company began manufacturing machine tools.

  In 1948, the company built a plant specifically designed for its rebuilding business on E. 222nd St. in Euclid, and in the next ten years, the firm consolidated all its manufacturing and engineering operations to its Euclid plant. In a postwar period of expansion, Motch & Merryweather acquired machine-tool and cutting-tool companies nationwide, and its distributorship represented over 50 machine-tool builders nationally.

  In 1968, Motch & Merryweather became a publicly owned company. Its record growth brought Motch & Merryweather to the attention of Oerlikon-Buehrle, a Swiss firm which owned some of Europe's most prestigious machine-tool operations. Oerlikon-Buehrle entered the U.S. market in 1979 by acquiring Motch & Merryweather, which continued under local management as a subsidiary, renamed the Oerlikon-Motch Corp. It had 1,500 employees nationwide, including 500 in Cleveland, before phasing out its distributorship division in 1988-89. Late in 1989, Oerlikon sold off Motch to Pittler, GmbH. As an independent subsidiary of this German toolbuilder, the Motch Corp. in 1995 employed 90 at its E. 222nd St. plant. By 2004, the Motch Corp., then a division of DeVlieg Bullard II, Inc., had moved its operations to 1900 Case Parkway in Twinsburg.

• The Smithsonian Institution Libraries' catalog lists catalogs from Motch & Merryweather and related companies.
• The Henry Ford Museum library lists a 1957 catalog from the Avey Division of this firm.
• The Metalworking Insiders Report for 1999-03-24 has an article on management changes at Motch. The article also sketches the then-recent history of the company.
• The Metalworking Insiders Report for 2002-02-18 has an article on the sale of Motch to Devlieg Bullard.
• Machine serial numbers for Avey Drill Presses from 1920 to 1957 may found here