Louis Allis left his father's company, E. P. Allis & Co., just before the merger that created Allis-Chalmers in 1901, and established Mechanical Appliance Co., which immediately began manufacturing dynamos and motors. In 1922 they changed their name to Louis Allis Co. The company seems to have undergone changes in 2002 but it remains in business today.

Allis was an OEM supplier for Oliver Machinery Co.

Information Sources

• The September 1901 issue of Science and Industry has this note.

  We are in receipt of a recent bulletin of the Mechanical Appliance Co., Milwaukee, Wis. This concern is making a specialty of small motors and dynamos, the motors ranging in size from 1/8 to 2 H. P., and the dynamos from 1/10 to 1 1/2 K. W. Although of comparatively recent organization, the marked success with which they have met is a good indication of the quality of their product.

• 1904 Official Directory of Corporations of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, page 113, lists "Mechanical Appliance Company, The. [Incorporated] March 11, 1901. [Capital] $50,000 / Incorporators—Sydney Bean, Thomas Watson, Frank Meyers. President—Louis Allis. Vice-President—Thomas S. Watson. Secretary and Treasurer—F. H. Petrie. Directors—A. W. Myers, T. S. Watson, L. F. Fish, Louis Allis."
• A 1904 edition of Textile World Record lists Mechanical Appliance Co. as a supplier of dynamos and motors.
• The 1915 edition of the ASME's Mechanical Equipment Directory lists Mechanical Appliance Co. as a maker of exhaust and ventilating fans.
• The 1917-12-29 issue of Electrical World lists Mechanical Appliance Co. as a maker of dynamos and motors.
• August 1918 Hand Book of the Electric Power Club, page 10, lists Mechanical Appliance Co., 133 Stewart St., Milwaukee, Wis., with "Executive Representatives" Louis Allis and R. G. Allis, plus "Associate Representatives" E. P. Allis, Gustav Reinhard, and Louis Reinhard. Kellogg and E. P. Allis were in "government service" at the time, presumably related to the war effort. Page 184 has a full-page text ad for the firm. It lists Louis Allis, President; R. G. Kellogg, Vice-President; O. F. Pihl, Jr., Treasurer; E. P. Allis, Secretary. Products manufactured included DC motors and dynamos, AC motors and dynamos, motor generator sets, DC ventilating fans and blowers, and buffing and grinding motors.
• An issue of the Electrical Review and Industrial Engineer for 1922 has this snippet: "The LOUIS ALLIS Co. formerly THE MECHANICAL APPLIANCE COMPANY ESTABLISHED ... Through close co-operation with machine tool designers The Louis Allis Co. engineers have applied and perfected MULTI-SPEED squirrel cage motors. ..."
• 1922 issues of Engineering World, Factory, and Industrial Management had notices of the name change from Mechanical Appliance Co. to Louis Allis Co.
• The company website says that they were founded in 1901, and says that the early motors were all DC motors. It claims that they developed the first AC motoro, in 1909.