The company was founded in November 1916, by William T. Casey, Otto J. Hoak and Robert Boogs, on a site on the Willamette River just south of the Ross Island Bridge. Little is known about the company's early years, but it appears to have served diverse markets. For example, it placed a bid for the manufacture of 200 fire hydrants for the City of Portland in 1927, and supplied the high pressure outlet gates for the Unity Dam on the Burnt River near Baker, Oregon in 1937. The company is recorded as having built only one ship prior to World War II - a small 140-ton tender for the US Coast Guard in 1935.