Caterpillar Inc. celebrates 100 years with traveling exhibit and $54,000 donation

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Trailers and tents sprinkled throughout the Caterpillar Lafayette Engine Center in Indiana offered its workers a break from the summer heat alongside a celebratory lunch — while offering a glimpse of the company's past and future.

Caterpillar Inc., an iconic Fortune 500 company with a storied history in the construction industry, celebrated its official centennial anniversary on April 15, but in a celebration spanning the entire year, Caterpillar spokesperson Lisa Miller said the company developed four trailers to be deployed to Caterpillar facilities around the world as an interactive exhibit for employees. One of those traveling exhibits made a stop to the Lafayette facility last week.

Miller said that in brainstorming before the company's 100th birthday, Caterpillar wanted to find a way to showcase its history to employees.

"A lot of the time when you work in a facility like this, you know what your facility does and you see your singular part within this big company," Miller said. "But this allows our employees to see the impact they're making on the company, and the company's impact it's making on the world."

As part of each tour stop, Miller said Caterpillar is making a donation to an area nonprofit within each community. A $54,000 donation to Food Finders Food Bank was made in honor of Tuesday's stop in Lafayette.

Caterpillar Inc., founded in 1925 through the merger of the Holt Manufacturing Co. and the C.L. Best Tractor Co., first came to Lafayette in 1982, Senior Vice President Bart Myers said. The Lafayette plant currently assembles diesel and natural gas engines, Miller said, producing specifically the 3500, 3600 and the C175 engine models.

Myers said he joined the Lafayette Caterpillar facility in 1992 after graduating from Purdue University with a degree in mechanical engineering. Moving up and around in the company through various roles, Myers said he was able to return to the Lafayette plant in 2024.

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Celebrating the centennial anniversary at the Lafayette plant, given the city's current bicentennial celebration, is exciting, Myers said, knowing the company's continued growth has been supported by the city.

"For the local employees, it's a chance for us to reflect on 100 years of history," Myers said. "At Caterpillar, one of our goals is to build a better, more sustainable world. As our employees go through this traveling showcase, they get to see how our products are used today, how they were used tomorrow, and how we'll do that in the next 100 years."

But for some employees like Stephen Bloch, a senior systems analyst for Caterpillar, seeing much of the history within the exhibit is like taking a walk down Memory Lane.

Bloch's 57-year history with the company predates the Lafayette facility. When the Peoria, Illinois, plant announced in the late 1970s that a new facility would be built in Lafayette, Bloch said the company was looking for voluntary transfers to the Hoosier state.

At the time, Bloch said he had a young family, and he'd never heard of "Lafayette," but he and his wife knew they wanted to raise their family in a smaller city.

Standing in the parking lot of the Lafayette plant, Bloch pointed across the street, remembering the early days of when a horse farm stood where Target and Dutch Bros now do, or when Creasy Lane was a dirt road.

Does he regret the choice to come to Lafayette back then? Absolutely not.

"It's been a really good career. This job has taken me around the world, and I don't think I would have had those opportunities anywhere else," Bloch said. "I've helped support our facilities in Texas, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi ... I've got friends all over the world, and I owe that to Caterpillar."

He's old enough to retire if he wanted to, Bloch said. But he simply loves what he does, and he loves working for Caterpillar.

The loyalty to Caterpillar stems from when he was a young college student, Bloch said, recalling working nights at the Peoria plant so he could attend Bradley University during the day.

That schedule worked fine for Bloch until he got word that he was being bumped up to work the day shift. For most people, that would be great news, but Bloch said that for him, it was the opposite.

"So, I go and talk to my supervisor, who arranged for me to have a discussion with somebody else who I'd never met. I laid out my sob story, and he looks me in the face and says, 'I'm sorry, but I can't do anything. It's a union shop, and I have to follow the rules,'" Bloch recalled with emotion in his voice, taking a moment to gather himself.

"That night, I got a phone call that there is an opening in the second shift, asking if I would be interested. Somebody had to do something to make that happen behind the scenes," he said. "It's the culture of Caterpillar that allows for these things to happen."

Walking through the trailer retrofitted with collages of current employees, pieces of American history are intertwined with Caterpillar's legacy, and what the future could look like within Caterpillar facilities.

Bloch said he knows he won't be around for the company's next 100 years. But he's confident that Caterpillar is on the cutting edge of technology to help create a more sustainable world.

Jillian Ellison is a reporter for the Journal & Courier. She can be reached via email at jellison@gannett.com.