Wilson Sporting Goods Company is an American sports equipment manufacturer based in Chicago, Illinois. Wilson manufactures equipment for a variety of sports, including badminton, baseball, basketball, softball, Canadian football, American football, golf, racquetball, soccer, padel, table tennis, squash, tennis, and volleyball.
The company traces its roots to New York-based meatpacking company Schwarzschild & Sulzberger (later changed to Sulzberger & Son's), which operated meat slaughterhouses.
Sulzberger & Son founded Ashland Manufacturing Company in 1913 to use animal byproducts from slaughterhouses. It started out making tennis racket strings, violin strings, and surgical sutures, but soon expanded into baseball shoes and tennis rackets.
In 1915, Thomas E. Wilson, former president of the Morris & Company meatpacking company, was appointed president by the controlling banks and changed the company's name to Thomas E. Wilson Company. The company acquired Hetzinger Knitting Mills to produce sports uniforms and a caddy bag company that manufactured golf balls but soon expanded to include footballs and basketballs.
In 1918, Wilson left to concentrate on beef packing, changing Sulzberger to Wilson & Co. (which eventually became Iowa Beef Packers and was subsequently acquired by Tyson Foods). The packer continued to have control of the company until 1966, when it was sold to Ling-Temco-Vought.
Under new president LB Icely acquired the Chicago Sporting Goods Company and entered into a contract to supply the Chicago Cubs. He also hired Arch Turner, a leather designer, who designed a leather football.
In 1922, the Ray Schalk catcher's glove was introduced and became the standard. He worked with Knute Rockne to introduce the double-lined leather ball and the first valved football, and the first waisted football pants with inserts.[1] In 1925, it was renamed Wilson-Western Sporting Goods after reaching an agreement with Western Sporting Goods.
After Rockne's death, the company focused on the game of golf, introducing the R-90, a sand wedge golf club inspired by Gene Sarazen's victory in the 1932 British Open.
In 1931, it changed its name to Wilson Sporting Goods Company. During World War II, the Wilson Duke ball was introduced, featuring premium leather, hand-stitched, lock-stitch seams, and triple-lined construction, and was adopted as the official ball of the National Football League.
Horween Leather Company has supplied Wilson with cowhide leather since 1941 for use in the production of footballs and basketballs. Wilson is Horween Leather Company's largest customer.
After the war, Wilson focused on tennis and signed Jack Kramer, who developed a line of tennis rackets under the Jack Kramer brand. Icley died in 1950, but the company continued to grow, and many believed that Icely's introduction of computers to monitor inventory was a huge help. In 1955, he acquired Ohio-Kentucky Manufacturing for its ball business. In 1964, he acquired Wonder Products Company, which made toys and custom molded items. He converted the custom mold section to create protective equipment for football and baseball, such as face masks for football helmets and leg guards for baseball catchers.
In 1967, the company was acquired by Ling-Temco-Vought. Just three years later, PepsiCo became Wilson's new owner. At the time, the company manufactured and commercialized the official balls of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and the National Football League, and also provided most of the team uniforms in Major League Baseball (MLB) and the United States Summer Olympics.
In 1979, Wilson tennis balls were first used in the US Open, and are still used today. In 2006, the Australian Open began using Wilson Tennis Balls.
