Everest and Jennings

Everest & Jennings was a manufacturer of mobility and adaptive equipment. Everest & Jennings was the first company to mass-produce wheelchairs.^[1][2]

Everest & Jennings

Industry	Mobility equipment
Founded	1930s
Headquarters	St. Louis, Missouri

Everest & Jennings logo on the back of a wheelchair.

Origins

Herbert A. Everest and Harry C. Jennings Sr. were friends, and both were engineers. Herbert Everest was also physically disabled after surviving a mining accident in 1918. Everest complained to Jennings about the bulk of chairs available in the early 1930s, and in 1933, the pair designed and built a lightweight, collapsible model in Jennings' garage.^[3][1] The design was patented in October 1937.^[4]

The pair soon went into business to manufacture their improved design. In the 1940s, they supplied disabled veterans of World War II through government contracts that established the company as a recognized name in rehabilitation equipment.^[5][6][7]

The Everest family sold its interest in the company in 1943,^[8] but Gerald Jennings, son of Harry Sr., was chief executive from 1952 until he retired in 1985.^[9][10]

In 1956, the company was "the first to manufacture the electric wheelchair on a mass scale".^[1]

Success and legal troubles

Photograph of First Lady Betty Ford Signing the Cast of a Television Crew Member, Following the Taping of the 1976... - NARA - 186827; the wheelchair's Everest & Jennings logo is visible under the armrest

By the early 1970s, Everest & Jennings International was "the world's largest supplier of wheelchairs."^[11] But this status brought increased scrutiny.^[12] In 1977, the United States Justice Department formally accused Everest & Jennings of practices that violated antitrust laws. The resulting settlement required Everest & Jennings to make annual compliance reports to the Justice Department; the settlement was called "little more than a slap on the wrist" by consumer advocate Ralph Nader.^[13] Nader was also involved with protests about the quality, safety, and price of Everest & Jennings chairs, by a disability rights group.^[14] A class action suit was brought by equipment dealers, but dismissed in court in 1984.^[15]

Everest & Jennings recorded sales of $145 million in 1980, and profits near $8 million.^[3] In the 1980s they launched "Avenues," an adaptive clothing line for wheelchair users.^[16] They also diversified into hospital beds, but it suffered major losses.^[2] Changes within the company and in the business landscape during the 1980s left Everest & Jennings struggling at decade's end.^[17]

Later developments

In 1992, facing financial difficulties from lost market share,^[18] Everest & Jennings moved from Camarillo, California to St. Louis, Missouri.^[19] In 1993, the company acquired Medical Composite Technology, a carbon fiber technology company.^[20]

In 1996, still struggling with debt and falling sales, Everest & Jennings announced the sale of the company to Graham-Field Health Products.^[21] Graham-Field soon closed the Everest & Jennings plant in Earth City, Missouri.^[22] Graham-Field continues to market wheelchairs under the Everest & Jennings name.^[23]

Notable customers

Among the prominent early users of Everest & Jennings wheelchairs were Franklin Delano Roosevelt,^[2] Sergeant Alvin C. York and Winston Churchill.^[24] Ed Roberts and other members of the Rolling Quads used Everest & Jennings power chairs.^[25] Author Joni Eareckson Tada once wrote, "If they ever made a statue of me, I would want my 300-pound Everest & Jennings power chair front and center."^[26] Actor Christopher Reeve's first wheelchair after becoming quadriplegic in 1995 was made by Everest & Jennings.^[27]