in 1901. When the pipe organ division was closed down in 1942, some 7,326 models had been built. Kimball was involved in making player pianos, the first effort being an automatic mechanism in 1901. As well, from 1915 to 1925, Kimball produced a popular line of phonographs. During World War II, Kimball produced aircraft parts for major military airplane manufacturers such as Boeing, Douglas and Lockheed. After the war, piano production resumed but a series of poor financial decisions by W.W. Kimball Jr led the company into decline. In the mid-1950s, Kimball built a luxurious new factory in the Chicago suburb of Melrose Park, Illinois, but the factory's high costs, its poor performance, and flagging sales brought the company into grave financial crisis. Kimball had slipped from being the world's largest piano maker to the seventh largest, and it was nearly insolvent. In 1959, the W.W. Kimball Company was purchased from the last remaining Kimball family heir by Mr. Arnold F. Habig, becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of The Jasper Corporation which began operations in 1950 and founded by Mr. Arnold F. Habig. The combined company was later renamed Kimball International. Piano production was relocated to the small, southern Indiana town of West Baden, Indiana, where the company was rejuvenated and once again began to grow. Ten years after the purchase, Kimball was once again the world's largest piano company. Jasper Corporation to Kimball International The Jasper Corporation was founded in 1950 in Jasper, Indiana, by Mr. Arnold Habig to make television cabinets, cabinets, and furniture. Jasper Corporation prospered from expanding television sales and from its investment in vertical integration, giving the company self-sufficiency. In 1959, Jasper, Inc., purchased the W. W. Kimball Company as a wholly owned subsidiary. Jasper moved its Kimball piano manufacturing to West Baden Springs in 1961; some northeast of the town of Jasper. The first Indiana-made pianos were plagued with quality problems, but the issues were addressed and the pianos improved. In 1966, Jasper bought the prestigious Austrian piano maker Bösendorfer. By 1969, Kimball had returned to its former position as the world's largest piano maker. The subsidiary made some 100,000 pianos and organs annually during its peak years in the 1960s and 1970s. An average day saw 250 pianos and 150 electronic organs shipped from the factory. Grand pianos from Kimball in Indiana ranged from compact models to larger models. In Vienna, the Bösendorfer