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Koss Construction
Company was founded in 1912 and incorporated in 1914. The
corporate headquarters was located in Des Moines, Iowa until 1998.
In October of that year, Koss relocated its office to 5830 SW Drury Lane in Topeka, Kansas. |
The company started from rather meager beginnings, from 1912 to 1921, Koss built bridges, culverts, dams, sewers, retaining and flood walls, railroads, substations, power plants, ice houses, trolley lines, dredging, stables, and an extension on the Iowa State Capitol Building, office buildings, and even a house or two.
Koss Construction was quite heavy in the structure field from the beginning until 1946. During that time, Koss built large structures in 11 states and many of them were major river crossings. The largest of these was the Fort Snelling-Mendota Bridge south of Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota that was built in 1926. This bridge had 13 reinforced concrete open spandrel ribbed arches that were each 304 feet long. The total length of the bridge was over 4,100 feet and was 200 feet high with a 120-foot distance to the river.
Koss started in the concrete paving field in 1921. They paved on US Highway 30 in Clinton County, Iowa during that year. In 1927, the company ventured to Peru, South America. The project was a toll road from Port of Callao to the capital city of Lima and took two years to complete. This was the only time that work was ever done outside the limits of our 48 contiguous states.
During the 1940's, during World War II, the company paved three airports in Oklahoma, and since then twelve more in the states of Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma.
Since the beginning of the paving operations, Koss has paved more than 70 million square yards of concrete pavement. This equates to a road from New York City to San Francisco, California and back to Brownsville, Texas.
In fact, a replica of one of the company's pavers, built in the 1930's, is located in the Smithsonian Institute.
We have a strong tradition of being a leader in our industry. It is a tradition that we are very proud of.
PICTURES FROM PAVING PROJECT JUST EAST OF DEWITT, IOWA ON HIGHWAY 30, (CIRCA 1921)
Click on picture below to enlarge
