Yuba Construction Company

Wendell P. Hammon founded the Yuba Construction Company in 1906, by purchasing the Western Engineering Company and merging it with his own steel from a casting foundry in Marysville. Four large machine shops were built near Oroville to maintain and build the dredgers. Hammon also founded the Yuba Consolidated Gold Fields on the Yuba River in 1904. This company became a large, profitable placer operation, a proving ground for new dredge designs and a training ground for dredge operators and others in this global industry.
As many as 50 dredgers worked in the Feather River/Yuba River drainage at one time. The Yuba Construction Company changed its name to the Yuba Manufacturing Company and later became a subsidiary of the Yuba Consolidated Gold Fields. The Yuba Construction Company was based in Marysville, California across the Yuba River from Yuba City. Its highly-regarded dredges were used in California as well as for gold mining in Alaska.

The company bought the Ball Tread Company in 1914 and began to make tractors.

Later, the company was known as the Yuba Manufacturing Company.

In 1957 these companies merged into Yuba Consolidated Industries. Yuba dredges have been built and shipped from California to worldwide markets during the first half of the 20th century. These "gold boats" were shipped in pieces and assembled where the mining would take place. Locations included the countries of Malaya, the Philippines, Bolivia, Columbia, China, and Russia.