About BAC

< History

Baltimore Aircoil Company was founded in 1938 by John Engalitcheff, jr., an award-winning pioneer in cooling system technology who recognized the promising future of the emerging air-conditioning and refrigeration industries. Beginning from a small site in Baltimore, Maryland, where the company manufactured evaporative condenser coils, B.A.C. grew steadily in the U.S. until World War II. Closing the company to enlist in the U.S. Navy, Mr. Engalitcheff re-opened B.A.C. after his discharge. Building on the success of its centrifugal-fan evaporative condensers, B.A.C. added cooling towers to its line in the 1950s and industrial fluid coolers in the 1960s. In 1963 a Canadian manufacturing plant was added, and in 1966 another was completed in Madera, California. B.A.C.’s international operations were also expanded in the 1960s, going from export sales to the opening in 1968 of a fully-equipped manufacturing plant in Belgium. This plant provided a solid base for selling B.A.C. evaporative cooling products to the European and Middle Eastern markets.

Since commencing manufacture of BAC products in 1968 the Belgian plant has been significantly expanded and is equipped with state of the art manufacturing machinery to ensure efficient and high quality production.


Each year approximately 3,000 units leave the BAC European manufacturing plants which employ some 500 people.
In 1970 Baltimore Aircoil became part of Merck & Company, Inc. Rapid growth followed with expansion of the product line and the opening of additional plants in Australia, the United States, Europe, Brazil and Japan.
A change in corporate affiliation occurred in 1985 when BAC was acquired from Merck by AMSTED Industries. Based in Chicago, Illinois, AMSTED is a diversified manufacturer of industrial products for construction and building, railroads, and general industry.
Today, John Engalitcheff’s innovative spirit is perpetuated by more than two thousand people who design, produce and market the world’s most extensive line of factory-assembled and field-erected cooling towers, evaporative condensers, closed-circuit fluid coolers and thermal storage systems for installations ranging in size from small commercial buildings to district energy plants, to full-size utility power generating stations.