By 1950, the Korean conflict was looming, television was gaining a niche in American homes, and the cement industry was striving to fulfill the growing West’s demand for the new construction.

In the 19 years since Permanente sacked its first cement, plant
capacity had more than doubled. For a company first seen by
the industry as unnecessary, it still wasn’t enough to meet the
country’s voracious appetite for building materials.

The ‘50s were a period of rapid growth for the company, as manufacturing plants and distribution facilities were constructed or acquired throughout the West.

By 1959, Permanente Cement Company had an annual capacity of 2.8 million tons. Two additional cement plants were added: the Olympic plant in Bellingham, Washington and the Cushenbury plant in Southern California. Thirteen distribution plants distributed cement from Guam to Alaska to Southern California. The company’s own line of barges and two steamships, the SS Permanente Silverbow and the SS Permanente Cement, carried bulk cement shipments to ports along the Pacific Coast and in Hawaii. With strategic locations planned often years in advance, Permanente Cement was growing to serve an ever-increasing number of customers.

The key to Permanente’s success, besides its massive supply of limestone and rapidly expanding markets was people.

Kaiser researchers helped pioneer prestressed and post-tentioned concrete, today an essential part of build construction. Among other successes, they developed a full line of oil well cements and worked towards precise chemical controls. Whenever a challenge presented itself, Kaiser’s engineers and researchers went looking for a solution.