CATERPILLAR CHRONICLE tells the whole Caterpillar story--from 1870 to the present. More than 200 color and 50 black-and-white phtographs reveal these heavy-metal monsters in their true grandeur, from prototype testing to on the job service.

This colorful Caterpillar chronicle is loaded with modern photography and rare images from the company's previously inaccessible archives. The all-inclusive retrospective is a visual and informational feast, beginning with the tractors built under the Best and Holt names and continuing on to today's giant earthmovers. 250 illustrations, 200 in color.

For this book, Frank Raczon dug up the dirt and constructed the only modern history of the world's heaviest machinery. So many things differentiate the Caterpillar brand from its competitors that it can be difficult to know where to begin. From its trademark Caterpillar Yellow to its tradition of making the most rock-solid products on earth, everything about the Caterpillar name is synonymous with the world's toughest machines. In fact, the company's success has led to it being used by economists as a bellwether for the state of the economy as a whole. In Caterpillar: Modern Earthmoving Marvels, author Frank Raczon details the largest and most modern earth-moving machines today, with down-to-earth explanations of how and why they work the way they do as well as interviews and quotes from Caterpillar's engineers and operators themselves. Featuring rare historical photography and insight from noted industrial historian Keith Haddock, this book offers a glimpse of how the Caterpillar's meteoric rise from an under-the-radar producer of agrarian and industrial equipment led to its modern status as an international corporate superstar. Filled with excavators, backhoe loaders, motor-graders, off-highway trucks and more, this book is sure to capture the imagination of anyone who has ever passed a construction site and wondered just how the machines work the way they do and what they're truly capable of.

9x12, 172 color & 63 B&W photos, 37 color and 28 B&W illustrations, index, bibliography

Provides a behind-the-scenes look at Caterpillar's rise to global dominance in the construction equipment manufacturing industry, revealing the series of risky business decisions made by the company's management that launched its success.