Mueller Co. which moved to Chattanooga from Decatur, Illinois in 2010, is the largest supplier of potable water distribution products in North America.

However, a production plant was opened in Los Angeles in 1933 in order to handle distribution for the company's still-growing market in the western United States.

[3] Mueller Co. also acquired Columbia Iron Works, a Chattanooga, Tennessee-based manufacturer of hydrants and gate valves in 1933.

[3] It reopened as a Mueller Co.-owned munitions plant during World War II, manufacturing 37mm and 57mm shells and large naval ordinance.

[3] During this time, Mueller developed an armor-piercing shell that was used in North Africa to defeat the Axis forces led by Erwin Rommel.

[3] The central Decatur campus went through a major modernization beginning in 1961, bringing most of the facility's operations under a single roof.

[3] Mueller opened a plant in Clinton, South Carolina to manufacture butterfly valves in 1980, but ceased operation in 1996 after the acquisition of Henry Pratt Company.

[3][6] In 1965, Mueller Co. bought the Los Angeles-based Adams Clamp Company and moved its production operations first to Decatur, Illinois, and later to its current location in Cleveland, Tennessee.

[27] The decision to consolidate Mueller's R&D activities in Chattanooga was intended to improve communications between researchers and manufacturers within the company.

Today, as many as 95 valves based on Mueller's original design are still used to protect the canal's system of locks.

[31] The largest installation of the system to date is by West Virginia American Water, which covers several towns stretching 10 miles down the Kanawha Valley River.

[36] Mueller Co. has also been a member of the Lost Foam Casting Consortium at the University of Alabama Birmingham, which is involved in improvements to the technology and growth in markets for the process.