Tex-Tech Industries in North Monmouth is renowned for tennis ball felt; it’s the largest producer in the world, and the largest employer in this tiny town.

The 105-year-old company makes that famous felt as well as materials that absorb sound and block fire. Lesser known, for the last few years, is the Tex-Tech special material that’s gone in the collars of tactical vests worn by soldiers in Iraq.

“You always debate what you want to do, and you want to do something that has some meaning to it,” said Stan Farrell, a new product development engineer.

This project had meaning. It’s not uncommon for Farrell’s Army rep to end talks with, “‘Remember why we’re doing this.’ It keeps it in perspective,” he said.

With more than $1.2 million in Department of Defense contracts in recent years, Tex-Tech is working on material to outfit the whole vest someday.

While soldiers have been the prominent face of what’s happening overseas, behind the scenes, from shirt collars to missile destroyers, Maine has been part of the Iraq War from the start.

The first U.S. Navy ship to fire Tomahawk missiles into Iraq was built in Bath.

One Saco company has been the exclusive supplier of an Army machine gun that shoots up to 350 tennis ball-sized grenades a minute.

“We’re very pleased … to contribute to saving lives for our troops in the field. We’re very honored the Army has selected us to work with them,” said Prof. Habib Dagher at the University of Maine’s Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center.

The center has developed ballistic tent inserts with a wood core that help protect soldiers under mortar attack. Up next at the center, with potential military applications:

An inflatable “bridge in a backpack” – rigid and ready in one hour.

Maine ranks 8th in the nation in defense spending per capita, outranking places like Massachusetts, New York and California, according to the Center for Defense Information, no doubt buoyed by Bath Iron Works and a small population.

Maine has military and manufacturing history that also go toward explaining all the activity, State Economist Catherine Reilly said.

Once considered a strategic location – tucked up in the Northeast, the closest state to Europe – Maine’s military bases in Limestone, Cutler, Bangor and an outpost in Winter Harbor have been closed over the last 50 years. Brunswick Naval Air Station is next.

As that’s happened, Maine’s congressional delegation has worked hard to make sure something goes in those gaps, Reilly said. “Loring is a perfect example of that.”

In addition, the U.S. military has policies of buying goods made largely in-country.

“Since Maine, historically, was a manufacturing state and had more manufacturing relative to other states, it would make sense a lot of that would end up here,” Reilly said.

“Defense money tends to go to established places and we’ve been doing defense contracts in Maine for a long time,” echoed Charlie Colgan, a University of Southern Maine professor and former state economist.

“There’s a reason that we’ve always had someone on the (congressional) Armed Services Committee.”

By land, by air, by sea

In the late 1990s, the former Saco Defense mothballed production lines for MK-19 grenade machine guns and M-2 50-caliber machine guns. The military said it had plenty.

Today it makes 10 a day of both, according to Gary LaPerriere, director of operations for General Dynamics Armament and Technical Products, which bought Saco Defense.

“All the aircraft you see out there overseas and domestically, whether it be an F-18 or F-15 or F-16 is carrying one of the Gatling guns that is also manufactured and produced right here in Saco as well,” said LaPerriere. Thousands of guns made in Saco are “over in theater right now.”

The MK-19 is exclusive to his plant, but it’s the popular M-2 that’s nearly doubled employment.

“We have literally worked here 24/7 for the last three years to support our troops overseas,” he said.

Sixty-nine of his machinists spent a week at Central Maine Community College this summer for training. Another batch is due for training in January.

At the former Loring Air Force Base, Maine Military Authority has rebuilt thousands of Humvees for National Guard troops. General Manager Gary Cleaves, who lives in Winthrop, said if a paint job calls for tan, it’s a sign that Humvee might be bound for Iraq. If it calls for tri-color green, it’s maybe Afghanistan.

Up at UMaine, Dagher’s working on two types of ballistic tent panels, one very light, one very inexpensive. The Army seems to lean inexpensive, for now, he said.

The center’s also working with a Boothbay Harbor yacht company on the next-generation boat for Navy SEALs. At high speeds, waves smack into the current boat so hard it’s causing severe spinal injuries, Dagher said. The new design has a shock-absorbing composite hull.

“Think of … jogging with an aluminum-sole shoe versus a Nike shoe that has an air core,” he said. “That’s essentially the difference with the boat.”

SEALs will take possession this winter; don’t look for the “bridge in a backpack” until 2009.

Down in North Berwick, Pratt & Whitney makes stators, seals and ducts for military cargo planes and jet fighters, parts that “aren’t terribly sexy but the engine won’t work without it,” said Steve Lowry, communications manager for military engines at the Connecticut headquarters.

Don’t know, can’t say or read between the lines

In 2002, local developer George Schott bought several hundred surplus Humvees from the U.S. Marine Corps. He’s sold some and leased others out for commercials. Last year, he sold six back to the military for $277,128, “the best of the best,” ones he had planned to keep.

The transaction was so covert he wasn’t told which branch the Humvees went to; Schott suspects they were for training here or the war.

Bushmaster Firearms in Windham has received $2.3 million in Department of Defense weapon contracts the last three years. A company spokeswoman said, “We cannot confirm where our firearms go.”

However, the company’s Web site seems an invitation to read between the lines. Messages include: “Helping defend freedom is a business we take seriously” and “The U.S. military and coalition forces rely on the quality, accuracy, and reliability of Bushmaster.”

Last November, L.L.Bean sold the DOD $31,687 worth of L.L.Bean Comfort Mocs – about 1,300 pair – for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. A spokeswoman couldn’t verify where in the world they went.

Dixie Stedman at BIW said the shipyard isn’t involved in research and development with immediate implications for Iraq or Afghanistan. She directed questions as to which Bath-built ships have been involved in the conflict to the U.S. Navy, which didn’t return an inquiry.

According to Navy News Service, the USS Howard – launched at BIW in 1999 – left the North Persian Gulf in March after a stint guarding Iraqi oil terminals. The USS Donald Cook, launched in Bath in 1997, fired the first Tomahawk cruise missiles at Iraq in the opening hours of the war.

Another Bath boat, the USS Decatur, stopped a ship in the Persian Gulf smuggling 3,700 pounds of hashish. Three smugglers had ties to al-Qaida.

Frustration, pride

Gil Reed is anticipating a call in the next three weeks for an order of 131 fuel trailers bound for Afghanistan.

Reed is president of Nichols Custom Welding in Wilton. The company has sent 283 fuel trailers, so far, to Iraq and 20 to Afghanistan, part of a $13 million Army contract that called for up to 1,000. He believes they get parked and security forces pull up to refill off the 500-gallon tank.

That contract expires in March. Reed’s going after another to supply off-road trailers; a sample is ready to go to Kuwait.

“It’s a very frustrating (experience) working with the government,” Reed said. It took 300-plus hours to pull together paperwork for that original bid. Nichols also had to borrow $2.5 million for 90 days to cover supplies, before that contract started to pay.

“We’ve almost gone broke,” he said.

Reed believes it’s been worth it; at peak, the company employed 85. Twenty work there now. He’s tried to buy everything he could from Maine suppliers, down to hiring a local company to translate 85-page operator manuals into Arabic and Dari.

As people have discovered where his trailers are bound, Reed said he’s gotten complaints that the company’s helping kill people, helping the war.

“It helps the economy. Somebody’s going to get (these contracts,) it might as well be Maine,” Reed said. “I’m trying to keep people alive in Maine.”

His son is part of a Black Hawk air ambulance crew out of Bangor headed back to Iraq for another tour next year.

“Yeah, we’re supporting the war,” Reed said, “and proud of it.”

Copy the Story Link