Our History
Today Matt Machine & Mfg, Inc. is a successful manufacturing business with approximately twenty-five employees and a sterling reputation in the machining industry. The company was started by our founder, Rudy Jezek, who grew up around machinery. Both his father and his uncle had businesses involving tools and machinery. He worked with both of them as a young teenager in the late 1940’s. His experiences and natural talents set the course for creating Matt Machine as it is today.
After four years in the Navy as an anti-submarine radar air crewman on carriers, he entered Drexel to study mechanical engineering. In his last year at Drexel he started working at Philco Corp. in Philadelphia where he had the opportunity to design test equipment for the Sidewinder missile. During this same time he created a small machine shop in an old stable near his home. When he moved his family to a small ranch house in the suburbs, a mandatory full basement was a must for his machine shop. Five years later the family moved to Pittsburgh where he had taken a position with Union Switch & Signal, his drill presses and lathes moved with them. Their new house had a large two-car garage to accommodate the ever increasing tools and machinery.
Sometime around 1980 his youngest son, Matthew, had also fallen in love with machinery. Matt loved everything about it and between the two a business was started. More than just selling small auto parts, it was the keen desire to understand how machines worked and the infinite possibilities and capabilities of their output. In 1982 Rudy and Matt found space to rent in an old Westinghouse rolling mill in Turtle Creek, PA. Rudy left his position as Manager of Manufacturing Engineering at The Switch to devote full time to creating Jezek & Sons. His son, Michael, who had a full time job, worked with them when he could, and the three of them worked long hours on their small business. His son, John, who also had a full time job, devoted time when he could. Rudy’s wife, Joan handled their small office; truly a family business. Creating a viable working space in a huge old factory was a feat in itself. But they did and pushed on.
Matt was killed by a drunk driver in 1985 when he was just nineteen years old, it was devastating and a struggle to continue, the family renamed the business Matt Machine in his honor. A 6000 square foot factory in Plum Borough was purchased in 1988, and renovation began. Adding additional space three times through the years, to create the current 18,200 square foot facility, while continually improving and streamlining the operations.
