New Departure Division of General Motors in World War Two / WWII
Bristol, CT
1889- 1965
Rest in Peace

New Departure Bearings was started in 1889, making it the oldest division in General Motors when it was purchased by GM in 1916. During WWII New Departure manufactured bearings for the war effort.  In 1965 it was combined with the Hyatt Bearing Division of GM and became the New Departure-Hyatt Bearing Division located in a new plant in Sandusky, OH.


New Departure was one of seventeen GM Divisions that was involved and supplied parts for the Boeing B-29 Superfortress during the Second World War. The B-29 was the most expensive of the wartime projects taken on by the US, and combined with the second most expensive Manhattan Project, ended the war with the dropping of the atomic bombs.  At a minimum New Departure supplied roller bearings for the sophisticated remote control gun control system and the Norden bombsight.

New Departure Division World War Two / WWII Production Numbers / Statistics:  New Departure continued to make the same product line during the Second World War as it did previously which was roller bearings.  Available data shows that in 1942 it made 67,376,111 bearings and in 1943 it made 85,321,043 bearings for the war effort.  Estimating that it made another 85 million in 1944 and then 50 million in 1945 as the war contracts were cancelled in August of 1945 New Departure probably made on the order of 287 million bearings for thousands of different uses in World War Two.  More can be learned about those military applications and its very interesting early history by reading the 1943 pamphlet below.

Bearing are ubiquitous.  They are used everywhere but we don't really think about them as they are invisible in rotating and oscillating a machinery.

New Departure Division, Plant A, Bristol, CT won the Army-Navy "E" award four times.
New Departure Division, Plant D, Meriden, CT won the Army-Navy "E" award four times.

The Norden bombsight used by the US four engine bombers of WWII to include the B-17, B-24, B-29 and B-32 along with the twin engine types.  As seen at the Carolinas Aviation Museum in Charlotte, NC.

New Departure supplied 29 bearings for the 72,000 Norden M-9 bombsights manufactured during the Second World War.

The Boeing B-29 Superfortress was the first aircraft to use remote sighting for the defensive guns.  For each remote gun system on the B-29 New Departure supplied 1,417 bearings.

This is what the remote gunner's position looks like looking into the gunner's bubble of a B-29 at the Pueblo Weisbrod Aircraft Museum in Pueblo, CO.  Unfortunately glare for the overhead lighting on the Plexiglas blocks some of the view.

This torpedo had nine New Departure bearings in it.

"New Departure Keeps 'Em Rolling, Flying, Fighting"
"Victory is our Business"

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All of us when we learned how to ride a bicycle no doubt used one that had a coaster brake on it, invented by New Departure.  In 1908 the company was making Taxi Cabs which were painted yellow, beginning the American tradition of yellow taxis.  In my professional life I had employees using Rockwell Hardness Testers but was unaware the device used by all metallurgical labs was invented by New Departure.  By the time World War Two arrived the company only made roller bearings.

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Pictured above are more equipment used by the US military in WWII that used ND roller bearings.  From the upper left there is

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