The Burke

The Burke Company's roots date back to World War II where Ed Burke ran a successful business selling machine parts to maintain tanks, jeeps, and guns to support the war effort. After the war Mr. Burke applied his experience and traveled across the country establishing distributor relationships with fluid power manufacturers, the first of these dist... ributorships with Hansen and Kepner. With key manufacturers lined up The Burke Company was launched in San Francisco in 1953. Upon his untimely death in 1955, The Burke Company was sold to David Magowan, Jr. who was at the time working for another Hansen distributor in Southern California. Like his predecessor, Mr. Magowan also had experience with World War II, albeit as a B17 bomber pilot. On his third bombing mission over Germany he was shot down and spent two years in a German POW camp. After the war, Mr. Magowan worked for Flying Tigers where he was a pilot and operations officer, flying machine parts from coast to coast. He acquired the Burke Company in 1955, and later moved it to So. San Francisco where it continued to develop strong relationships with it's manufacturers and customers. In 1974, Chuck Donegan moved his family from Ohio and joined the Burke Company as sales manager. Chuck got his start in fluid power with Hansen in 1961 at the young age of 21, after serving four years in the Coast Guard. In 1985 Chuck and Mr. Magowan entered into a partnership agreement, and in 1989 Mr. Magowan sold his share to Chuck and enjoyed his retirement years pursuing his passions, including restoring his sailboat. Today the Burke Company thrives in it's new location in Foster City, California, where it continues to proudly provide it's customers with the same high quality products and service that it has over the last 53 years.Read More