1931: Arthur Collins opens Collins Radio Company in the basement of his home with one employee

1933: Incorporation as Collins Radio Company (September 25) under the laws of Delaware; the Company moves to a sub-floor in the Metropolitan Building at 2920 First Avenue, Cedar Rapids, telephone 2-0016,
(Collins Signal, February 1933)

1934: The Byrd Antarctic Expedition II sails with complete Collins short wave broadcasting station aboard,
(Collins Signal, January 1934)

1935: The factory portion of Collins moves to 7th and First Avenue, Cedar Rapids

1936: The Radio Corporation of American (RCA) accuses Collins Radio of patent infringement in the use of oscillator tubes in Collins transmitters, (Cedar Rapids Gazette article, 12 December 1965)

1937: The factory moves back to 2920 First Avenue, Cedar Rapids

1938: Patent licenses were secured from RCA and AT&T on favorable terms,
(Company speech given by Art Collins to the Underwriters' Representatives, 1 November 1944)

1940: The first section of what is now called Main Plant was built at 855 - 35th Street, Cedar Rapids,
(Collins Column, May 1946, Issue XXXVIII)

~1942: Collins Employees Credit Union established

Note: Until 1942, no women had been employed in the factory, (Collins Column, May 1946, Issue XXXVIII)

1943: Factory employees accept the American Federation of Labor as their bargaining unit

1946: Collins built and began production in a site at Burbank, California,
("The Collins Story" by Arlo C. Goodyear, 14 October 1954)

1950: Collins built a production site in Dallas, Texas, ("The Collins Story" by Arlo C. Goodyear, 14 October 1954)

1953: Collins built the C Avenue complex "in the shadow of the WMT-TV tower",
("The Collins Story" by Arlo C. Goodyear, 14 October 1954).
The building cost $2 million on 52 acres of land,
("Collins and the Electronic Beanstalk" article by Nancy Gibbons Zook, 1956)

1955: Acquired Communications Accessories Company in Kansas City, Missouri,
("Collins and the Electronic Beanstalk" article by Nancy Gibbons Zook, 1956)

1961: Collins' Western Division moves from Burbank to Newport Beach, California,
("Collins History is Record of 'Firsts'", Orange County Industrial News, 1961)

Note: Collins Radio had one of the wildest swinging stocks; in 1958 it sold under 11, in 1960 it was 72; in 1964 it was back to 15; and in 1968 it sold over 100, ("Who Needs A Degree" Forbes, January 1968)

1969: Electronic Data System (EDS), at the time a small Texas company headed by Ross Perot, tendered an offer to buy 51% of Collins in an attempt to take over Collins Radio; by May, EDS withdraws its offer; discussions with Honeywell emerged, which later collapsed

1971: Collins Radio Company merges with Rockwell International Corp.; Art Collins is named President & Board Chairman

1972: Robert C. Wilson named President & Chief Executive Officer of Collins Radio Company; Art Collins leaves Collins Radio to form Arthur A. Collins Consulting, Inc.

1982: Art Collins receives the Pioneer Award from the Aerospace & Electronics Systems Society of the IEEE

1996: Consolidation of Collins Commercial Avionics (CCA), Collins Avionics and Communications Division (CACD), and the Dallas, Texas-based Communication Systems Division (CSD) into one organization,
(January 1997 Millennium article)

1997: Collins buys Hughes-Avicom and enters the in-flight entertainment market

1998: Collins sells Railroad Electronics to WABCO, (August 1998 press release)

1999-2000: Company-wide integration of SAP, (April 1998 Millennium article)

2000: Collins buys Kaiser Aerospace and Electronics, (October 2000 press release)

2001: Rockwell International Corp. spins-off Rockwell Collins, Inc. as independent, public traded, company

Early 30's: Provided the first radios to police departments across the country

1934: First airborne radio on the Goodyear airship "Enterprise"

1934: The Byrd Antarctic Expedition II sails with complete Collins short wave broadcasting station aboard (Collins Signal, January 1934)

1938: The Autotune® is invented allowing mechanical band switching and tuning of radios in aircraft and ground installations; the ART 13 transmitter, which incorporated the Autotune®, became standard equipment on all military airplanes during WWII

1940s: Collins pioneered Linear Tuned Circuits, providing operators at remote stations with a choice of thousands of frequencies, ("Collins and the Electronic Beanstalk" article by Nancy Gibbons Zook, 1956)

1945: Collins built and installed the world's first commercially built cyclotron, also known as an "atom smasher" at Brookhaven, Long Island, ("The Collins Story" by Arlo C. Goodyear, 14 October 1954)

1949: First to observe lunar eclipse by use of radio astronomy,
("Collins History is Record of 'Firsts'", Orange County Industrial News, 1961)

1952: In cooperation with the National Bureau of Standards, sent the first long distance message using the moon as a reflector, ("Collins and the Electronic Beanstalk" article by Nancy Gibbons Zook, 1956)

1950s?: Developed the 50-foot Big Dish antenna at the Naval Research Laboratory, the world's first parabolic reflector which enabled astronomers to hear into outer space,
("Collins and the Electronic Beanstalk" article by Nancy Gibbons Zook, 1956)

1956: With Art at the dials, a U.S. military plane flying atop the North Pole made radio contact with another U.S. craft hovering over the South Pole, (Time, 24 September 1956)

1959: The first to develop an inflatable reflector antenna which could survive the outside environment without the protection of an external radome, ("The First Fifty Years" by Ken C. Braband, 1983)

1960: The first photograph transmitted via satellite was a picture of President Eisenhower, sent from Cedar Rapids to Richardson, ("The First Fifty Years" by Ken C. Braband, 1983)

Note: by 1961 Collins owned 623 U.S. patents

1960s: Collins supplied the communications systems used by America's first astronauts in the Mercury Space Capsule Freedom-7 and Liberty Bell-7
Collins supplied the communications systems on the first manned Apollo spacecraft. [Note: Art was invited to appear with Walter Cronkite during CBS' coverage of the first Apollo moon landing in 1972, but Art declined, and let the glamour go elsewhere, (Cedar Rapids Gazette 3 December 1972).] Development and production of the Apollo project at Collins Radio took nearly five years, and at its peak involved nearly 600 employees

1962: Developed the first sea-going radio sextant for celestial navigation,
(Cedar Rapids Gazette article, 12 December 1965)

1969: Collins introduces new distance measuring equipment (DME) and ATC transponder

1977: First to receive GPS satellite signal acquired, tracked, and decoded at 11:41pm, July 18, 1977,
(Cedar Rapids Gazette article 19 July 1977 and an internal company presentation)

1970: First commercial avionics use of High-Level-Language (AED)
1970: World’s first microcomputer (Collins microcomputer) with HLL-driven architecture, began

1980: World’s first 16-Bit CMOS microprocessor (AAMP)

1983: World’s first commercial avionics use of Ada High-level Language (Beech Starship)

1987: Validated Ada/AAMP compiler

1993: World’s first verified (to FAA requirements) microprocessor (FCP2000)

1995: World leadership in formal microprocessor verification

1997: World’s first Java-embedded microprocessor: JEM

1933 to 1971: Arthur A. Collins, President, Collins Radio Co.

1972 to 1977: Robert C. Wilson, President and Chief Executive Officer, Collins Radio Co.

1977 to 1981: Clare Rice, President, Collins Avionics Group

1981 to 1990: James Churchill, President, Collins Commercial Avionics
1981 to 1990: Jack Cosgrove, President, Collins Defense Communications

1990 to 1996: John Girotto, President, Collins Commercial Avionics
1990 to 1996: Jack Cosgrove, President, Avionics & Communications Division

1996 to 1999: Jack Cosgrove, President, Avionics & Communications

1999 to 2001: Clayton Jones, President, Rockwell Collins, Inc.

2001 to 2002: Clayton Jones, President and Chief Executive Officer, Rockwell Collins, Inc.

2002 to Present: Clayton Jones, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO, Rockwell Collins, Inc.