Wiggins Lift Cofounder Hattie America Wiggins Passes Away

Wiggins Lift Cofounder Hattie America Wiggins Passes Away

We are sad to announce that. Hattie America Wiggins passed away at the age of 98 on November 22, 2018, at her home in Oxnard, California. She and her husband, Melvin Wiggins, founded Wiggins Lift Co., Inc. in 1960. Mel passed away on November 24, 1989.

Hattie was born on October 14, 1920, in Ada, Oklahoma. She married Melvin Wiggins in 1935. They lived in Oklahoma and Texas before following the Great Migration to California. After living in Newhall, Hawthorne, and Ojai, they settled in Oxnard and began Wiggins Lift Co., Inc., a heavy machinery manufacturing company, making forklifts for the agricultural industry. Wiggins Lift grew to provide innovative and customized forklifts to the marine, agriculture, military, yard, and mining industries. Mel passed away in 1989, and Hattie continued working at the company every day until this year.

She is survived by a son, Michael and his wife, Nancy; a daughter Darleen, and her husband, Paul. She has four grandchildren (Michele, Dana, Melissa, Michael) and eight great-grand-grandchildren (Micah, Cayman, Alexa, Maya, Grayson, Cody, Kennedy, Holland).

A memorial service will be held at the Ventura Church of Christ on Wednesday at 12:30 pm, followed by a burial at Ivy Lawn in Ventura. In lieu of flowers, the family asks for donations to the John Clayton’s Does God Exist program.


See also:

Happy 95th Birthday, Hattie  Wiggins!
Ventura County Star: Oxnard’s Wiggin’s Lift has been a family business for over half a century