Hawco was established in 1968 in Slaughter, Louisiana as a rebuilder of clamshell buckets and grapples. As Hawco's customer base and revenues grew, the company hired experienced engineers and began designing and fabricating new cable driven clamshell buckets and grapples. By the early 1980's, Hawco was well established as one of the leading manufacturers of grabs in North America

During the mid-1980's, Hawco expanded its product line by adding hydraulic and electro-hydraulic designs. Since then, Hawco has grown to be North America's largest supplier of clamshell buckets and grapples and the world's first ISO 9001 quality certified supplier of this type of equipment.

Over its history, Hawco has the unique distinction of building the following clamshell buckets and grapples which are considered to be the largest of their type to have ever been built:

Largest clamshell bucket: 77 cubic yards

Largest electro-hydraulic scrap grapple: 20 cubic yards

Largest hydraulic scrap grapple: 7 cubic yards

Largest electro-hydraulic refuse grapple: 14 cubic yards

Largest 2-rope roundnose dredging bucket: 40 cubic yards

These accomplishments symbolize Hawco's design and manufacturing capabilities and represent the company's "can-do" attitude when industry has had unique requirements.