In the mid-1990s, I started keeping a list of companies whose names and/or ownership had changed. When Bela Liptak started the project to re-issue the Instrument Engineers' Handbook for a fourth time, he asked me if I would contribute the list to the book as an appendix. With the able assistance of Suzy Edvi, we did just that. We've updated it now twice, and the 2005 update will be published in the newest volume of IEH4 as "Appendix 9."
CRC Press and Bela Liptak have kindly given me permission to publish the material from Appendix 9 on ControlGlobal.com, and we'll do just that. It will take some time to do it, since I can do something I can't do in Bela's book-- give hyperlinks to the current incarnation of each company that still exists.
So look for the appearance of a new feature at ControlGlobal.com in the next month or so. The "Directory of Lost Companies" rides again.
Walt