The staff at Life essentials has the experience to ensure your needs are met. Combining personal backgrounds with professional abilities is our key to efficiency. We will work to solve any barrier problem in the home, workplace, farm, or recreational area.

In 1968, Hubert Von Holten started a small machine shop in his chicken house in Round Grove, Indiana. He called it Round Grove Machine, and it became a family business. At first, Hubert started out making Model A parts for car restoration, but he was soon taking on more work. He expanded the company and renamed it Mud Hog. In 1982, he sold that factory and built a smaller one in West Lafayette, Indiana.

Four years later, Dr. Bill Field of Purdue University talked Hubert into working with some students on a special project. They would develop a tractor lift for a farmer in Vermont, much like the platform lifts Hubert had made years before for his own farm equipment.

Not liking the original design because of its limitations, Hubert transformed the lift so it no longer just went from point A to point B. The new lift had switches that allowed the user to guide the lift in multiple directions.

This new simpler-to-use and more practical lift was called “The Simplicity Lift” and was manufactured by Round Grove Machine.

At this point, it was safe to say that the manufacture and design of these machines was no longer just a hobby. Thus, Life essentials was born and trademarked. With the help of AgrAbility organizations, Life Essentials has been declared a very successful program to put people back to work.

In 2002, Life essentials got back to its roots. We built a smaller facility back up on the farm in Round Grove Township of Brookston, Indiana. In the same year, Kathleen Smith partnered the ownership, incorporating Life Essentials.