Thomas Olsen was the owner of Fred. Olsen Shipping Co., and he fled Norway in 1940 together with Joakim Lehmkuhl and their families because of the Nazi invasion. They eventually came to the United States seeking investments to assist in the war effort. Olsen and Lehmkuhl purchased controlling interest in Waterbury Clock Company in 1941, and Olsen became chairman. Olson appointed Lehmkuhl president, who had studied business and engineering at Harvard and MIT, and the company became the largest producer of fuse timers for precision defense products in the United States under his direction. They built a new concrete plant in nearby Middlebury, Connecticut in 88 days in 1942 for the high-volume production of precision timers. In August 1943, the Under-Secretary of War awarded the Waterbury Clock Company the Army-Navy "E" Award for excellence for their "Anglo-American fuse", and shareholders voted the following December to rename the company United States Time Corporation.