About Us

Our History

It’s 1959 in Moxee Washington where native Shirley Loranger met Charles Washington while they were working in the Hops Farms. Charlie was from Arkansas born in Mt Olive, when a group migrated to Washington for work. The two fell in love and were married the next year in 1960.

In 1960 after long seasons of hops farming Charlie and Shirley relocated to Calico Rock Arkansas. Charlie started working at the Washington Auto Parts store and Shirley would soon be a mother to three boys. In 1962 she welcomed David, and in 1963 she welcomed Randy. Soon after in 1964 Shirley would begin a job at the Baxter Lab company. During these times the boys often would go to work with Charlie so he could watch them. They grew up taking apart and putting together cars. Each summer the Washington’s would adventure back to the hops fields in Moxee to bring in more income, all the way through to 1970.

In 1970 Charlie & Shirley would move to Brockwell Arkansas. Around this time Charlie switched gears and started working for Tilman Adkins setting well pumps. In 1971 they added their youngest and final son Shannon to the family. As the years went on Tilman decided that he wanted to get out of well work and sold his pump truck to Charlie. By 1980 Charlie had officially started his own company, Washington Pump. Their business grew and as their sons got older they started helping out. In 1981 while sill in high school Randy would work with his dad in his “free” time. After graduating he pursued college for a short period, and was back in the family business before to long. In 1987 Shannon while still in school started helping with the family business as well. For many years the family worked on all kinds of jobs including residential, recreational, and city jobs.

Though Charlie and the boys did the hard physical work, for many years Shirley would be behind the scenes taking care of all the paperwork by hand. She always says “I don’t understand the computers so I just wrote everything down. Over the years Shirley has kept a detailed archive of papers, pictures, books and more to preserve their family history. In 1993 they added a second business to their workload. Washington Drilling made it so that they now drill the wells before placing pumps. Both of Charlie’s boys would take on learning both aspects of their trade, however Shannon would eventually take the lead in Drilling and Randy would take the lead on Pump installation. The family business continued to flourish and as the family grew the would add on Shannon’s son Tyler and family friend David Dykes as apprentices. …….. Unfortunately after 45+ years in the well business Charlie was diagnosed with having dementia, keeping him from being able to keep working the business he built from the ground up. In his mind he will always be tending to the farm or going on pump calls. Charlie would be proud of the way his sons have carried on his life’s work. After so many years in business we would just like to extend our appreciation for the clients that have been with us from the beginning as well as new clients who keep us going. Thank you all.

IN LOVING MEMORY

Charles Washington April 7th 1939 to December 17th 2022

Our Employees