Robert Bohn is retiring as chairman and CEO of Oshkosh Corp. effective Dec. 31, the Oshkosh, Wis.-based parent of JLG Industries announced this week. The board of directors named Charles Szews CEO as of Jan. 1, 2011. Szews, who joined the company in 1996 as chief financial officer, is currently serving as president and chief operations officer and will serve as president and CEO.

Bohn will remain on the board until February when current board member Richard Donnelly will succeed Bohn as chairman.

Bohn led the company through a series of acquisitions including JLG, Pierce fire trucks, Medtech ambulances; Jerr-Dan trailers and towing vehicles, McNeilus trash haulers and concrete ready-mix trucks and a number of other companies. During his tenure the company grew from a $400 million firm into a multi-billion international corporation and Fortune 350 company, diversifying the company to a wide range of products.

Bohn introduced multiple-product manufacturing on a single production line to Oshkosh before the process was widely practiced. He helped guide the company through the recent global economic downturn to projected record-setting fiscal 2010 sales and earnings levels. A series of high-profile contracts for military trucks from the U.S. Defense Department, including a contract to build thousands of armored, all-terrain trucks for deployment in Afghanistan helped boost the company’s fortunes.