XEROX A FIXTURE IN WEBSTER SINCE 1955

[Anonymous]

Xerox a fixture in Webster since 1955
Webster
and Xerox have been synonymous for half-a-century, as Webster is home
to the company’s huge manufacturing complex. Xerox has been a Webster
neighbor since Dwight Eisenhower was in the White House. The first
building permit was taken out in 1955 and despite some downsizing;
Xerox remains a fixture in Webster.Two men, Chester Carlson and Joseph
Wilson, largely shaped Xerox. Carlson was a patent attorney looking for
an easier way to make copies. He invented xerography. Wilson was the
visionary who embraced Carlson’s invention when dozens of other bigger
companies passed it by. They transformed a small company called Haloid
into Xerox.the first 914 copier in 1959 was so successful that Xerox
was flooded with orders and what started out as a modest manufacturing
operation in Webster became one of the largest in New York almost
overnight and it’s getting larger. The company is building a new $60
million toner plant.Xerox prides itself on being both a good neighbor,
and a good corporate citizen. “And so that involves both environment,
health and safety and being responsible in the community. Just last
week, we did our day of caring. A lot of employees went out to
different places both in Webster and Monroe County,” said John Laing,
Xerox Senior Vice President of Supplies Delivery Unit.Webster Town
Supervisor Ron Nesbitt says Xerox has been an important asset to the
town and helped to change Webster’s rural character. “Given people a
place to come to the town of Webster and live and raise a family, which
has been a good thing, and give them steady employment in the town of
Webster.”Xerox provided steady employment in Webster until recent years
when the workforce shrunk about in half. Nesbitt says he has not seen
the Webster job cuts in residential or commercial development. The new
Gil Hatch Center for customer innovation is attracting so many
customers from all over the world to see new products that the town is
getting two new hotels to compliment a Fairfield Inn.Xerox has also had
an impact on Webster merchants. “The impact is huge. We rely 90 percent
on Xerox. A couple years ago, we lost 5,000 workers. Many of those
workers were customers. They visited the village frequently. So it has
been tough,” said Mark Vinci owner of Webster’s East Main Street
Rubinos.Ralph Sholts is a retired Xerox electrical engineer who spent
29 years with the company, raising a family in Webster at the same
time. “That was a great place to work. It was even fun although it was
hard sometimes. When you like what you’re doing, it makes a
difference.”And he’s one of many employees to lend their intellectual
talents to the community, in his case, as a school board member. “Xerox
was always sensitive to what their employees liked to do and the
community. And Xerox was really a community oriented business.”

[Author]

May 23, 2006 at 11:58 AM