Billy Crystal
Billy Crystal Finds Fun In Growing Old (But Still Can't Find His Keys)
October 17, 2013 1:31 PM
Billy Crystal isn't happy about turning 65, but at least he's finding a way to laugh about it. His new memoir — Still Foolin' 'Em: Where I've Been, Where I'm Going, and Where the Hell Are My Keys? — is on the best-seller list, and he'll be back on Broadway in November.
Crystal got his start in standup comedy, and in 1977 he landed a leading role in the sitcom Soap — playing one of the first openly gay characters on TV. In 1984 he joined the cast of Saturday Night Live and went on to star in the films When Harry Met Sally, City Slickers and Analyze This. He's hosted the Oscars more times than anyone except Bob Hope. In 2007 he received the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. His autobiographical one-man show 700 Sundays won a Tony in 2005 and reopens on Broadway in November.
Interview Highlights
On how his show business family brought him to comedy early
[I did impressions] of relatives because I heard so many different sounds. You know, my dad was in the music business and of course my uncle was a giant [music producer], but my dad in particular had the house filled with these Dixieland jazz stars — really the best of them, Henry "Red" Allen, Willie "Lion" Smith, Buster Bailey, Cutty Cutshall, Tyree Glenn, Zutty Singleton, these are big names in the Dixieland world. It was mostly African-American [musicians] and my Jewish Eastern European relatives.
The house as I say ... smelled of brisket and bourbon, so you could hear that. I started imitating them. Phrases came out of that, "Can't you dig that?" "I knew that you would." We were at [Passover] Seders and they were confused with the bitter herbs, "Do we smoke these or do we do we dip them in salt water?" "We dip them in salt water, well that's gonna kill the vibrancy of the weed, you know." So that's what I was around. So I would imitate them. That's where it all started.
On losing his father at age 15
At the time it was devastating, of course. My two older brothers were both out of the house and in college, and I was left alone with [my mom] and we developed this incredible bond where I could not let her get too sad, [even] when I felt it in myself. It was a hard thing to juggle. I never felt like I could have a weak moment, I had to always be there for her and keep her up. ...
I'd try to make her laugh, and try to do things with her. ... She is the greatest hero I'll ever know because she kept us all together, she made sure we all graduated college. She always believed in us no matter what we do. My older brother Joel became an art teacher; my brother Rip ultimately became a television producer and singer and actor himself.
For me, it was always, "Whatever you want to do, I'm there for you." I never stopped believing in us and I never felt like I was wanting for anything, except for my father, and that was not going to be. I describe in the book [that] I don't think I ever felt young again in that way. I never felt I had my 15, 16, 17 kind of years the way I maybe should have. It's a huge dent in you that it's hard to knock out and make it all smooth again.
On his early standup days opening for Sammy Davis Jr., who used to lie to the audience about their relationship
I have 40-something intros [that Davis Jr. did]; all are different, none of them happened. And it was hilarious. ... [He did it] because it was show business. Because I think he thought he was doing a good thing for me and for him. He created this whole wonderful fantasy world for the two of us that was part of the show. I was OK with it. I thought it was really fascinating.
I loved him. Every time I was with Sammy it was like going to the show business museum because the stories were so extraordinary, and I didn't care if they were true or not after a while. ... I don't know if he really got high with Humphrey Bogart or not. It didn't matter because he was painting these fantastic pictures.
On playing Jodie, one of the first openly gay characters on television, in the show Soap in the late '70s and early '80s
We were in front of a live audience and I would be acting with the man who was playing my lover, and we used those words, and the audience would titter and laugh, and make me uncomfortable doing the scenes. ... I wanted to sort of stop and yell at them, "What's so funny? What's the matter with you people? Grow up!" It made me very self-conscious at times.
I think back to what we did and the things we talked about, all these years ago, and I'm so proud of what we did. I think it was in the third season Jodie was confused about his sexuality and he has a one-night stand with a woman and she gets pregnant and has a baby. ... Now I have to raise this little girl and so we go to court [to determine] who is going to get custody of the child. ABC did a poll and the poll at that time said 3 to 1 that the country wanted Jodie to get the baby. And I thought, "OK, we did good here."
On hosting the Oscars
I love doing it because I love the danger of it and you have to come through and think on your feet. That's why that show, no matter who hosts it, it really should be a fast-thinking comedian who is really quick on their feet that can handle situations that happen, or somebody with that kind of mentality that can capitalize on something.
On his proudest Oscar moment
I was introducing [director and producer] Hal Roach — Mr. Roach was 100 years old, he was one of the fathers of early days in films, he put Laurel with Hardy, he created the Our Gang kids, and all these silent movies he did — he was a giant. I think it was his 100th birthday and he was just supposed to take a bow. So I'm at center stage and I say, "Ladies and Gentlemen, one of the fathers of this industry, he's 100 years old, Mr. Hal Roach." Big hand, he stands up. And he starts talking and he has no microphone. ... And it's getting restless in the audience and they're all looking at me going, "What are you gonna say?" And I see the red light is right on me, and I looked at the audience and lines are flying through my head and one settled like a slot machine, three cherries, and I said, "Ladies and Gentleman, it's only fitting because he got his start in silent films." It took the pressure away, and that's one time I will pat myself on the back.
Excerpt: Still Foolin' 'Em
Honestly, my mom always made me feel special on my birthday, March 14. When I was a young boy, she used to wake me up at the exact time I was born: 7:36 A.M. As I grew older and moved out of the house, it became the phone call at 7:36 A.M. Even after I got married and had kids of my own, I always woke up looking forward to her call — it started the day off on the right foot. I put that tradition into City Slickers, with Jayne Meadows's voice playing my mom on the other end of the line. Mom's been gone since 2001, but come March 14, I still get up early and look at the alarm clock, and at 7:36, in my mind I hear the phone ring. Her call always ended with her saying, "Do something special." I didn't even mind that she called collect.
The most special thing I ever did on my birthday was when my life's dream came true: I got to play for the New York Yankees.
In 2007, I was in Costa Rica for Christmas vacation and could feel my birthday looming. I was anxious about turning sixty — it felt like a huge number. Derek Jeter happened to be at our hotel. I'd known Derek since his rookie year, and we'd become friends. I told Derek I was going to be sixty and was a little freaked out about it. Jeter asked, "If you could do one thing to make yourself happy, what would it be? You should do something special." Somewhere, my mom was smiling.
...
I knew my answer to Jeter's question right away. When Joe Torre was the Yankees' manager, he had let me work out with the team many times, even before World Series games. Joe and I were very close friends, and he not only knew I could handle myself on the field but thought my presence might even relax the guys. Infield practice was the most fun. I was still a good player, having been an outstanding (if I say so myself) high school second baseman and shortstop, and had played in leagues in New York and Los Angeles into my forties. My skills, though hardly professional, were solid. I still take batting practice regularly in a cage at home, and every morning my gym workout ends with a "catch." Turning double plays with Jeter on the historic infield of old Yankee Stadium was an enormous thrill. I wanted to do it again — this time, for real.
I came up with a plan where I would get one at bat in a spring training game. Whatever happens, happens, and I then announce my retirement and throw the team a party. Jeter loved the idea, and a few weeks before my sixtieth birthday, he and George Steinbrenner, Lonn Trost, Randy Levine, Brian Cashman, Bud Selig, and Major League Baseball gave me the greatest birthday gift ever: the Yankees would sign me to a one-day contract, and I would play against the Pittsburgh Pirates in a spring training game in Tampa. The game was on March 13, 2008, the day before my sixtieth birthday.
The official contract was for $4 million! But the nice part was that the Yankees gave me three days to come up with the money. We worked it out so that I would be the DH — designated Hebrew. Even though I wasn't going to be in the field, I needed to prepare. As you get older, there's a fine line between getting a walk and just wandering away from the batter's box. So I went into training.
Reggie Smith, the former great player who'd trained my "Maris and Mantle" — Barry Pepper and Thomas Jane — for 61*, has a baseball academy in Encino, California. He is a great teacher, and a better man. When I told him what was happening, he was almost as excited as I was. We didn't have a lot of time, but every day I worked on my swing with Reggie and his son (also a great teacher), against live pitching. As I left the West Coast for this great moment — accompanied by my good pal Robin Williams and some dear friends from high school — I was hitting eighty-five-mile-per-hour fastballs and felt as ready as a fifty-nine-year-old comedian can feel as he's about to play for the New York Yankees.
...
Trivia freaks will know that I was the oldest person ever to play for the Yankees, and the first player ever to test positive for Maalox. I actually did have to undergo routine testing. When they asked me for blood and urine, I gave them my underwear. The day before the game, I met with Yankee manager Joe Girardi. He wanted me to lead off and play left field. I said that was too far to run. We agreed that I would lead off and DH and have just the one at bat. Joe wanted me to score a run if I could. I wasn't sure (again, that's a long way to run), so we agreed that if I did get on base, Johnny Damon would pinch-run for me. It would be more theatrical, so to speak. I signed my contract with Lonn Trost and Jean Afterman and went and got dressed in the clubhouse. I knew most of the guys in there and had been in the clubhouse many times, but this felt unreal — I was one of them. In a strange way, I was very relaxed about it. It was so natural for me to wait until everyone had left the clubhouse so I could take off my clothes and put on my uniform. Just like high school gym class.
The team was on a road trip, and I spent that day working out with Derek and José Molina, who'd stayed back in Tampa. I took batting practice with Jeter and José while a small crowd and many camera crews looked on. I was on my game, hitting line drive after line drive. I know I shocked everyone, which was a great feeling. But I was in great shape and ready. Tino Martinez was throwing me sixty-mile-per-hour fastballs while Janice videotaped from a distance. Derek saw her and motioned for her to come over by him at the cage. She whispered to him, "How fast is Tino throwing?"
"One-oh-seven," Derek whispered back.
...
I couldn't sleep that night. It was really happening. I arrived at the park early the next morning. Girardi met me and we hung out a little, and to this day I can't thank him enough for welcoming me the way he did. This was his first year with the club, and the last thing he needed was some aging leading man as his lead-off man. Yet he treated me like a ballplayer, which is what I was that day. I did my pregame stretching and conditioning drills with the club and, of course, was then ready for a nap. Batting practice was amazing. I was in the cage with Derek and Damon and Bobby Abreu and Alex Rodriguez and Jorge Posada. When the guys nodded to one another that I was okay, I was on cloud nine. The hard part was that once batting practice was over, we had about an hour and a half till game time. I could feel my sphincter tighten, as well as my lower back and hamstrings. Now it wasn't just fun, it was really on.
I had lunch with Derek and Jorge and tried to be cool, but I was getting more and more anxious. Jorge and Derek were so easy with me. We all ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches: the same meal I always had before games in high school and all the league games I'd played in and, actually, before hosting the Oscars. After lunch I went to put my game uniform on, and that's when the pranks started. My shoelaces were cut, so when I went to tie them, they came off in my hands. The toes on my socks were cut as well, so when I pulled them on, my foot went through. I took it all in good stride, trying to act like nothing bothered me, as I knew the guys were watching. I was careful putting on my cup, as the fear of hot sauce loomed. The pranks continued — my hat switched with one that didn't fit, my glove missing, a belt with no holes — until it was time to go to the dugout.
The stands were full as I bounded onto the field with the team to loosen up. A big roar from the crowd made me feel great, until I realized that A-Rod and Jeter were standing next to me. The national anthem was played, and I had a tear in my eye as I looked into the stands to see my brothers, Joel and Rip, and my daughter Jenny, and of course Janice. Mike Mussina threw a perfect first inning, and then I was up. When the announcer introduced me with "Leading off for the Yankees, the designated hitter, number 60, Billy Crystal," I just about lost it. Since I'd been a kid, playing with my dad, brothers, or friends, I'd always dreamed of this moment, and now it was real. The crowd gave me a tremendous hand as I left the on-deck circle. "Hack," (meaning swing) said Jeter, patting me on the helmet.
The Pirates' pitcher was Paul Maholm: six foot two, 220 pounds, from Mississippi. Never been to a Seder. I was nervous, but the one thing I was not nervous about was getting hit by a pitch. It never entered my mind. If Maholm hit me, I'd sue. You ever see a Jew get hit by a pitch? They get plunked in the leg and they grab their neck. Whiplash! Once I'd found out the date of the game, I'd gone to the Pirates' website to see who'd be pitching. I'd then watched Maholm strike out Barry Bonds. A real confidence builder. I studied his motion and his release point and tried to visualize what hitting off him would be like. As I approached the plate, the ump greeted me, as did the Pirates' catcher. I watched Maholm's warm-up pitches, looking for the release point I had seen on the website, and told myself, I can do this.
"Play ball!"
I stepped in. Since 1956, from the time I had seen Mickey Mantle play in the first game at the stadium I'd gone to, I had wanted to be a Yankee.
So there I am in the batter's box fifty-two years after that first game, my heart beating into the NY logo on my chest. Maholm is staring in for the sign, and I'm staring back, trying to look like I belong. Here comes the first pitch: ninety-two miles an hour. Ball one. I never see it, but it sounds outside. The ball makes a powerful thud in the catcher's glove. I want to say, "Holy s__t," but I act like I see one of those every day. In fact, I do: on TV, not in the F___ING BATTER'S BOX. The count is 1 and 0. He comes in with a fastball, a little up and away, and I hit a screaming line drive down the first base line, which means I didn't hit it that hard but I'm screaming, "I hit it! I hit it!" Someone yells, "DOUBLE!" Which would be tough because I can't run like I used to and on my way to second base I'd have to stop twice to pee. The last time a Jew my age ran that fast, the caterer was closing down the buffet.
But I'm still thinking double. The ump is thinking, Foul ball. I had made contact with a major league fastball. Okay, 1 and 1. Ball inside, 2 and 1, and another ball and it's 3 and 1. I'm this close to getting to first base, just like at my prom. I look over, and Derek Jeter is in the on-deck circle yelling, "Swing, swing!"
The windup, the pitch. It's a cutter. The nastiest cutter I've seen since my bris. But I swing and miss. The first time I've swung and missed in two days at Tampa. Now it's 3 and 2. The crowd stands up. This is my only shot, my only at bat. Ever. Maholm winds, I look to the release point, and there it is: eighty-nine miles per hour, a cut fastball, the same pitch he threw to that obstructer of justice Barry Bonds. I swing over it. Strike three. I'm out of there.
I head back to the bench, but before I do, I check with the ump: "Strike?" He shakes his head no: low and inside. I'm so mad I missed it, and also mad I didn't take the pitch, that I almost don't hear the crowd standing and cheering. The guys are giving me high fives. Girardi hugs me, then Kevin Long, the great hitting coach, and then Jorge. Then, for the first time in baseball history, they stop the game and give the batter a ball for striking out. A-Rod hands it to me, saying, "Great at bat!" My teammates greet me as if I've just hit a home run. Mariano Rivera hugs me, and others keep saying the same thing:
"Six pitches, man, you saw six pitches!"
I sit with Yogi Berra and Ron Guidry for a few innings, and if that isn't cool enough, I'm asked to come up to Mr. Steinbrenner's office. In full uniform I walk into the boss's lair. He gives me a big hug and then says with a straight face that I've been traded for Jerry Seinfeld.
Excerpted from Still Foolin' 'Em: Where I've Been, Where I'm Going, and Where the Hell Are My Keys? by Billy Crystal, published by Henry Holt and Company, LLC. Copyright 2013 by Jennilind LLC. All rights reserved.
Xerox
Happy Birthday, Copy Machine! Happy Birthday, Copy Machine!
by KATE O'CONNELL
October 23, 2013 3:14 AM
Copy machines can be found in every office, and most of us take them for granted. But 75 years ago, the technology that underpins the modern photocopier was used for the first time in a small apartment in Queens.
Inventor Chester Carlson used static electricity created with a handkerchief, light and dry powder to make the first copy on Oct. 22, 1938.
The copier didn't get on to the market until 1959, more than 20 years later. When it did, the Xerox machine prompted a dramatic change in the workplace.
The first commercial model, the Xerox 914, was bulky and cumbersome. It weighed nearly 650 pounds. It was the size of about two washing machines and was prone to spontaneous combustion.
But even literally going up in flames wasn't enough to kill the product. In fact, it was in high demand.
"There was a distinct need for simple copying like this, and it just took off," says Ray Brewer, historical archivist for Xerox Corp. "We sold thousands of these machines, and the demand was such that we were manufacturing them in large quantities."
Brewer says the popularity of Xerox technology abroad inspired more clandestine uses for the copier. Some machines actually had miniature cameras built into them during the Cold War for the purpose of spying on other countries.
Back at home, the copier was proving to be a godsend for secretaries. One Xerox commercial features a female secretary saying:
"I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing a button. Anything he can see I can copy in black and white on ordinary paper. I can make seven copies a minute. ... Sometimes my boss asks me which is the original, and sometimes, I don't know."
Author and historian Lynn Peril says the machines had to have been "fabulously liberating."
"Oh my god, you didn't have to work with all the lousy carbon paper," she says. "You could just take it and put it on this glass surface, and press a button and you've got as many copies as you wanted."
The beauty of the technology, Peril says, was that it saved time for office workers without making their workplace role obsolete.
Angele Boyd is a business analyst at the International Data Corp. She says copier technology created a more democratic information system.
"Until then, you needed to go to a press or you needed to go to a third party external print shop to produce that kind of quality output," she says.
The core technology in the copier, later transferred to printers and scanners, has remained the same since the 1930s.
Comment:
al barkan
"the original went into the copy machine and never came out...or.....came out shredded. sometimes the toner, which was liquid in those days, dripped or poured from the copier onto the furniture and onto the rug. how about the early copiers that made copies that were "wet". it was not usual to see sheet of paper on a clothes line strung across the office. ahhh.....those early days!"
Xerox Corporation /ˈzɪərɒks/ is an American multinational document management corporation that produces and sells a range of color and black-and-white printers, multifunction systems, photo copiers, digital production printing presses, and related consulting services and supplies. Xerox is headquartered in Norwalk, Connecticut (moved from Stamford, Connecticut in October 2007), though its largest population of employees is based around Rochester, New York, the area in which the company was founded. On September 28, 2009, Xerox announced the intended acquisition of Affiliated Computer Services for $6.4 billion. The deal closed on February 8, 2010. Xerox holds a Royal Warrant from Queen Elizabeth II and the Prince of Wales.
Researchers at Xerox and its Palo Alto Research Center invented several important elements of personal computing, such as the desktop metaphor GUI, the computer mouse and desktop computing. These features were frowned upon by the then board of directors, who ordered the Xerox engineers to share them with Apple technicians. The features were taken on by Apple and, later, Microsoft. Partly thanks to these features, these two firms would then go on to duopolize the personal computing world.
History
The Xerox 914 was the first one-piece plain paper photocopier, and sold in the thousands and millions.
Xerox was founded in 1906 in Rochester as The Haloid Photographic Company, which originally manufactured photographic paper and equipment. The company subsequently changed its name to Haloid Xerox in 1958 and then simply Xerox in 1961. Xerography, a modern word meaning "dry writing" developed from two Greek roots, is the name of the process invented in 1938 by Chester Carlson and developed by the Haloid Company. The company came to prominence in 1959 with the introduction of the Xerox 914, the first plain paper photocopier using the process of Electro-photography, (later changed to xerography) discovered by Chester Carlson, which he developed with John H. Dessauer. The 914 was so popular that by the end of 1961 Xerox had almost $60 million in revenue. Revenues leaped to over $500 million by 1965. Before releasing the 914, Xerox had tested the market by introducing a developed version of the prototype hand-operated equipment known as the Flat-plate 1385. This was followed by the first automatic xerographic printer, the Copyflo, in 1955. The Copyflo was a large microfilm printer which could produce positive prints on roll paper from any type of microfilm negative. Following the Copyflo, the process was scaled down to produce the 1824 microfilm printer. At about half the size and weight, this still sizable machine printed onto hand-fed, cut-sheet paper which was pulled through the process by one of two gripper bars. A scaled-down version of this gripper feed system was to become the basis for the 813 desktop copier.
In 1963 Xerox introduced the Xerox 813, the first desktop plain-paper copier, realizing Carlson's vision of a copier that could fit on anyone's office desk. Ten years later in 1973, a basic, analogue, color copier, based on the 914, followed. The 914 itself was gradually sped up to become the 420 and 720. The 813 was similarly developed into the 330 and 660 products and, eventually, also the 740 desktop microfiche printer.
Chester Carlson's original hand equipment, which saw the market as the 1385 Flatplate, was not actually a viable copier because of its speed of operation. As a consequence, it was sold as a platemaker to the offset lithography market, perhaps most notably as a platemaker for the Addressograph-Multigraph Multilith 1250 and related sheet-fed offset printing presses. It was little more than a high quality, commercially available plate camera mounted as a horizontal rostrum camera, complete with photo-flood lighting and timer. The glass film/plate had been replaced with a selenium-coated aluminum plate. Clever electrics turned this into a quick developing and reusable substitute for film. A skilled user could produce fast, paper and metal printing plates of a higher quality than almost any other method. Having started as a supplier to the offset lithography duplicating industry, Xerox now set its sights on capturing some of offset's market share.
Xerox's first foray into duplicating, as distinct from copying, was with the Xerox 2400. This number denoted the number of prints produced in an hour. Although still some way short of offset speeds, this machine introduced the industry's first Automatic Document Feeder, Slitter/Perforator, and Collator (sorter). This product was soon sped up by fifty percent to become the Xerox 3600 Duplicator.
Meanwhile, a small lab team was borrowing 914 copiers and modifying them. The lab was working on a project called the "Long Distance Xerography" project (LDX for short). The aim was to be able to connect two copiers together via the public telephone network, such that a document scanned on one machine would be copied out on the other. Many years later this work came to fruition in the Xerox Telecopiers, seminal to today's fax machines. The fax operation in today's multifunction copiers is true to Carlson's original vision for these devices.
The company expanded substantially throughout the 1960s, making millionaires of some long-suffering investors who had nursed the company through the slow research and development phase of the product. In 1960, a xerography research facility called the Wilson Center for Research and Technology was opened in Webster, New York. In 1961, the company changed its name to Xerox Corporation. Xerox common stock (XRX) was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1961 and on the Chicago Stock Exchange in 1990.
In 1969, Xerox acquired Scientific Data Systems [SDS], and produced the Sigma line of 32-bit mainframe computers in the 1960s and 1970s.
Printer History: The first non-impact printer was the Xerox 1200, it was based on the 3600 copier. It had an optical character generator designed by a brilliant optical engineer Phil Chen. The laser printer was invented in 1969 by Xerox researcher Gary Starkweather by modifying a Xerox copier. Xerox management was afraid the product version of Starkweather's invention, the 9700 would negatively impact their copier business so the 9700 sat in limbo until IBM launched the 3800 laser printer. Xerox then launched the 9700.
This development resulted in the first commercially available laser printer, the Xerox 9700, being launched in 1977. Laser printing eventually became a multi-billion-dollar business for Xerox. Archie McCardell was named president of the company in 1971. During his tenure, Xerox introduced the Xerox 6500, its first color copier. During McCardell's reign at Xerox, the company announced record revenues, earnings and profits in 1973, 1974, and 1975. John Carrol became a backer, later spreading the company throughout North America.
Following these years of record profits, in 1975 Xerox resolved an anti-trust suit with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which at the time was under the direction of Frederic M. Scherer. The Xerox consent decree resulted in the forced licensing of the company’s entire patent portfolio, mainly to Japanese competitors. Within four years of the consent decree, Xerox's share of the U.S. copier market dropped from nearly 100% to less than 14%.
In 1970, under company president Charles Peter McColough, Xerox opened the Xerox PARC (Xerox Palo Alto Research Center) research facility. The facility developed many modern computing technologies such as the graphical user interface (GUI), Laser printing, WYSIWYG text editors and Ethernet. From these inventions, Xerox PARC created the Xerox Alto in 1973, a small minicomputer similar to a modern workstation or personal computer. This machine can be considered the first true Personal Computer, given its versatile combination of a cathode-ray-type screen, mouse-type pointing device, and a QWERTY-type alphanumeric keyboard. But the Alto was never commercially sold, as Xerox itself could not see the sales potential of it. It was, however, installed in Xerox's own offices, worldwide and those of the US Government and military, who could see the potential. Within these sites the individual workstations were connected together by Xerox's own unique LAN, The Ethernet. Data was sent around this system of heavy, yellow, low loss coaxial cable using the packet data system. In addition, PARC also developed one of the earliest internetworking protocol suites, the PARC Universal Packet.
In the mid-1970s Xerox introduced the "Xerox 9200" a product; origially designed to be sold to print shops, to increase their productivity. It was twice a fast as the 3600 duplicator at 2 impressions per second(7200 per hour). It was followed by the 9400 which did auto duplexing and then by the 9500 which offered zoom reduction.
In the late 1970s Xerox introduced the "Xerox 350 color slide system" This product allowed the customer to create digital word and graphic 35mm slides. Many of the concepts used in today's "Photo Shop" programs were pioneered with this technology.
In 1979, Steve Jobs made a deal with Xerox's venture capital division: He would let them invest $1 million in exchange for a look at the technology they were working on. Jobs and the others saw the commercial potential of the WIMP (Window, Icon, Menu, and Pointing device) system and redirected development of the Apple Lisa to incorporate these technologies. Jobs is quoted as saying, "They just had no idea what they had." In 1980, Jobs invited several key PARC researchers to join his company so that they could fully develop and implement their ideas.
In 1980, Xerox announced the forward looking 5700 laser printing system, a much smaller version of their 9700, but with revolutionary touch screen capabilities and multiple media input (word processing disks, IBM magcards, etc.) and printer 'finishing' options. This product was allegedly never intended to make the commercial markets due to its development cost, but rather to show the innovation of Xerox. It did take off with many customers, but was soon replaced with its still smaller and lower cost (and assumedly more profitable) 2700 Distributed Electronic Printer offering in 1982.
In 1981, Xerox released a system similar to the Alto, the Xerox 8010 Star. It was the first commercial system to incorporate technologies that have subsequently become commonplace in personal computers, such as a bitmapped display, window-based GUI, mouse, Ethernet networking, file servers, print servers and e-mail. The Xerox 6085 Star, despite its technological breakthroughs, did not sell well due to its high price, costing $16,000 per unit. A typical Xerox Star-based office, complete with network and printers, would have cost $100,000.
In the mid-1980s, Apple considered buying Xerox; however, a deal was never reached.[citation needed] Apple instead bought rights to the Alto GUI and adapted it into to a more affordable personal computer, aimed towards the business and education markets. The Apple Macintosh was released in 1984, and was the first personal computer to popularize the GUI and mouse amongst the public.
The company was revived in the 1980s and 1990s, through improvement in quality design and realignment of its product line. Development of digital photocopiers in the 1990s and a revamp of the entire product range—essentially high-end laser printers with attached scanners, known as Multi Function Machines, or just MFMs, these were able to be attached to computer networks—again gave Xerox a technical lead over its competitors. Xerox worked to turn its product into a service, providing a complete document service to companies including supply, maintenance, configuration, and user support. To reinforce this image, the company introduced a corporate signature, "The Document Company" above its main logo and introduced a red digital X. The digital X symbolized the transition of documents between the paper and digital worlds.
In mid-1990's LA County Superior Court turn to Xerox to help it replacing nearly 500 aging copiers throughout LA County, but Xerox refuse to consider leasing. The County instead went to Konica and introduced the concepts leasing of copiers for the first time in the industry. Xerox was shut out of the County for the next two years.
In 2000, Xerox acquired Tektronix color printing and imaging division in Wilsonville, Oregon, for US$925 million. This led to the current Xerox Phaser line of products as well as Xerox solid ink printing technology.
In September 2004, Xerox celebrated the 45th anniversary of the Xerox 914. More than 200,000 units were made around the world between 1959 and 1976, the year production of the 914 was stopped. Today, the 914 is part of American history as an artifact in the Smithsonian Institution.
Xerox's turnaround was largely led by Anne M. Mulcahy, who was appointed president in May 2000, CEO in August 2001 and chairman in January 2002. Mulcahy launched an aggressive turnaround plan that returned Xerox to full-year profitability by the end of 2002, along with decreasing debt, increasing cash, and continuing to invest in research and development.
Wallace Stegner
http://wallacestegner.org
Wallace Stegner
Born Wallace Earle Stegner
February 18, 1909
Lake Mills, Iowa, USA
Died April 13, 1993 (aged 84)
Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA
Occupation Historian, novelist, short story writer, environmentalist
Language English
Nationality American
Period 1937–1993
Notable award(s) Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
(1972, Angle of Repose)
National Book Award for Fiction
(1977, The Spectator Bird)
Spouse(s) Mary Stuart Page (1911–2010)
Children Page Stegner
Wallace Earle Stegner (February 18, 1909 – April 13, 1993) was an American historian, novelist, short story writer, and environmentalist, often called "The Dean of Western Writers". He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1972 and the U.S. National Book Award in 1977.
Stegner was born in Lake Mills, Iowa, and grew up in Great Falls, Montana, Salt Lake City, Utah, and in the village of Eastend, Saskatchewan, which he wrote about in his autobiography Wolf Willow. Stegner says he "lived in twenty places in eight states and Canada". He was the son of Hilda (née Paulson) and George Stegner. Stegner summered in Greensboro, Vermont. While living in Utah, he joined a Boy Scout troop at an LDS Church (although he himself was a Presbyterian) and earned the Eagle Scout award. He received a B.A. at the University of Utah in 1930. He also studied at the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa, where he received a master's degree in 1932 and a doctorate in 1935.
In 1934, Stegner married Mary Stuart Page. For 59 years they shared a 'personal literary partnership of singular facility,' in the words of Arthur Schlesinger Jr. Stegner died in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on April 13, 1993, from a car accident on March 28, 1993.
Stegner's son, Page Stegner, is a novelist, essayist nature writer and professor emeritus at University of California, Santa Cruz. Page is married to Lynn Stegner, a novelist. Page co-authored "American Places" and edited the 2008 Collected Letters of Wallace Stegner.
Career
Stegner taught at the University of Wisconsin and Harvard University. Eventually he settled at Stanford University, where he founded the creative writing program. His students included Sandra Day O'Connor, Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry, Simin Daneshvar, Andrew Glaze, George V. Higgins, Thomas McGuane, Robert Stone, Ken Kesey, Gordon Lish, Ernest Gaines, and Larry McMurtry. He served as a special assistant to Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall and was elected to the Sierra Club's board of directors for a term that lasted 1964–1966. He also moved into a house near Matadero Creek on Three Forks Road in nearby Los Altos Hills and became one of the town's most prominent residents. In 1962, he co-founded the Committee for Green Foothills, an environmental organization dedicated to preserving and protecting the hills, forests, creeks, wetlands and coastal lands of the San Francisco Peninsula.
Stegner's novel Angle of Repose (first published by Doubleday in early 1971) won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1972. Yet it was based on the letters of Mary Hallock Foote (first published in 1972 by Huntington Library Press as the memoir A Victorian Gentlewoman in the Far West). Stegner explained his use of unpublished archival letters briefly at the beginning of Angle of Repose but his use of uncredited passages taken directly from Foote's letters caused a continuing controversy.
Stegner also won the National Book Award for The Spectator Bird in 1977. In the late 1980s, he refused a National Medal from the National Endowment for the Arts because he believed the NEA had become too politicized. Stegner's semi-autobiographical novel Crossing to Safety (1987) gained broad literary acclaim and commercial popularity.
Stegner's non-fiction works include Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West (1954), a biography of John Wesley Powell, who was the first man to explore the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon and later served as a government scientist and advocate of water conservation in the American West. Stegner wrote the foreword and edited "This Is Dinosaur," with photographs by Philip Hyde, a Sierra Club book that was used in the campaign to prevent dams in Dinosaur National Monument and helped launch the modern environmental movement. A substantial number of his works are set in and around Greensboro, Vermont, where he lived part-time. Some of his character representations (particularly in Second Growth) were sufficiently unflattering that residents took offense, and he did not visit Greensboro for several years after its publication.
Legacy
On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of Stegner's birth, Timothy Egan reflected in The New York Times on the writer's legacy, including his perhaps troubled relationship with the newspaper itself. Over 100 readers including Jane Smiley offered comments on the subject.
In recognition of Stegner's legacy at the University of Utah, The Wallace Stegner Prize in Environmental or American Western History was established in 2010 and is administered by the University of Utah Press. This book publication prize is awarded to the best monograph the Press receives on the topic of American western or environmental history within a predetermined time period.
Lewis-Clark State College in Lewiston, Idaho has a history of presenting an annual lecture titled after Stegner. The Wallace Stegner Lecture has long been a literary-cultural highlight for the LCSC community. Named in honor of Western writer Wallace Stegner, the annual lecture features discussions about the writer’s relationship with the physical and psychological territories in which he or she resides.
The Stegner Fellowship program at Stanford University is a two-year creative writing fellowship. The house Stegner lived in from age 7 to 12 in Eastend, Saskatchewan, Canada was restored by the Eastend Arts Council in 1990 and established as a Residence for Artists; the Wallace Stegner Grant For The Arts offers a grant of $500 and free residency at the house for the month of October for published Canadian writers. In 2003, indie rock trio Mambo Sons released the Stegner-influenced song "Little Live Thing / Cross to Safety" written by Scott Lawson and Tom Guerra, which resulted in an invitation for Lawson to serve as Artist-in-Residency for March 2009.
In May 2011, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Stegner's Los Altos Hills home, which was sold in 2005, is scheduled to be demolished by the current owners. Lynn Stegner said the family attempted to sell the home to Stanford University in an attempt to preserve it, but the university said the home would be sold at market value, customary for real estate donated to Stanford. Wallace Stegner's wife, Mary said that Wallace would disapprove of the fuss surrounding the issue. In addition, when the town wanted to name a path near their home after him, he said "No." However, Mary Stegner confided that her husband later came to enjoy walking on it, and the path was eventually named for him posthumously, in 2008.
Bibliography
Novels
Remembering Laughter (1937)
The Potter's House (1938)
On a Darkling Plain (1940)
Fire and Ice (1941)
The Big Rock Candy Mountain (1943), autobiographical
Second Growth (1947)
The Preacher and the Slave (1950), reissued as Joe Hill: A Biographical Novel
A Shooting Star (1961)
All the Little Live Things (1967)
Angle of Repose (1971), winner of the Pulitzer Prize
The Spectator Bird (1976), winner of the National Book Award
Recapitulation (1979)
Crossing to Safety (1987)
Collections
The Women on the Wall (1950)
The City of the Living: And Other Stories (1957)
Writer's Art: A Collection of Short Stories (1972)
The American West as Living Space (1987)
Collected Stories of Wallace Stegner (1990)
Late Harvest: Rural American Writing (1996), with Bobbie Ann Mason
Chapbooks
Genesis: A Story from Wolf Willow (1994)
Nonfiction
Mormon Country (1942)
One Nation (1945), with the editors of Look magazine
Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West (1954)
Wolf Willow: A History, a Story, and a Memory of the Last Plains Frontier (1962), autobiography
Wilderness Letter (1960)
The Gathering of Zion: The Story of the Mormon Trail (1964)
Teaching the Short Story (1966)
The Sound of Mountain Water (1969)
Discovery! The Search for Arabian Oil (1971)
The Uneasy Chair: A Biography of Bernard Devoto (1974)
Writer in America (1982)
Conversations with Wallace Stegner on Western History and Literature (1983)
This Is Dinosaur: Echo Park Country and its Magic Rivers (1985)
American Places (1985)
On the Teaching of Creative Writing (1988)
Where the Bluebird Sings to the Lemonade Springs: Living and Writing in the West (1992)
Short Stories
"Bugle Song" (1938)
"Chip Off the Old Block" (1942)
"Hostage" (1943)