Tom Day really working for . He now Photo by Ken Sakamoto has 37 years' service. For most of those remembers years, he installed power equipment in always meant to go back, but some Pearl Harbor central offices. For the past three how I never got around to it. When years, Tom has been working at the this assignment came up, I added some A d v a n c e d C o m m u n i c a t i o n s C e n t e r i n vacation time onto the assignment so , where he is re that I could spend some time catching sponsible for installing and maintain up on the 40 years of changes that On Sunday, December 7, 1941, "a ing Western Flectric's demonstration have taken place since I was there. I date which will live in infamy," Tom m o d e l s o f b u s i n e s s a n d r e s i d e n c e was able to take part in the 40th Day began his breakfast at Schofield products. A large part of his job r e u n i o n o f t h e P e a r l H a r b o r s u r v i v o r s . Barracks in Oahu where he was sta involves installing exhibits of WF I visited Hickam Field, Schofield Bar tioned with Company C of the 21st equipment that AT&T sponsors at racks, Diamond Head, and, of course. Infantry Regiment. He remembers that t r a d e s h o w s a n d c o n v e n t i o n s . H e c o n Pearl Harbor. It was a lot of fim to see morning vividly. As he puts it, "At the siders himself an expert on the my old Army buddies, although we time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, I Dimension® PBX, the Horizon® com were reminiscing about a terrible had just begun to eat my pancakes. All munications system, and the event." of a sudden, everything just blew up. Dataphone® data sets. His job takes Tom did one more thing before Pancakes and everything. I went head him all over the country and, for coming back to the mainland. "Best of over heels over the chair. No one tunately, he enjoys the travel. all," Tom says, "I sat down for breakfast knew what had happened. It was By a stroke of luck, he was asked to on December 7, 1981, in the shadow chaos. I was lucky though—I am here install an exhibit in Hawaii in Decem of Diamond Head, and I ordered pan to remember." ber 1981. "I jumped at the chance," cakes. Forty years later, 1 finished my After World War II, Tom started Tom says, "to go back to Hawaii. I'd breakfast with no mishap." Third Quarter Contents 34th Year

Page 2 Page 6 Page 18

2 Competitors There are a lot of them out there c T e c h n o l o g y for the Eighties Teehnology is shaping our future

14 My Time Is Flexible A choice of starting times J ^ In Recognition 10 of Long Service Golden oldies and some new ones

18 Zap! Static electricity can he deadly

*)<) Don't Panic! It A few tips on keeping your cool Could Kill You n A P r o c e s s o r f o r t h e WE's newest proeessor rtc World of Communications Open house at a museum

QQ Phones, Phones, A collection for the ages Phones

30 Summer on Campus Studying for the computer age

32 Pioneers with Insight A library of talking books is the goal

O n t h e C o v e r w ® WE is published for empioyees of George Gray P e t e r L e w i s Using a touch of surrealism, artist Western Electric. Editor Design Ed Lindiof has tried to capture the President: D.E. Procknow; Saul Fingerman Leonard Stern essence of some of the 's Secretary; EC. Chiids; Managing Editor Photography Treasurer: R.E.Ekebiad. major "Technology for the Eighties." Editorial office: 222 Broadway, NY NY 10038 Elizabeth Periman Thomas J. O'Donoghue (See page 6.) These are photonics, : (212) 669-2621 Associate Editor Production microelectronics and stored-program Copyright © 1982 by Western Electric Co., Inc. control. All three technologies are Ail Rights Reserved. moving us towards an all-digital Printed in the United States of America. Western Electric network, as symbolized by the ones Title "WE" is a registered U.S. trademark. and zeros threading their way through the picture.

W E t a l k e d w i t h but 1 believe the 250 percent increase WE: What caused the change? is indicative of the trend. A dozen FRECHE: For years we tended to Executive Vice years ago, following the landmark Car- think of largely in President Gerry terfone Decision by the Federal terms of the Bell System. But events Communications Commission—^which outside our control are making it clear Freche about the in effect allowed interconnection of that the world is rapidly changing with privately owned terminal equipment many telephone administrations and impact of to the Bell switched network—the many equipment suppliers who also competition that we talked about was have financial and technological re competition almost entirely in the customer prem sources. Moreover, many of our ises sphere, that is, telephone sets, competitors are large foreign com Massive changes have taken place in PBXs and data modems. panies sponsored by, or protected by, the U.S. telecommunications industry The effect on Western Electric's their governments. This makes for a in the past decade, partly because of total sales was not too noticeable rather difficult situation in trying to technological innovation, partly be because the economy was booming sell our wares abroad; in effect, to cause of regulatory imposed changes and the telephone companies were compete on our competitors' home and finally because of the entry of new ground. Many government regulatory players. Hundreds of new companies and political actions in this country, have entered the field as service or however, have thrown open the door equipment providers. The modified to these same foreign suppliers and in Consent Decree recently agreed to many cases virtually insist that the Bell with the Justice Department portends operating companies buy from com even greater change in industry petitors, including foreign suppliers. structure. WE: How Strong are we tech Since one of the major factors in nologically, as contrasted with Western Electric's planning process is these foreign competitors? FRECHE: We are very sound tech competition, we asked Gerry Freche, Executive Vice President, Network nologically, financially and Planning and Management, about the managerially. In fact, the basis of our impact of this intensifying competition success over the years has been our on the company. preeminence in the electrical and WE: Just how serious is the com electronic areas. But it is a situation petitive challenge? We have heard that can change. Our foreign competi talk about competition before, but "Much of the tors are large, well-established, our sales and earnings keep going financially sound firms with very fine up. We can't be doing too badly. competition we face research and development groups. FRECHE: What you say is what some today is an outgrowth Some perform R&D directly in this of our people believe, and it could of our own innovation" country; others have acquired high give them a false sense of security. technology companies here to develop new products for the American mar They are deluding themselves. The buying more of everything in an at ket. They are strong, well-run firms to competitive challenge we face is real tempt to keep up with the burgeoning and getting more serious everyday. demand for service. Today, however, be taken seriously. The recent settlement of the Justice the impact of competition is being felt "WE: A great deal has been said in the press during the course of the Department case will intensify the on all parts of our product line. For competition to supply the local ex nearly every product we make and Justice Department case about barriers to entry into the telecom change companies. We also see the every service we perform, other com munications equipment business. intensity of competition for intercity panies have products, capabilities and telecommunications increasing large appetites for sales growth. We Is it really that difficult to get in a n d s u r v i v e i n t h i s b u s i n e s s ? steadily. face a constant challenge to prove that WE: How has the competition ours is the best buy for the money. FRECHE: The facts, it seems to me, changed? Aren't they the same WE: The competition charges speak for themselves. I've previously familiar names, just grown bigger that we have the Bell segment of mentioned the growing numbers of and bolder? the market firms listed in Telephony's Buyers' FRECHE: Many good companies are locked up. How true is that? Guide, which is one indicator of ex emerging, some of whom are entirely FRECHE: It is certainly not true pansion of the industry. Another is the new in this area. There are many more now, and 1 doubt that it ever was. We i n c r e a s e i n r e v e n u e s . A n u m b e r o f o u r names today. A dozen years ago, the have always earned the business we new competitors may have started in annual Buyers' Guide issue of Tele got. Currently, AT&T estimates that the garages but they outgrew them very phony listed 344 firms as suppliers in Bell Operating Companies are buying quickly. A number of competitors in the $50-million range increased their t h e t e l e c o m m u n i c a t i o n s b u s i n e s s . L a s t about $2V2 billion worth of telecom volume of business by 50 percent to year, the listing ran to 1,234 names. munications products made by more than 100 percent in just the last There is no claim of absolute accuracy suppliers other than Western Electric. or completeness in either of the lists. In 1977 the comparable figure was year. The foremost example is Mitel, Jl'/i billion, so that the value of these t h e C a n a d i a n m a n u f a c t u r e r o f P B X s , whose business volume grew by about As of July 1, Mr. Freche became president, purchases has doubled in less than five 125 percent. Micom Systems, Para- New England Telephone Co. years. 3 Third Quarter 1982 dyne, California Microwave, M/A-Com foreign companies were active in the than Bell or former Bell companies, a n d S c i e n t i fi c A t l a n t a a r e s o m e o t h e r so called "interconnection" market, and become more active in the inter examples of growth firms, although a but as they have become better national sphere. shade less spectacular than Mitel. capitalized they have approached the The business that Western is in is W E : W h o i s o u r m o s t s e r i o u s Bell switched network as a primary universally characterized by people competitor from an across-the- market. outside of our company as an extraor board point of view? WE: What effect has competition dinarily attractive business. Many in FRECHE: I would put Northern Tele had on employment? What do you the financial community forecast that com at the top of the list. They were at s e e f o r t h e f u t u r e ? the telecommunications industry of o n e t i m e o u r C a n a d i a n a f fi l i a t e a n d FRECHE: Lost sales very definitely the 80s will be as attractive as was the many of their operating procedures impact on employment. And if we computer industry of the 60s. Con are very much like Western Electric's. continue to lose sales, it is certainly sequently, the financial community has In recent years, however, they have going to reduce employment fur on occasion been willing to finance spread out of Canada into the United t h e r — o v e r h e a d a s w e l l a s d i r e c t . n e w t e l e c o m m u n i c a t i o n s e n t r a n t s w h o States, so that their investment here is Competition also puts a squeeze on have little more than a good idea and a now larger than in Canada. Northern profits, which puts a squeeze on R&D, garage to work in. For Western and its Te l e c o m h a s s o l d s u b s t a n t i a l a m o u n t s employees, this is a good news and a of switching equipment to the Bell bad news situation. The good news is operating companies, including digital that it's great to be in a leadership central offices, which are big ticket position in an attractive business; the items. bad news is that many others are WE: Who would you put next? attracted to the business and they will FRECHE: ITT, GTE and Nippon Elec be taking dead aim at us. tric. Speaking from strictly a trans WE: How are we fixed to meet mission point of view, Rockwell Inter the competition? national probably is the next most FRECHE: We know that in the new important, largely because of its Col environment we are going to have to l i n s R a d i o s u b s i d i a r i e s . We w o r k e d do many things differently. However, closely with Collins in the Saudi Ara your question seems to imply that we bian project. That points up another of have not faced competition before. the problems we face when we talk That's not true. We have always faced competition. competition in our part 'of the busi Sometimes companies are suppliers ness. We have the technology, the and subcontractors in one sphere and "Our foreign people, the experience and the facili competitors in another or both at the competitors are large, ties to do an outstanding job. same time. We have a history of being able to WE: You've mentioned the as well-established, offer our customers complete sys sault on the American tele tems—not just individual products. communications marketplace by financially sound firms with very fine Everything works compatibly. It's de foreign-based companies. How are signed to do so, manufactured to do they going about it? R&D groups" so, installed to do so. Our customers FRECHE: They are operating for the look to us as a total systems supplier. most part through American subsidi which is where new products and W E : I n w h a t a r e a s a r e w e aries and affiliates. They have been services come from. It is a circular strongest? buying up high technology firms right challenge. FRECHE: We are strongest in the full and left. The trade press is filled these WE: If the competition gets an range of telecommunications, prod days with news of consolidations, ac increasingly large share of the lo ucts and services. Our team has honed quisitions and joint ventures. For cal exchange companies' equip its skills to a high order in basic instance. Northern Telecom has ac ment business, what can we do to electronics, software, quired an interest in more than a grow and prosper in the years proficiency and systems logistics. dozen U.S. firms in the telecom ahead? What a lot of people forget is that Bell munications equipment, data FRECHE: To prosper, we must Laboratories invented the transistor processing and testing fields since quicken our pace of introduction of and Western Electric perfected the 1978. Siemens AG of West Germany new products and services to protect manufacturing processes to make pos has acquired almost as many and, in our present sales base. To grow we sible the mass production of all addition, has formed a partnership must expand our product and service s e m i c o n d u c t o r d e v i c e s . M u c h o f t h e with Corning Glass Works—Siecor—to offerings beyond our traditional tele competition we face today is an out produce optical fibers. Philips NV of communications base. Our marketing growth of our own innovation. the Netherlands and L. M. efforts must be strengthened and bet Similarly, the Bell switched network is Telephone Co. of Sweden have also ter focused. We also have to a giant computer, operated by soft acquired American companies. The aggressively step up our cost-reduc ware, which is again one of the Japanese firms, on the other hand, tion efforts to keep our company a hallmarks of the new competition. But have relied more on establishing their low-cost producer. We'll have to culti again it's an area where we have own U.S. subsidiaries, than on vate new business. We are going to tremendous expertise. 1 believe we are acquisition. have to go out and beat the bushes for strongest in the areas of greatest po Initially the firms acquired by the government work, make sales to other t e n t i a l f o r t h e f u t u r e .

4 WE Quiz

Western Electric is the world's lead Hewlett-Packard ing manufacturer of telecommunica Honeywell, Inc. tions equipment. Increasingly, our AMDAHL position as industry leader is being Sperry Univac challenged. The quiz below makes no CIT>]lccitel^ claim to cosmic completeness. It is Q. Who are the major producers of integrated circuits? designed simply to familiarize you A. Gould-American Micro System w i t h t h e n a m e s o f s o m e o f o u r m o r e active competitors—names you will Fujitsu 1 nil Intel be hearing much more insistently Motorola f r o m h e r e o n . C o n d i t i o n s h a v e Mostek changed and will change even more as FUJITSU National our products are offered for sale in Nippon Electric world markets. Philips Schlumberger-Fairchild Siemens Q. Who are the ten largest across-the- board competitors that Western Elec Te x a s I n s t r u m e n t s t r i c f a c e s i n w o r l d m a r k e t s ? (313 Q. What is a niche competitor? A. CITAlcatel (France) Switching & Telephone A. A company that specializes in one prod Fujitsu (Japan) Products uct or a limited product area. GTE(USA) ITT (USA) L.M. Ericsson Telephone Co. (Sweden) Q. Who are the major manufacturers Nippon Electric (Japan) of PBXs worldwide besides the big 10? Northern Telecom (Canada) A. Mitel (Canada) Philips NV (Netherlands) Rolm Siemens AG (West Germany) ITT Thomson-CSF (France) Q. Who are the major producers of wire and cable for Q. In the transmission area who are telecommunications? our major competitors in the provi A. Atlantic-Richfield-Anaconda sion of carrier equipment—excluding E s s e x W i r e & C a b l e the foreign big ten? GK Technologies-General Cable A. Exxon-Reliance I n s i l c o - T i m e s W i r e & C a b l e Harris-Farinon ITT-Standard Telephone and Cable Lenkurt (GTE) Phelps Dodge Lynch Communications Systems Simplex Rockwell International-Collins NEC Nippon Electric Co.. Ltd Q. Aside from the Bell operating com Q. Who are the world's leading pro Tokyo. Japan panies, which telephone companies or ducers of fiber optics? administrations are the largest world A. Hitachi w i d e i n t e r m s o f n u m b e r o f I n s i l c o - T i m e s F i b e r iiurfliGrn served? Nippon Electric telecom A. Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Public Siecor (Siemens-Corning) Corp. (Japan—51 million) Valtec (M/A-Com-Philips) Federal Ministry of Posts and Telecom munication (West Germany—25 Q. Who are the major manufacturers of telephone sets world wide—again million) besides the big 10? British Telecom (United Kingdom—21 PHILIPS million) A. Plessey (Great Britain) Ministry of Posts & Telecommunications General Dynamics-Stromberg-Carlson of the USSR (21 million) Q. Among the foreign suppliers of telecommunications equipment—ex Q. In the United States, aside from SIEMENS AT&T Long Lines, what other com cluding provision of telecom m u n i c a t i o n s s e r v i c e — ^ w h o i s t h e panies are major providers of long distance service? largest manufacturer of electronics equipment in the world? A. American Satellite A. Philips NV of the Netherlands is No. 1 Graphnet iy« THOMSON-CSF GTE-Telenet Q. Who are the major suppliers of ITT-DTS, USTS processors for telecommunications MCI operations? Our ten largest across- SBS A. Digital Equipment Corp. the-board competitors Southern Pacific Communications Co. IBM Tymshare-Tymnet 5 Third Quarter 1982

Technology for the Eighties

Technology is what the Bell System's future is all about. Here is where ifs taking us and how ifs happening

In our rapidly changing world, the wide variety of services. thing that keeps changing most rapidly The key word here is digital It is technology—and the rate of such refers to the fact that all signals, be change keeps accelerating. More new they voice, data or video signals, arc- science and technology have been t r a n s m i t t e d a n d / o r s w i t c h e d a s created in our century than in all of streams of distinct pulses rather than man's previous history. as continuously varying electrical cur Not surprisingly, Western Electric, rents that vary in analogous mimicry which, in partnership with Bell Labo- • of the voices or other signals they ratories, has significantly contributed represent. It's worth noting here that to this state of technological flux, has the Bell System network began as (and been, and eontinues to be, profoundly largely remains) an analog network. affected by it. The products we make, This is simply because we live in what the ways in which we make them, the is essentially an analog world. Speech, skills required to make them—even, in for example, is analog—continuous some cases, the environments in changes in air pressure that vibrate which we make them—are all quite o u r e a r d r u m s i n a c c o r d a n c e w i t h t h e different from what they were 20 or speaker's words. Digital signals, on the 30 years ago. As a leading-edge man other hand, are strictly electronic- ufacturer, our name is virtually creations. synonymous with change. Three forces are driving the once This dynamic situation is, perhaps, all-analog Bell System network to best exemplified by a single fact: over wards its all-digital future. They art- 40 percent of the thousands of prod new technology, economics, and cus ucts we ship today were introduced t o m e r d e m a n d . S o l i d - s t a t e d e v i e e s , into manufacture within the past five lightwave transmission systems and years. Similarly, many of the proeesses stored-program control are most effi and much of the equipment used to cient when operated in the digital make and test them are equally new. mode. One might say that they tend to Three basic technologies underlie be inherently digital in nature. t h e e l e c t r o n i c r e v o l u t i o n t h a t m a r k e d Solid state memories, for example, our entry into what has come to be store bits—the ones and zeros that called, "The Information Age." These make up the fundamental alphabet of technologies are microelectronics, digital languages. Lightwave systems photonics, and software. All of these are by far most efficient when the are intertwined and mutually suppor signals they carry are pulses of light. tive of the Bell System's massive effort Although they can carry an analog of to create an Integrated Services Digi the human voice as a continuously tal Network—a nationwide, end-to- varying light beam, this would use a end digital network that will provide a much greater to carry the

7 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 same small amount of information. It to another, customer demand for digi would be cheaper because, even then, would be akin to using the enormous tal service is growing. it was becoming clear that digital capacity of the Alaska pipeline to send As for economics, the picture here terminal equipment would be cheaper only a trickle of oil. is much more complicated, being af than analog terminal equipment be Of the three technologies underly fected by things like new equipment cause of the transistor." ing a digital network, software is the costs, the number of circuit miles By 1962, this realization had led to most digital of all. It is, among other involved, and the types of equipment t h e i n t r o d u c t i o n o f t h e w o r l d ' s fi r s t things, written to control stored-pro- already in place. digital telecommunications system— gram-control processors which are As Don Leonard, formerly Vice T-1 Carrier. Further advances in tech computer-like machines that control President, Engineering, (now Vice nology since then have made digital electronic switching systems. Such President-Switching Systems at Bell metropolitan trunks cheaper even for machines "talk" in digits. Since more Labs) notes, "When we began looking lengths as short as three miles. Today, and more of our customers are in into the feasibility of digital transmis about 70 percent of Bell System inter volved in data processing of one kind sion in the late 50s, we saw that digital o ff i c e c i r c u i t s a r e o n T c a r r i e r — a n d or another and need to ship increasing trunks of 10 miles or longer between that figure is expected to grow to 90 quantities of digits from one location central olFices in metropolitan areas percent by 1990. For long distance transmission, the economics still generally favor analog systems, so that only a little more than one percent of the Bell System's inter city facilities are digital. However, by 1990, this figure should rise to about 30 percent. Another major step towards the all- digital network was taken in 1965 with the introduction of the first stored- program-control switching system— the No. 1 FSS. Eleven years later. Western Electric installed its first No. 4 ESS—an all-digital stored-program- control toll switch with a capability of handling over 550,000 calls per hour. What makes the No. 4 ESS all-digital as compared to the No. 1 ESS is that it uses something called a time-division network and can only switch digital signals. However, although the No. 1 uses a space-division network, in which every signal is provided with a separate metallic path, it should be noted that, in addition to analog sig nals, it can also efficiently switch digital signals up to 64 kilobits per second (per channel). Thus, the abil ity to switch or not switch digital signals does not depend on time- division switching alone. In a time-division switch such as the No. 4 ESS and the more recent No. 5 ESS, the input and output signals to the network must be digital and are assigned to separate time slots and switched by high-speed solid-state cir cuits. Both of these switches only handle digital signals and, therefore, analog signals must be converted to digital in order to be switched. In a mixed analog and digital net work, multiple conversions add expense, pointing up why network planning on an overall basis is so important. An all-digital network will reduce the expense of such con version equipment as well as the cost o f i t s m a i n t e n a n c e . "Ultimately," says Leonard, "the tech-

8 WE we continue to develop better digital nology is taking us where we want to flexibility and ease of growth. be—digital all the way—and that Several other kinds of very large transmission banks and multiplexor means right into the home and office." scale integration (VLSI) chips are also equipment in support of the Inte Towards this end, Western Electric is used, including 64K random access grated Services Digital Network. ATTS, producing a whole family of digital memory (RAM) chips that can store w h i c h s t a n d s f o r A u t o m a t e d Tr a n s m i s subscriber loop carrier systems such over 64,000 bits of information and sion Terminal System, encompasses a as the SLC*-96 system. Known as pair- coder-decoder chips (codecs) that n u m b e r o f v i t a l t r a n s m i s s i o n u n i t s . One of these, the D5 channel bank, gain systems, because they make it translate speech and other kinds of possible to send up to 96 voice signals analog information into digital pulses now under development, will be mi over as few as three pairs of wires, this and back again as needed. croprocessor controlled. It handles equipment can keep signals digital all Another kind of analog-to-digital conversion (and vice the way out to the feeder terminals chip, called the gated crosspoint versa), important maintenance and op where they can be separated and (GDX) provides an economical inter erating functions and a number of d i s t r i b u t e d t o i n d i v i d u a l h o m e s a n d face for those loops which are still revenue-generating special services. offices in either analog or digital form. analog. It has the high voltage charac This design concept will substantially For that last step—digits into the teristics required to function in the reduce the amount of equipment re home, we are getting ready to man quired in a central office, again ufacture a digital telephone and a through innovative design and time-division PBX. architecture. However, far more important to the "Ultimately^ the DAGS, which stands for Digital Ac evolution of an all-digital network than cess & Cross-Connect System, con either a digital telephone or PBX is technology is solidates high volumes of digital sig something called, "digital synergy." In taking us where nals and also multiplexes T1 (1.5 essence, this says that the more digital we want to be— megabit) and TIC (3 megabit) bit transmission and switching equipment streams. More importantly, it can elec you already have in place, the more digital all the way" tronically set up, test and rearrange economical it is to add more. For special services circuits—all from re example, a central office with a pre mote locations. Without DACS, such circuits have to be manually rear ponderance of digital T-1 trunks and the opportunity to add digital loops ranged every time a change is called has a much greater economic incen for by the customer. tive to install a local digital switch such as the No. 5 ESS than a central office with a preponderance of analog MICROELECTRONICS (VLSI) trunks and loops and little growth opportunity. With over 100 million M i c r o e l e c t r o n i c s c a n b e l o o k e d c i r c u i t m i l e s o f T- C a r r i e r a n d o v e r fi v e upon as the fuel stoking the digital million circuit miles of digital radio in engine. Since the early 60s, when the first integrated circuits were devel place—plus the growth of digital satel lite signals and special data transmis oped, the trend has been to double sion systems—the digital incentive the number of components that can be fabricated on a single silicon chip grows larger every year. W e s t e r n E l e c t r i c h a s b e e n r e i n f o r c every year. More and more equipment functions have found their way onto ing this incentive by constantly adding to its already substantial line of digital Microelectronics chips. Western Electric manufactures products and systems. Most promising is the fuel stoking th o u sa n d s o f d i ffe re n t ki n d s o f i n te of these new additions is the already grated circuits, and designs mentioned No. 5 ESS; a local time- the digital engine over 60 new ones every year. division switch flexible enough to "We're at the point," says Leonard, h a n d l e f r o m f e w e r t h a n 2 , 0 0 0 l i n e s t o "where we can put an entire system or more than 100,000. hostile loop environment of zaps and subsystem on a chip the size of your "It's a state-of-the-art system in every surges eaused by lightening. The GDX fingertip. Some of these chips perform sense of the term," says Leonard. "It is smaller, faster and cheaper than any circuit functions that used to require whole racks of equipment." incorporates a host of innovations, the of the mechanical switches it sup most important of which is described plants. The No. 5 ESS uses fiber The net result has been a constant in the phrase, 'distributed processing lightguides to interconnect its various decrease in the cost of digital elec a n d a r c h i t e c t u r e . ' " T h i s m e a n s i t s units. Because of their high informa tronics, with every decrease bringing the reality of an all-digital network a "intelligence" is provided by a number tion-carrying capacity, these fibers of and digital signal substantially reduce the number of little closer. L e o n a r d n o t e s t h e d r a m a t i c d i ff e r processors distributed throughout the c a b l e s n e e d e d f o r i n t e r c o n n e c t i o n . I n ence that very large scale integration system, rather than concentrated into addition, since they are not suscepti a single unit. This distributed intel ble to electromagnetic interference, has made between a typical 10,000 the lightguides reduce the amount of line No. 1/lA ESS and the No. 5 ESS in ligence is glued together via an innovative software architecture e l e c t r i c a l n o i s e a n d c r o s s t a l k i n t r o terms of numbers of components. which makes for greater modularity, duced into the system. "The No. 1/lA ESS," he says, "uses 640 d i f f e r e n t k i n d s o f d i s c r e t e c o m p o - • Tr a d e m a r k o f We s t e r n U l e c t r i c In addition to switching equipment. 9 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 nents, such as and capacitors, assembly time required." and cheaper memories do just that by and 124 different kinds of integrated Another important aspect of VLSI is enabling programmers to trade off circuits. If you add up all the transis that it has helped reduce—or, at least, expensive development time for cheap tors on those integrated circuits, plus hold down—the cost of software de memory space. Here, again, econom all the discrete components, the total velopment. It is primarily memory ics are at work and ultimately decide c o m e s t o a b o u t s e v e n m i l l i o n chips that have been doubling their bit the limits of such tradeoffs. components. capacity every year, and the large Although the Western Electric/Bell "The No. 5 ESS, on the other hand, number of "cheap" bits they offer has Labs team had to play "catch-up" in uses only 30 different kinds of discrete helped ease the burden of developing the early days of solid-state memories, components and only 64 different software that rigidly minimizes mem it did so with a vengeance and led the kinds of integrated circuits. Yet, if you ory use. Software development is world in introducing the 64K RAM add up all the components on these totally professional labor intensive and into production. "We're still ahead of chips, the total comes to a staggering having to squeeze the utmost out of everybody else in 64K technology," 2 5 0 m i l l i o n . T h i s m e a n s a l o t m o r e every available memory cell can be says Leonard, "in terms of reliability capability and complexity in a lot less very costly. Anything that reduces and speed." space, with a lot less power and program development time is a plus. H e a l s o f e e l s w e ' r e a h e a d w i t h t h e 256K RAM, which Allentown Works will begin producing before the end of this year. The 256K RAM, which like its predecessor, the 64K, seems to have skipped a generation (we made neither a 32K nor a I28K memory), can store over a quarter of a million bits of information and will provide the memory for delivering Information Age services. It is incredibly fast, with an average access time of just over 100 billionths of a second. And it is as reliable as it is fast, because it is relatively insensitive to outside inter ference such as alpha particles and power-supply "noise." It packs more than half a million components— mostly transistors—onto a chip of silicon slightly larger than a half-inch long by a quarter-inch wide. What makes this high density possi ble is the chip's use of feature sizes as small as 2.3 microns (or 90 millionths of an inch). Initially, the smallest fea ture sizes—technically called "design rules"—on the 64K RAM were 3 5 microns. Even so, most of the equip ment used to make the 3.5-micron chips can be used to make the 2.3- micron chips, although some new processing techniques will be required. It is, of course, just such new processing techniques—new technol ogy—that has enabled us to go from only a few components on a chip to o v e r h a l f a m i l l i o n i n l e s s t h a n 2 0 years. A history of this rapid progress would—and, in fact, does—fill several volumes. It is worth noting here that, in addition to the transistor, itself, which led to microelectronics, most of the technology that made VLSI possi ble came out of the Bell System^—that is, our Engineering Research Center, Bell Labs, and the manufacturing engi neering forces. A 1978 Fortune article listing 18 major advances in semicon ductor electronics pointed out that 12

WE o f t h e m h a d c o m e f r o m t h e B e l l of which provides intelligence for of the technological synergy smooth System. These included techniques for customer premises equipment such as ing the network's progress towards growing single crystals of transistor the Touch-a-matic® S telephone and digitalization. quality from molten silicon; tech the second of which does the same for niques for removing unwanted im switching machines, operating support purities from such crystals (zone refin systems and transmission systems. PHOTONICS ing); techniques for growing one kind Gallium technology is also being of crystal onto an electronically dif studied. But, when asked if—as one "Without vision, planning and, most ferent kind of crystal (epitaxy); and newspaper story recently predicted— importantly, an understanding of sci ence and technology, our third major techniques for printing microscopic Silicon Valley might soon become Gal circuit patterns on semiconductor sur lium Gulch, Leonard smiles and shakes Information Age technology—pho faces (photolithography). h i s h e a d . tonics—^would never have entered the Since then, several new processing "Silicon," he says, "is a very mature network as swiftly as it has," says Leonard. About ten years ago. Bell techniques have been added to West technology. It has been around for a ern's manufacturing arsenal, including long time and it will be around for a Labs' and Western's ERG started work plasma etching and laser repair of long time to come, beeause we under- ing on lightwave technology. Today, the Bell System has over 25,000 kilo memory chips. The former uses a plasma of ionic gas to "carve" circuit m e t e r s o f We s t e r n E l e c t r i c m a n u f a c features into silicon wafers. It elimi tured optical fiber in working light nates the pyramiding that comes with We're still second wave transmission systems—more traditional acid etching—a problem to none in light than has been installed in all of the resulting from the fact that acid cuts rest of the world. But the best exem silicon away just as quickly in the wave technology plar of fiber technology's growing u n w a n t e d h o r i z o n t a l d i r e c t i o n a s i t importance is the lightwave fiber and d o e s i n t h e d e s i r e d v e r t i c a l d i r e c t i o n . cable manufacturing plant within the Plasma etching neatly carves out VLSI Atlanta Works—a factory within a fac features with clean-cut vertical walls, tory that is capable of producing tens of thousands of kilometers of light- permitting the fabrication of smaller features and components. guide a year. The laser-repair technique, which is "We're still second to none in this used on the 64K RAM, and will also be technology," says Leonard em used on the 256K RAM, greatly in phatically. "Our systems expertise is creases chip yield by making it excellent, and the proof is in the short possible to substitute spare memory time it has taken us to come from a elements on a chip for ones found to 45-megabit system (the FT-3) to a 90- be defective due to crystal defects or megabit system (the FT3C). And we're not stopping there. On the 600-mile specks of dust picked up during manufacture. long Northeast Corridor, we'll be Several other techniques and proc 'Ifs tremendously using wavelength to ob esses presently under development tain three 90-megabit channels per will ultimately make it possible to important for our fiber." fabricate-long-lasting masks with manufacturing An old concept in a new field, sharper line definition and smaller wavelength multiplexing makes it pos features and, then, to dry etch those engineers to sible to send three separate lightwave smaller features onto chips. understand signals through a single fiber simul Along with the 256K RAM, Western taneously by using different wave is preparing to put into full production computers and lengths for each one. The different a remarkable new software" wavelengths are essentially different colors that are combined into a single chip that can process 32 bits at a time—as compared to the 4, 8, or 16 fiber by optical filters and separated bits most microprocessors are limited stand it. Gallium promises higher again by similar filters at the receiving to. Called the BELLMAC* 32A micro speeds, and we're using it for things end. Also under development are long processor, the new chip's 150,000 like lasers and light-emitting diodes, transistors and other circuitry give it but we don't understand it as well as wavelength lasers, single-mode fibers, as much computing power as many silicon. I suspect, for this decade, deepsea lightwave cable, integrated contemporary minicomputers are ca gallium will continue to find its major optics, and a fiber version of the pable of. It is fast, uses very little applications in improving our pho SLC-96 system. The long wavelength laser is impor power, can work with very large mem tonics and digital radio." tant because light at the wavelength it ories, and has an instruction set that The latter reference is to a gallium can efficiently handle sophisticated a r s e n i d e fi e l d e ff e c t t r a n s i s t o r We s t e r n emits (1.3 to 1.5 microns) suffers less loss through the fiber than light at operating systems and high-level com Electric uses as the power amplifier in short wavelengths. Lower loss means puter languages. the DR-6 digital microwave radio sys fewer repeaters and more economical Already in production are the tem. Called GaAsEETs for short, these BELLMAC* 4 microcomputer and the tiny chips replace the expensive and systems. BELLMAC* 8 microprocessor, the first short-lived traveling wave tubes pre The single mode fiber is potentially " Tr a d e m a r k o f We s t e r n E l e c t r i c viously used—another small example very important, because it promises

11 Third Quarter 1982 l o w e r l o s s e s a n d w i d e r b a n d w i d t h s . bered that, as tiny as lightguide is, into a single solid-state chip that will Wider bandwidths, of course, mean what we see is more than half glass perform all the functions necessary to greater transmission capacity with all cladding. It is only the core that keep lightwave pulses sharp and that portends. However, single mode actually carries the light signals. With strong as they traverse long distances. lightwave technology is a whole new a core only as big as three or four A single, integrated optics chip will be ball game and will require new man bacteria, a splicing mismatch of only a able to (1) detect an incoming light ufacturing processes, new electronics, f e w m i l l i o n t h s o f a n i n c h c o u l d l o s e pulse, (2) convert it into an electrical and, above all, new connectors and the whole signal. "Still a great deal of signal, (3) amplify, or regenerate it, splicing techniques. One reason is that progress has been made, and there is and (4) convert it back to light for the core of single mode fiber is only no doubt in my mind that we will retransmission. The potential savings a b o u t o n e - t e n t h t h e d i a m e t e r o f t h e soon bring a high-performance, single of such a chip keep growing as more core in the multimode fiber presently mode system into existence," says and more fiber permeates the being used—and the present core ( 50 Leonard. network. microns) is only two thousandths of Integrated optics represent an at The SLC-96 system has already been a n i n c h i n d i a m e t e r A t e n t h o f t h a t i s tempt to combine digital, lightwave, d e s c r i b e d . A fi b e r v e r s i o n w o u l d r e down to germ size. It must be remem and microelectronics technologies place present copper cables between the terminals with glass, thus extend ing lightwave technology into the subscriber loop, as well as digital. "Ultimately," says Leonard, "we have the same goal for light as we have for digits: we'd like to stay in light all the way into the home or office, eliminat ing the need for any conversions whatsoever. "Actually," he adds, "we have the technology to do that right now We can even get enough light power into a fiber to ring an electronic telephone 'bell,' but the economics don't justify it, yet."

STORED-PROGRAM CONTROL (SOFTWARE) Software, without which the stored- pfogram-control concept would be meaningless, has become one of West ern's fastest growing product lines. This was inevitable since, as Leonard notes, "Over the years, telecommuni c a t i o n s s w i t c h e s h a v e c o m e m o r e a n d more to resemble computers. Even the languages used to write their pro grams have come increasingly to re semble the languages used in informa tion processing machines. In fact, the Bell System network constitutes the largest single software system in the world." The growing importance of soft ware—as well as the magnitude of the task of creating it—is best illustrated by our commitment to supporting software development at Bell Labs as well as by our new Network Software Center in Lisle, Illinois. Its five build ings of approximately 600,000 square feet will house about 2,500 em ployees—many of whom are moving in even as this article is being written. Most of these people will complement Bell Labs in the design of computer programs for Bell System telecom munications equipment, including our entire family of electronic switching

WE systems. Their work extends into D I G I TA L V S A N A L O G three basic areas called, traditional, ESS generic, and special projects. To technical people, the dif for example, is represented by the Traditional software—so called be ference between analog and digital sequence 01100100. cause Western Electric people have transmission is so basic as to re These eight-bit samples are inter been working in this area the long quire no explanation. But, for leaved with samples of other signals est—are the programs that handle the nontechnical types, the words often a n d t r a n s m i t t e d a s a c o n t i n u o u s enormous data bases unique to each have no meaning at all. pulse stream at extremely high and every central office. Often con The simplest way to think of an speeds. One advantage is that it taining over a million items of analog signal—let's say a voice sig doesn't make any difference to the information, these data bases include nal over a pair of wires—is as a transmission equipment whether things like trunking routes, equipment c o n t i n u o u s fl o w o f e l e c t r i c a l c u r the pulses are representing voices, addresses and billing information. rent that varies in exact proportion TV pictures, or data. To digital The generic programs provide the to the voice it is representing. At transmission equipment, a pulse is a basic intelligence that enables elec the receiving telephone, this cur pulse is a pulse. They all look tronic switching systems to swiftly rent creates a fluctuating electro exactly alike, varying only in their route calls through the network. It magnetic field that vibrates a metal combinations. That's why it's so includes special services capabilities— diaphragm. The diaphragm recre easy to mix voice, data and picture such as Call forwarding. ates the original voice by pushing a signals when they are transmitted Special projects develop different vibrating column of air into your digitally. kinds of programs, such as one that ear. Another advantage is that, be makes it possible for police, fire, and Digital transmission is quite an cause all the pulses are alike, they other emergency bureaus to instantly other story. It has been mathe can be exactly recreated, or "regen obtain the street address of people matically proven that all of the erated" along the way as they weaken over long distances. The calling the emergency 911 number. information in a voice signal can be I n a d d i t i o n t o s o f t w a r e f o r t h e extracted by measuring, or "sam pulses can be pretty feeble by the traditional generic and special proj pling," the amplitude of the signal time they reach a regenerator, but, ects areas. Bell Labs—and, increas at a rate that is at least twice its as long as they can be detected in the proper sequence, there is no ingly, Western Electric—produce soft frequency. What's more, that por ware for things like operations support tion of the signal between samples problem. The regenerator simply systems that simplify management and can be discarded, leaving room to recreates brand new ones for the maintenance of the network; for cus insert samples of other voice next leg of the trip. The ultimate tomer premise equipment such as signals. received signal may have been PBXs; and, of course, for the manufac In Bell System digital transmis regenerated dozens—even hun ture, testing and inventory control of sion, the sampling rate is 8,000 dreds—of times, but it will still be the tens of thousands of Western times a second. Each of these sam an exact replica of the original. Electric products we make. ples, or measures of amplitude, is Analog signals can, of course, be "It is tremendously important for encoded into a short sequence of amplified as they weaken en route our manufacturing engineers to under ones and zeros, which is the binary across the country. But they tend to stand computers and software," says number system as well as the lan pick up noise and interference Leonard. "Not only are more and more guage of computers. A one can be along the way, and this gets ampli of our products using software, but electronically represented by a fied, too. Over the years, Bell Labs more of our engineers are using com pulse and a zero can be represented has developed all kinds of ways to puters and software to design them by the absence of a pulse. A se minimize such noise and inter than ever before. That's why we have quence of eight pulses can repre ference, but digital transmission over 56 courses on these subjects at sent any one of 256 individual virtually eliminates these problems the CEC—more than for any other amplitudes. An amplitude of 100. altogether. discipline—and more are being developed." One of our software systems has become world famous. Called the a simplex mode as a stand-alone, communications manufacturer—and UNIX* system, it is a highly versatile general purpose computer in over 30 we will." As for the future, Leonard is optimis operating system that makes it fairly W e s t e r n E l e c t r i c l o c a t i o n s . tic. "We've got a lot of smart people easy for people to develop software. Asked if he envisioned Western de Its features for editing, data managing veloping consumer software, such as working on a lot of things. And, even and compiling have greatly improved TV games, Leonard was quick to an though you can't schedule inventions, the productivity of software genera swer, "No." I predict our future will sparkle with as many innovations as ever. Mean t i o n . T h e r e a r e o v e r 1 , 2 0 0 U N I X "Just because we have all kinds of systems in use in the Bell System and capabilities," he said, "doesn't mean while, our need is to continue increas even more in the outside world under we'll use them for all kinds of things. ing productivity and to encourage in license. The UNIX system works ex We have printing presses for some of our people the vision of tomorrow and drive to overcome obstacles, so ceedingly well with Western's 3B20 the technical support material we gen that we reach our goals first. Our processor, the duplex version of erate, but that doesn't mean we'll get which provides intelligence for No. 5 into printing wedding invitations. competition is formidable, but we ESS, TSPS, and CCIS. It also operates in "Our mission," he concluded, "is to don't like to be, and we don't intend • T r a d e m a r k o f B e l l L a b o r a t o r i e s remain a first-class, leading-edge tele to be, second."

13 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 this area. There has been a tremen dous amount of office construction and road construction has not kept pace. Anything we can do to adjust the flow of cars coming in here helps, My Time Is since we are among the larger employ ers in the area." George Hlava, Department Chief, FlexIMe Technical Professional Relations, provided some of the nuts and bolts on implementation. "We made the first announcement in a Technical Profes Somefhing new is happening at Ihe s i o n a l R e l a t i o n s N e w s l e t t e r t h a t c a m e out February 15," George said. "About Network Software Center, and, so far, the same time, we started to develop everybody seems to like it informational material for everyone i n v o l v e d . T h e s e m a t e r i a l s i n c l u d e d employee and supervisory brochures as well as training curriculum from Lee Kopp's Training, Public Relations and Graphic Arts Departments." Beth Eddy, Assistant Manager, On April 1,1982, the first con establish special work schedules. Human Resources, described the in T h e s e s c h e d u l e s w o u l d b e e s t a b tingent of people who occupied the troduction of the Flexible Work Hours Network Software Center (NSC) in lished on a monthly basis. There at NSC. "A great deal of emphasis was Lisle, Illinois were given a choice of w o u l d b e n o c o r e h o u r s f o r t h e s e placed on implementation planning. A starting time—anywhere from 7:00 employees since they may be re a.m. to 8:45 a.m. That day marked the key factor in our implementation was quired to work unusual shifts such a series of training sessions with the beginning of Western Electric's first as midnight to 8 a.m., noon to 8 supervisors which provided the neces f o r m a l t r i a l o f F l e x i b l e Wo r k H o u r s . p.m., etc., to meet current business T h e t r i a l a t t h e N e t w o r k S o f t w a r e sary information to implement and to needs. train their employees, as well as a Center includes three independent al WE spoke with several of the indi forum for discussion of concerns. As a ternatives: Flextime, Staggered Hours v i d u a l s w h o w e r e i n v o l v e d w i t h t h e result of these meetings, we made and Flexitour. While the majority of some modifications in the original NSCs employees are on Flextime, the development and implementation of the Flexible Work Hours Trial to get a proposal. Staggered Hours and Flexitour ap fl a v o r f o r t h e b e h i n d - t h e - s c e n e s e f f o r t "We have been working very closely proaches provide for unique business as well as the impetus for Flexible with Human Resources people from situations. A description of each alter Wo r k H o u r s a t N S C . the Guilford Center, in particular. Bob native is as follows: Ron Tevonian, Director of Network Kempen and Judith Stokes." F l e x t i m e — ^ T h i s i s t h e m o s t f l e x i b l e Engineering and Software Develop- "Since this is a formal corporate and applicable of the three ap mentt at the Center, who spearheaded trial," Judith said, "we have attempted proaches. Employees on Flextime the program says, "The program was to identify pertinent measures to eval would be expected to work the instituted, largely because of employee uate the ejffect of Flexible Work Hours. core hours between 8:45 a.m. and requests. No sin^e set of hours is These measures will include data on 3:45 p.m. The start time could vary ideally suited for all people. By accom employee perceptions and business on a daily basis, but each employee modating the work hours to an operations. Trends of these data were would be required to submit a individual's situation, we can avoid tracked prior to the start of Flexible weekly schedule to the immediate c o n fl i c t s w h i c h w o u l d o t h e r w i s e l e a d W o r k H o u r s a n d w i l l c o n t i n u e t o b e supervisor by the preceding t o l o s t t i m e o r r e d u c e d e ff e c t i v e n e s s . monitored until the conclusion of the Wednesday. "In moving to this new building, trial, which is scheduled to be six Staggered Hours—In order to there was a convergence of factors months after the last organization provide adequate coverage to meet that seemed to cry out for a more moves into NSC. At the end of the the needs of the business, there flexible approach. First and foremost trial, these data will be analyzed to may be some individuals, groups, or were the desires of employees coupled evaluate the overall impact." organizations (e.g., word process w i t h t h e n e e d s o f b u s i n e s s w h i c h Casey Encher—Information Systems ing, data centers, etc.) where a less require many of our people to be at Staff Member (ISSM) (Flextime)—"1 flexible work schedule would be w o r k a t o d d t i m e s . M u c h o f o u r w o r k like it, mostly because of the long required. Staggered Hours, like involves the use of computers. When drive—25 miles. I get here at 7:30 Flextime, has a set number of core you have everyone starting at different which makes a big difference in traffic hours (8:45 a.m. to 3:45 p.m.). times, there are opportunities to ac patterns although with daylight savings These schedules would be ap cess a lightly loaded computer and time there have been some other delays. proved on a quarterly basis. improve interactive response time. I've already exercised my flexibility. Flexitour—^Unique business situa Other aspects of our work require One day I had to have some work done tions (e.g., Diagnostic Centers, access to a test laboratory to integrate on the car. We can do things like that on Scheduled Test Lab Time) may re software and hardware into a system. fairly short notice—^as long as we keep quire supervisors and individuals to "Another factor is highway traffic in accurate records."

14 WE LindaPaule—Information Systems Staff Pat Crawford—Computer Service come in three days at 7 and the other Member (Flextime)—"There are some Clerk—Systems Support Group (Flex- two at 7:30. It's entirely a matter of per sonal preference. 1 can get a tremen things I'd like to see done differently, time)—"1 used to come in early anyway. but I think it shows that the company is Now 1 come in early and have the advan d o u s a mo u n t o f w o rk d o n e w h e n 1 first looking out for the people. My husband tage of quitting earlier. 1 live about 15 get in. The meetings and the the phone is a supervisor at Indian Hill—just minutes away in Naperville, but 1 do calls and interruptions usually don't across the road—and I normally come notice that by coming a little earlier 1 come before 'core' time. It varies, I'm i n w i t h h i m a n d w o r k 8 t o 5 . I f t h e r e ' s beat the traffic. In the evening I've been sure, but in this row there are only two some special work situation, we can ad using the extra time studying." o f u s w h o a r r i v e w i t h t h e e a r l i e s t just our schedules. 1 think it's going to group." take a while for everyone to adjust, in Jerry Zamirowski—Information Sys Bob Mele—Department Chief-Software cluding management." tems Associate (Flextime)—"The last Production (Flextime)—"1 was a mem Lois Wolf—Coordinator, Word Process couple of days I've been flexing. My ber of the original task force on flexible ing (Staggered Hours)—"I'm not a car's in the shop and I've been riding to working hours and we will continue to meet monthly to discuss progress and morning person at all—so the later 1 can work with a friend. I've been able to

s t a r t t h e b e t t e r . I ' m o n 8 : 4 5 t o 5 : 4 5 adjust my schedule at no loss to the problem situations. It is still very early which is fine. Here in word processing company to draw any conclusions. At the end of we're on staggered hours where our ser "The approach towards flex hours the trial, which will run about a year, we vices must be available from 7 to 5:45. shows a more professional attitude to will summarize the results and publish We gave everyone in here their choice ward people on the part of the com our recommendations. 1 think people on when they wanted to start and pany—and a more professional attitude have been very receptive to the trial. coverage worked out amazingly well. toward work on the part of the people." They seem to be trending toward early Everyone got her prime choice. Com in, early out. And there's very little flex muting is not normally a problem. 1 live D o n O b e r h o l z — S e n i o r I S S M ( F l e x ing during the week. They set patterns a 11 miles west in Aurora. Unfortunately, time)—"1 like it, but my wife doesn't. week in advance and hold to them. at the moment the tollway is all torn up We're getting up an hour earlier, which Some supervisors have noticed an im so it's slower going. From where 1 sit 1 is great for me, but it's harder for her to provement in some people who had can see one of the parking lots. It is adjust. She works at the Geneva Com problems getting to work on time. If the trial proves successful, a program even interesting that three quarters of the lot munity Hospital. 1 come by carpool more flexible than we now have may be empties at four. It's difficult to contact w i t h a n o t h e r S e n i o r I S S M . W e ' v e recommended." o u r c l i e n t s a f t e r t h a t h o u r. " worked out an arrangement where we 15 Third Quarter 1982 In Recogmtion of Long Service

Despite all those old jokes about gold watches at retirement parties, the fact of the matter is that Western Electric did not provide such memen tos until relatively recent times—the mid 1960s. Additional vacation days have always been the principal way the Company recognized long service. And since 1915, the Company has given out s e r v i c e e m b l e m s o n n o t a b l e a n n i v e r s aries. Awarding the emblems provides an opportunity for the honoree to spend some time with the boss or upper levels of management (depend ing upon length of service) to talk about job satisfaction. The emblems have changed in design seven times over the years—largely reflecting the looks of the telephone set. The em blems are available in the form of tie tacks and various other jewelry items, which is what most of us choose rather than the original lapel button. Company-paid luncheons for up to 12 friends of a retiree, which are sometimes selected in lieu of a gift, date back to 1944, although there had been sporadic attempts to get such a program started for at least 15 years before that. Gifts paid for by the company, ini tially a gold watch, a sterling silver bowl or silver tray, were first pre sented on a company-wide basis in 1966. When the price of gold sky rocketed in the early 1970s, however, l4-carat gold watches were discon tinued. It was at that time that a variety of gifts was first offered. The items offered are all top quality. Aver age cost to the Company is about S170. List prices run considerably higher. Effective Sept. 1. there will be 4l choices, if you add in all the different styles of watches and patterns of silver ware available. In addition to the types of products shown here. Design Line®

16 WE Curtis Campbell, Department Chief, Corporate Staff, Pioneer Activities and Special Studies, examines a man's pocket watch, one of the new items. She administers the anniversary gifts and retirement gifts programs.

decorator telephones are also available as gifts, except the Americana Edition wall telephone, which is a limited edition model. Purchasing has recently negotiated a contract with a new supplier, for the items shown in the large photo, Michael C. Fina Co. of New York City. L. G. Balfour Co. of Attleboro, Mass., continues as the supplier of jewelry i t e m s w h i c h i n c l u d e t h e W E e m b l e m . Items are not stocked by Western Electric. They are ordered from the supplier on an individual basis by the local anniversary coordinator at the time the employee makes the selection.

Gifts awarded at retirement or on the 25th service anniversary and every five years thereafter, include old standbys plus some new items such as luggage, silverplated flatware, a new camera, and a 5-inch TV set and cassette player in one.

17 CAPTAIN DENVER TH THAT PESKY STATIC METER. THESE ANTI-STATIC PRECAUTIONS REALLY CRAMPING MY STYLE.",

Zap!

If you walk across a nylon carpet, or E l e c t r o s t a t i c d i s this insidious and costly problem. stroke a cat, or comb your hair, you It was the Bell System's first sym will pick up (or lose) a few billion charge "zaps" mil posium on ESD—electrostatic dis electrons. Whether you know it or charge, and it took the missionary zeal not, you have acquired a charge of lions of dollars of two men to make it happen. The static electricity. If you're home, or out worth of integrated men are Burt Unger of Bell Labs and shopping, or visiting a friend—or just Western's "Mac" McFarland. The year about anyplace where you're not circuits every before, both had presented papers on handling integrated circuits, the most ESD at a non-Bell System technical damage you can do is give yourself or year—but we're symposium in Las "Vegas. your friend a slight electrical shock. "Afterwards," says McFarland, "Burt But, if you are around integrated fighting back and 1 and a couple of other Western circuits, you have become a potential and Bell Labs engineers got together killer. With just a touch of your finger, By Saul Fingerman to talk about the ESD situation in the you can blast the life out of these tiny Bell System. We agreed that something silicon chips. You won't see or hear Photos by should be done, and Burt said, 'How the explosion, because it happens on a about a Bell System symposium?' microscopic scale—but it does hap fack Sauchelli When 1 came back to Denver, 1 asked pen. In fact, the chips get "zapped" so for permission to hold one, and got it." often, it costs the Bell System millions System to the Denver Works audi Unger handled the technical end of of dollars every year. torium last April. They came to hear the program—^who would talk about And that's what brought a lot of men experts from Western Electric, Bell what—^while McFarland did the organ a n d w o m e n f r o m a l l o v e r t h e B e l l Labs and AT&T tell them how to fight izational work. This included mailing

18 WE A stalwart Captain Denver gives nasty old Static Man a taste of his own medicine. The cartoon first appeared on the cover of the Denver Works' employee magazine.

o u t a b o u t 6 0 0 i n v i t a t i o n s t o B e l l System people they thought should be interested. "I thought, maybe, we'd get 80 people to come," he says. He wasn't even close. The response was overwhelming, and it very nearly became a "standing-room-only" affair.

This crater isn't on the moon. It's on a tiny integrated circuit chip and was caused by a bad case of electrostatic discharge.

Chairs had to be added to the Denver Works' auditorium all the way up to the back wall. Nearly 250 people came, including 111 from Western, 95 from Bell Labs, 16 from AT&T, and 24 from the Bell operating companies. "The Bell companies had to be included," says McFarland, "because ESD problems begin from the day of integrated circuit manufacture and continue all the way to operation in the field. We can do everything possi ble to get our products to them in good condition, but, if they don't know how to cope with ESD, they can On the stage of the Denver Works auditorium, Burt Unger of Bell Lab still damage them." oratories and Western Electric's "Mac" McFarland talk over some details before The fact is that any time solid-state the opening of their symposium on the problems of electrostatic discharge. devices or circuit packs containing them are touched, they are in symposium. Every time 1 touched a walk across a carpet can reach 30,000 volts. An amble across a vinyl tile floor jeopardy. This is particularly true in doorknob at the hotel last night, 1 areas with low humidity, such as Den drew a spark about a quarter of an can charge you to 13,000 volts. Just ver, where dry air and dry skin make it inch long." Mercifully, he didn't add sitting on a workbench stool and difficult for an electrostatic charge to that it had been a shocking doing a normal amount of squirming bleed off and dissipate. As Unger experience. around can get you up to 3,000 volts. observed in his opening remarks, And, yet, it can be. The potential Incidentally, you can't feel anything "Denver is a great place for an ESD your body builds up during a short until you get up over about 4,000

19 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 volts. But 25,000 volts in the vicinity static electricity damage without so careful handling is required." of your scalp is literally enough to phisticated equipment. In addition As for people working around the make your hair stand on end and give there's a problem called "latency." This chips, they now are grounded by wrist you that "bride-of-Frankenstein" look is where a zapped integrated circuit straps with built in safety resistors. so popular in 1930s horror movies. will often only be wounded, rather These straps are connected to long The reason that none of this is than killed outright. Such a device cords with clips on the end that snap harmful to humans, let alone lethal, is often passes all tests and continues on to conductive plastic counter tops that ESD shocks are essentially all working for weeks or months, or even on their work benches. Because the bark-and-no-bite, which is to say they a year—^but, eventually, it will suc counter tops are grounded, they dissi are virtually all voltage and no current. c u m b t o i t s w o u n d a n d d i e . T h e pate electrostatic charges before they And, for a shock to injure you, it has to longer this process takes, the more have a chance to build up in an push a fair amount of current through expensive it becomes. That's because operator's body. your body. Even your fingertip arcing the cost of finding and replacing a Static electricity is created when over to a doorknob at 30,000 volts defective integrated circuit increases two materials rub against each other. If won't suffer any physical harm, be by about a factor of 10 at each stage of you make them conductive, you elimi cause the high resistance and its progress into the Bell System. For nate the problem. If your socks were capacitance of your body slows that example, if it costs 30 cents to find a made of conductive material, they discharge down so that it occurs over defective integrated circuit in the wouldn't go snap, crackle and pop and a relatively long interval. manufacturing stage, it will cost $3 00 cling together so tenaciously when On the other hand, ESD is devastat you pull them out of the clothes dryer. ing to integrated circuit chips because In fact, the fabric softener you proba all the charge is released very quickly bly use to cure this pesky problem is into a very, very small volume. The really a mild conductive agent. ESD power being dissipated through a Where operators have to move pinpoint-sized transistor junction can around a lot, they use shoe straps and easily reach a staggering 2.5 million conductive grounding mats. The watts per square centimeter in the first straps, tucked into their shoes, con millionth of a second. "And that," as SometimeSy inte duct electricity from perspiration- one of the symposium speakers noted m o i s t e n e d s o c k s t o t h e m a t s . in wry understatement, "is an awful lot grated circuits Ionized air blowers that dissipate of power to be dumping into a tiny are only static electricity over workbenches are piece of silicon." also in use, as are anti-static shipping It is, in fact, enough power to bring "woundedy' bags and bubble packs and conductive the silicon up to its 1,400° Centigrade cleaning solutions in wave-soldering r a t h e r t h a n machines. In the latter case, Denver melting point and beyond. True, it very quickly re-freezes, but only after killed outright Works engineers discovered that the its operating characteristics have been brushes used to clean circuit packs after they passed through wave-solder drastically altered, or totally de stroyed. Microphotographs of zapped ing machines were building up terrific chips often look like pictures of cra voltages on the underside of the packs ters on the moon. Not surprisingly, as and doing a lot of them in. A con ductive cleaning solution solved the integrated circuit components get smaller and more and more of them problem and is saving Western Electric are crowded onto chips, the effects of millions of dollars every year. ESD become even more deadly. at the printed wiring board stage; As far as McEarland is concerned, With all of this, one wonders why $30.00 at the final system test stage; the really heavy artillery against ESD an ESD symposium wasn't held long and $300 in the field or customer damage consists of Static-Awareness before now premises stage. Programs, one of which he instituted "That's easy," says McFarland. "The At this point, the question becomes, in Denver in 1981. Now an integral reason is that, even though lots of "What are we doing about all this?" part of the Dimension® PBX and people knew there was a problem, The answer is, "Quite a lot." Horizon® communications system cir they weren't sure what was causing it. Starting with the chips, themselves, cuit pack manufacturing lines, the ESDs of only 100 volts or less can we are building protective networks program has already resulted in cost damage integrated circuits, but you right into them. Connected to every reduction savings of $3.8 million. It is can't see it, or hear it, or feel it, so lead, the networks consist of diodes clearly the way to go. people weren't able to recognize it." and/or resistors and capacitors. The "I'm optimistic," he said after the He could have added that, even only problem here is that "real estate" ESD symposium came to a highly today, it is extremely difficult to detect on the already crowded chips is at a successful conclusion. "People who premium, and the value of such space used to be just voices crying in the has to be balanced against the poten wilderness have now been heard sys tial cost of ESD damage. In any case, tem-wide. The word is getting out, and To prevent static electricity from the networks offer limited help. As now that people have become con building up in her body, Ruth Reagan McEarland says, "There's only so much scious of ESD, they'll start to do clips her wrist strap to the conductive counter top of her work bench. we can do inside the chip, so very something about it."

21 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 Dont Panic! It Could Kill You There is no simple way of avoiding panic. But there are things you can do By Paul Chance

It is a December afternoon in 1903. The famous comedian, Eddie Foy, is performing before a large audience at the Iroquois Theater in Chicago. Sud denly someone shouts, "Fire!" and people jump to their feet. Foy comes to the front of the stage. "Don't get excited," he shouts, "there's no dan ger." The orchestra plays a number. The rigging above the stage is ablaze, and as Foy leaves the stage the entire loft comes crashing down in flames. The lights go out, and the crowd goes mad. The melee is worst in the balcony, where the flames lick at the crowd. One swarm of people surges for the fire escape ladders. Those who can't get onto the ladders spill out of the windows and fall to their deaths. Others stream down the stairs. Some produce panic. There are, of course, The greater the danger, of course, fall, and are washed over by the wave many others. Soldiers who panic in the more likely we are to panic. Thus, of people behind them. In some places battle may throw down their weapons a person who awakens and sees a curl the bodies pile up seven or eight feet and run into the fire of an advancing of smoke emanating from a waste- deep; those who are not crushed, enemy. When a household explosion is paper basket is less likely to panic suffocate. imminent, people sometimes rush past than is a person who awakens and The fire is quickly extinguished; a nearby exit in order to get to the finds the bedroom engulfed in flames. there is little damage. The crisis is back door they are accustomed to The slimmer the chances of avoid over in ten minutes, yet over 500 using. A swimmer being carried out to ing injury, the greater the chances of people already lay dead, and another sea by a riptide may struggle uselessly panic. If escaping injury is virtually 100 will soon die from their injuries. against the current when all he needs certain, there usually is little panic. Most are victims not of fire, or smoke, to do is swim parallel to the shore to Hence, people do not ordinarily panic- or falling debris, but of panic. escape danger. A motorist driving on w h e n a fl o o d t h r e a t e n s t o i n u n d a t e Panic may be defined as an inap an icy road should pump his brakes to their homes because there usually is propriate response to danger, but that avoid a collision, but he may panic and plenty of time to get to high ground. is something of an understatement. slam the pedal to the floor instead. Had all thirty exits in the Iroquois . Often, as in the Iroquois Theater fire, All sorts of situations, then, can Theater been clearly marked and func it proves to be a life-threatening re induce panic. What they all have in tioning properly, there might have sponse to danger. A burning building common, however, is the possibility of been far less panic and many more is one kind of danger that is likely to avoiding injury if one acts quickly. survivors. Ironically, if there is no Dr. Chance is a consulting psychologist Both danger and the possibility of chance of avoiding injury, if there is who has written for us previously on the avoiding injury appear to be essential nothing a person can do except hope subject of safety. to produce panic. for rescue, there is ordinarily little

22 WE panic. For instance, when divers are trapped beneath the sea, they seldom panic. People rarely panic unless there is some chance of avoiding injury by speedy action. Panic often has disastrous con sequences, so it would be nice if there were some simple way of preventing it. There isn't. There are, however, two things you can do to lessen your chances of becoming a victim of panic. The most obvious thing you can do is avoid situations that are likely to be dangerous. You can, for instance, avoid driving when the roads are slippery. When driving on icy roads, you can reduce your speed so that you will have more time to react to hazards. You can avoid attending events in t h e a t e r s a n d a u d i t o r i u m s t h a t a r e o v e r crowded. And so on. Of course, you can't always avoid situations in which danger may arise. You are least likely to be trapped in a hotel fire if your room is on the ground floor, but you may not be able to get a room on that floor. The best way to avoid the dangers of the highways is to stay off them, but then how would you get to work? It is impossible to lead a normal life and avoid all situations where danger may arise. The next best thing to avoiding danger entirely is to learn how to cope with it. The person who is least likely to panic in a crisis is the person who k n o w s w h a t t o d o w h e n i t o c c u r s . I n World War I, the Germans introduced two new weapons, poisoned gas and the flame thrower. When Allied sol diers faced these weapons for the first time, they often panicked, sometimes with fatal consequences. But once the priate response. It is for this reason checking into a hotel, take a few soldiers had learned what they were that the training of professionals who minutes to look over possible escape- up against and how to cope with it, may face danger in their work in routes. You can take driving instruc they usually kept their heads. Similarly, cludes practice at dealing with tion (perhaps involving simulation police officers, fire fighters, pilots and simulated hazards. Fire fighters do not training) that will give you valuable flight attendants seldom panic when merely read about what to do to avoid practice in coping with dangers you f a c e d w i t h t h e h a z a r d s o f t h e i r w o r k s u f f o c a t i o n f r o m s m o k e i n h a l a t i o n , might encounter on the road. You can because they have learned what to do they practice crawling on their hands take a first aid course that will give when those dangers arise. and knees through burning buildings. you practice in treating make-believe Merely knowing what to do in the Police officers undergo training in injuries. You can take a course in event of danger does not, however, which they are attacked by armed water safety that includes practice in guarantee that you will do it. Most 'criminals.' Pilots spend hours at a dealing with boating hazards, such as people know that they should pump flight simulator that throws their fires, collisions and capsized boats. their brakes when stopping on slip 'plane' into a spin. Soldiers practice Remember that while reading or hear pery roads, that they should avoid advancing on an enemy while 'bombs' ing about what you are supposed to do elevators when escaping from burning explode around them. is helpful, you are most likely to avoid buildings, that if their boat capsizes It would be impractical for most of panic if your training includes per they should stay with the craft rather us to undergo the sort of training forming the necessary skills under an than attempt to swim ashore. Yet when taken by police officers and others. expert's supervision. faced with such dangers many people But you and the rest of your family can If you are well-prepared for a crisis, do not do what they know they should have periodic fire drills in which you you should be able to cope with it do. Ideally, then, learning to cope with actually do what you should do in the when it arises. If not, you may panic. a hazard means practicing the appro event of a home fire. Similarly, after And that could kill you.

23 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 Processor for the Information Age New times call for new products, and here is one of the newest. It is versatile and fast—and it is stirring up a lot of interest Photos by Joseph Gazdak

Last March, Jim Brewington, Man and CAM were in Detroit. It was the ager, Account Management (Network), fifth such meeting and at least five Bold graphics add emphasis to Jim and several of his colleagues went to more are planned for this year. Brewington's talk on the JB2()S. Detroit to tell a group of Michigan The 3B20S shows are composed of B e l l e x e c u t i v e s a b o u t o n e o f We s t e r n audio/visual presentations about the Electric's newest and most exciting processor, the UNIX* operating sys products. The people tem, and the support services and listened with rapt attention because training available to 3B2()S purchasers. they knew they were hearing about These presentations are followed by new technology in a new field. several demonstrations using an on- site working 3B20S to show potential The product they heard about is the customers the versatility of the pro 3B20S processor—our initial offering in a line of minicomputers for Bell cessor and its uses in the office of today and the future. System applications. Bob Merna of PLPM, who is respon According to Brewington, "The sible for processor sales, spoke about 3B20S is a vehicle that will help us its capacity and features. "This mini realize many new opportunities. We are offering the 3B20S as a package of computer," he said, "is built in the Western tradition of reliability. It offers hardware, software, and support ser the best uptime of any system in its vices for a variety of applications that class and it has performance to include computer-aided design and match." manufacturing, business data process The 3B20S evolved from the 3B20D ing, engineering problem solving, and model processor, which was designed office automation. It's a sophisticated for switching systems where reliability machine with Western Electric's repu Kathy Zitny outlines the role of the is critical. In fact, the 3B20D is the 3B20S in the office of the future. t a t i o n f o r e x c e l l e n t s e r v i c e b e h i n d i t . " central processor for the new No. 5 The Bell operating companies are ESS local digital switch. The 3B20S

not yet familiar with this new line of offers all the same components as the M e r n a . " I t w a s m a n u f a c t u r e d a t o u r Western Electric product. To change duplex model and goes through all the Works. It took only that, the account teams, the Product factory system tests to insure re four hours to get it from the crates to Line Planning and Management liability. It is a processor built with the working order. (PLPM) organization and the Corpo c u s t o m e r i n m i n d . I t h a s a w i d e "Most important, however, the ma rate Account Management (CAM) operating temperature range (from chine is built for performance. It uses organization have teamed up to launch 32°F to 122°F), it is quieter than other the latest circuit technology, high an orientation program for representa minicomputers, it has a 15-minute speed memory, and advanced architec tives of the operating companies. backup power supply for insurance ture. It can execute almost one million T h e s e d e m o n s t r a t i o n s i n c l u d e a n o v e r against a power failure, it consumes instructions per second. That's fast less power, and it is easy to install. view of what the 3B20S is and can do, enough to balance every Western em as well as a presentation using a fully " W e r e c e i v e d t h i s m a c h i n e h e r e i n ployee's checking account for a operational 3B20S processor. In Detroit as a finished product," said month—in five seconds. 1 think it's a March, PLPM, several account teams, • Tr a d e m a r k o f B e l l L a b o r a t o r i e s solid system with excellent design."

24 WE "Many of the UNIX software com mands are grouped into packages for convenience and easy use. For exam ple, there is a package, the Pro grammer's Workbench, that aids in the development of software for large, mainframe computers. Another pack age provides complete text processing and phototypesetting facilities for pro duction of memoranda, brochures, handbooks and other large documents. Still another package provides tools for circuit designers. Taken all to gether, 1 hope you can understand why I'm very enthusiastic about the 3B processor and the UNIX system." Following Don's lead, Kathy Zitny a product planner and a member of the PLPM group, gave a presentation about the UNIX system application package known as the Office Automation Sys tem (OAS). "This application," she explained, "combines data and information pro cessing to make the Information Age a reality. The Office Automation System attempts to replace paper shuffling w i t h e l e c t r o n i c t r a n s m i s s i o n . Yo u c a n send and receive messages in stantaneously via video display terminals rather than waiting days for a letter to get from one person to another. In essence, OAS improves office productivity with features that are being developed to provide word processing, electronic messaging, a dictionary and spelling checker (with the capacity to add specialized words or acronyms), and an electronic calen dar. The Office Automation System has been used on a trial basis at four Bell System locations. One of the first full- service site applications is being in stalled at WE's Southgate facility in Morristown, N. J., where I'm told it is anxiously awaited as a real time-saver." Mario Padilla, Director of Product Planning for Processors, has his office Bob Mema (third from left) talks about the 3B20S. at Southgate. He confirms that the 3B20S, the Office Automation System, and other applications that will make office workers more productive are the "way of the future." He asserted, It's the software that gives compu computer programmers. ters their versatility and flexibility and "The UNIX operating system," he "Part of our future is in this 3B20S the 3B20S was designed to make said, "promotes user elFiciency be processor. We have high quality equip maximum use of the UNIX operating cause its command language ment and software, but as important, system. Designed by Bell Labs, UNIX emphasizes brevity." We like to say you w e h a v e t h e We s t e r n E l e c t r i c t r a d i t i o n software has earned a fine reputation get a lot (of work done) for a little of service. We back this system from among programmers and software de (command typing). There are over cradle to grave. This might be our first signers both in and out of the Bell t h r e e h u n d r e d c o m m a n d s i n t h e v e r minicomputer, but we're not new to the business of installing and maintain System. Don Jester, also of PLPM, sion of the UNIX system that is demonstrated briefly some of the com furnished with our 3B processor. ing our equipment. We're respected mands available on this system and However, a user can learn the fifty or for our service commitments, and we allayed concerns that software and so often-used commands in a relatively intend to continue to observe that computer terminals are only usable by brief period, and, thereby, become good reputation—in this new field for information systems engineers and much more productive. the Bell System."

25 Third Quarter 1982 World of Commu nications

I t w a s h a r d t o t e l l who was having more fun—the parents o r t h e c h i l d r e n

Photos by Warren Schild

This year, Western Electric em ployees in the Chicago area wrapped up Engineers' Week in a big way. On Saturday night, Eebruary 27th, Chi cago's grand Museum of Science and Industry, where a new Bell System exhibit about telephony and com m u n i c a t i o n s c a l l e d " O M N I C O M " w a s recently installed, opened its doors exclusively for WE employees and their guests. The whole museum was accessible that evening—the famous coal mine, the new Viking exhibit, the World War II submarine, and of course, OMNICOM—to everyone connected with the , Montgom ery Works, Northern Illinois Works, and the Central Region Headquarters. OMNICOM, which means, "world of communications," is a joint effort of , AT&T Long Lines, and W e s t e r n E l e c t r i c w i t h c o u n s e l f r o m Bell Labs. There are 36 modules in the exhibit, many of which include hands- on interactive machinery—voices can be recorded and played back, cranks activate lights and bells, buttons acti vate recorded information. One exhibit explains Sir Isaac Newton's discovery that sound waves travel at different speeds. Another describes the difference between analog and digital information. There's one that describes how a microwave radio sys tem works and one that explains how t h e B e l l n e t w o r k m a k e s u s e o f m i c r o wave radio, , satellite paths, and lightwave systems for telecommunications. A t W e s t e r n E l e c t r i c ' s e x h i b i t a b o u t magnetic bubbles, you can record your own voice and hear it played back using this technology. At our

26 learn something new here—but it's usually so crowded. It's a world-fa mous institution. Tonight, the few thousand people who are here hardly make a dent in crowding the exhibits, so I feel really good about this idea of opening it to the employees and their families." Danny and Cathy Cossa got caught by the magnetic bubbles and spent a good deal of time learning more about magnets and what they mean to the telephone network. Danny, in particu lar, seemed to be captivated by the lights that flashed on and off as a result of a magnetic field generated when he spun the crank attached to the exhibit. Their dad, Tony Cossa, now at North ern Illinois Works in #1A ESS customer support, spent a good deal of his career at Hawthorne. He said he Fay Bass gives her son Billy a boost was very pleased to see his children so so that he can get a better look at interested in the exhibit. "I'm glad one of the displays at OMNICOM t h e s e e x h i b i t s a r e w r i t t e n s o w e l l — i n in Chicago's Museum of Science and layman's terms," he said. "The technol Industry. ogy really does need to be explained, because the Information Age is really upon us and my kids will be full photonics exhibit there is a demon beneficiaries of today's technology—if stration of lightwave communications they understand it and can take advan and lasers. If you are interested in tage of it. We're engineering a new learning more about silicon integrated information processing and transmis circuits and microprocessors, the ex sion era in the Bell System. This hibit about microprocessors has a full exhibit, with its historical as well as and detailed description and a hands- futuristic segments, is one way to on portion. prepare these children for the different TTtere's an exhibit that pits a tic-tac- w o r l d t h a t ' s a r o u n d t h e c o r n e r. " toe player against a computer and It was the first visit to the Museum dares the player to "beat the brain." It's of Science and Industry for Gregory not easy and this game was drawing a Bridgewater. He had a look of wonder big crowd that evening. Many of the at the size and scope of the museum. exhibits include telephone receivers, His father, George, works at the Indian and instructions to listen in, to find Hill facility. "This WE open house," out the point of the exhibit and a little George said, "was a great idea—es more about the subject. Little children pecially for the children. They don't as well as adults pick up these tele always know or understand what we phone receivers just as naturally as if do for a living. It's a good way to they were at home speaking on their describe the telephone network, how own telephones. One thing was clear it operates, and what our role in it is. throughout OMNICOM—Western After we finish here, Gregory wants to Electric people are comfortable see the coal mine exhibit and the around phones. story of the Vikings. I'm sure we'll be Fay Bass from the Warrenville Data back here again. This isn't the kind of Center and her son Billy were there place you can cover in one evening— that evening. She spoke enthusi there's just too much information to astically about this kind of event for absorb in one trip." Billy. "Touring this museum," she said, Judging from the crowds in the "is an educational experience. I always m u s e u m a n d i n O M N I C O M t h a t e v e ning, a great many WE employees and t h e i r f a m i l i e s e n t e r e d t h e w o r l d o f c o m m u n i c a t i o n s a n d f o u n d i t f a s c i n a t Tony Cossa's children, Danny and ing. With the help of OMNICOM, a Cathy, got an idea of hotv magnetic bubbles store information by turning great many more people will share the the crank to move "bubbles" along a vision of the new world of telephony track. This movement caused lights to and the technology that is transporting flash—in the children's eyes. us into the Information Age.

T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 27

obtain phones and phone parts for his collection. Phones, "I've picked up quite a few of these phones at swap meets and antique shops," he relates. "Half of the fon of Phones, this type of hobby is bargaining for the telephone you want." Phones The Holtman 'collection' contains everything from an 1898 American Electric tandem phone to one of the Jack Holtman first, circa 1900, office can has over 100 of them d l e s t i c k m o d e l s . T h e l a t t e r w a s licensed for use only in the state of California. The gleaming oakwood and By Dale Shores brass fittings bear testimony to Holt- man's fastidious refurbishing process. In addition to the phones, directo Have you ever seen a McKinley ries from days gone by grace the phone? How about a Strowger? If you collection. One such directory bearing haven't, then you might want to visit the date 1924 reveals the first system Jack Holtman's telephone "museum." of number assignments. "Back then," An installation supervisor in the Holtman explains, "if you were the Southern California Installation Area, first person in town to have a phone, Holtman started collecting antique you were assigned the number one; if telephones and phone-related memo you were the twelfth, then that was rabilia four or five years ago. your number, and so on." As he tells it, "It all started during a Mrs. Holtman has gotten caught up trip to Oregon. 1 ran across a man who in the telephone collecting spirit as had two antique wall phones for sale well. She recently traced a phone that and, working for Western, 1 was inter appeared in a Christmas catalogue for ested, so 1 bought them. But it wasn't May Company department store to its until a year later that 1 actually got owner in Hollywood. This took pa around to refurbishing them. Now I've tience, perseverance and quite a bit of got 50 phones inside and probably 50 time on the phone. Holtman admits, more in my workshop. The problem is "She's really been a lot of help." I'm running out of walls to display Although still enthusiastic about his t h e m o n ! " hobby, Holtman states that costs have Holtman belongs to the Antique skyrocketed and the rare models he Telephone Collectors Association seeks are harder to find. "1 had to go which publishes a monthly newsletter to Salome, Arizona for the McKinley listing phones for trade or sale. This is set," he admits. But cost and scarcity just one of many sources Jack uses to of the antique sets do not deter him from continuing his search for rare Surrounded by a battery of antique telephones and phone-related memo wall telephones, Jack Holtman rabilia. "As long as I'm working for proudly displays one of his attractive Western, my hobby will interest me acquisitions. He refurbished most of because it ties in with my job. 1 really them, himself. can't foresee getting bored with it."

T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 29 Summer on Campus For a few weeks each year, these employees leave their jobs to become full-time college stiAdents By Elizabeth M. Perlman

Rakesh Khetarpal of Montgomery, Bill Foster of Co lumbus, Gary K a h l e r a n d Aaron Faltin of Omaha, Paul Bendig of At lanta, and Bob Attebery of Omaha.

Lasers, robotics, microelectronics, Moreover, for graduate work in state- when the company needs employees software, and photonics are just a few of-the-art technology, the right courses with advanced academic training. Sev of the dynamic technologies that West are not always available locally. The eral participating universities have ern Electric recognizes as vital to our CEC offers intensive courses in the agreed to waive their normal admis future and our growth. Advances in technologies of Western Electric pro sions tests giving the candidates the these fields are proliferating so quickly cesses and products that satisfy the company selects the chance to sink or that technical professionals find they needs of many people. But, to ensure swim based on the tests at the end of must continually update their educa the quality and technical leadership each course. tion to stay current with their fields. which is fostered by more technical Steve Dupor, a technical writer at Our position on the leading edge of professionals completing advanced de Reynolda Road in Winston-Salem, is technology is in large part a result of gree programs, the company offers one of the participants in Western employees who stay in touch with two other programs that go beyond Electric's Summer On-Campus Pro state-of-the-art developments and con tuition refund and courses taught at gram. Like the others interviewed for stantly renew the sophisticated knowl the CEC. This is why the CEC adminis this article, he is studying at Brigham edge they use on their jobs and in ters these programs: the Engineering Young University in Provo, Utah to t h e i r c a r e e r s . and Science Fellowship Program and ward a degree in computer aided Many technical professionals com the Summer On-Campus Program. manufacturing. "I applied for these bat "obsolescence" by continuing their Each year, ten or more technical pro c o u r s e s i n o r d e r t o m a i n t a i n a c u r r e n t education either at courses sponsored fessionals are awarded fellowships to level of knowledge about our products by the Corporate Education Center or pursue graduate degrees in technical and technology," he said. "Technology through advanced-degree work at lo subjects which meet company needs is moving so quickly, I really have a cal universities. Finding the best way and provide individual development sense of urgency about maintaining an to keep up to date varies. For some, for the recipients of these fellowships. understanding about the state of the night school under tuition refund is The Summer On-Campus Program art. I feel we can accomplish more by the right answer, but that is a long haul operates on a larger scale. At selected being on campus, with labs, and time involving a major commitment and universities, master's degree programs set aside for nothing in our lives but the personal time to fit classes and are planned by the CEC and the studying. The whole environment is homework into already busy lives. university faculty in technical subjects more conducive to learning than night

30 WE c o u r s e s w o u l d b e . " level courses offered exclusively for to keep us going." To minimize time away from family WE employees; and the work they Depending on when they started, and job, the courses are concentrated eomplete in a month is equivalent to a t h e s t u d e n t s w h o w e n t b a c k t o s c h o o l in a four- or five-week period during l6-week semester; so they spend most in the summer of '82 are just one-to- the summer, so the work is intensive. of the time going to class, in a lab, or four short summers away from mas Employees who are accepted to the studying. ter's degrees in one of the following Summer On-Campus Program leave This program has been sponsored disciplines; eleetrical engineering, their briefcases at home along with by the CEC since 1957 when 137 computer science, industrial engineer their jobs, their families, and their day- s t u d e n t s a t t e n d e d fi v e u n i v e r s i t i e s a n d ing, or computer aided manufacturing. to-day routines to become full-time t o o k c o u r s e s l i k e " E l e c t r o n Tu b e s a n d Larry Mullins, a senior engineer at students. Circuits" and "Computer Theory I and the Denver Works, asserted, "I'm en Bill McCormick, a process engineer II." This year almost 300 students rolled in this program because it's at the Atlanta Works, concedes, "I were accepted and courses ranged exactly what I was looking for. Auto deeided to join this Summer On- from "Computer Graphics" to "Inte mated manufacturing is the direction Campus Program because it poses grated Cireuit Technology" to we should be going. 1 plan to do a fewer problems than I would have had "Industrial Robotics." thesis in the area of eomputer control going to night school. There's less Rakesh Khetarpal, a planning engi led testing. The professors have been negative impact on my job when I neer at the Montgomery Works, really cooperative about helping me take a solid five weeks off. Also, 1 think explained his decision to pursue a tie my ideas into my job and into the w e c a n l e a r n b e t t e r i n t h i s e n v i r o n master's degree in computer aided 'real world.'" ment. This is my third summer in the manufaeturing: "I have a feeling that Brigham Young University is the robotics and computer aided design only participating school that offers a are going to evolve very quickly. It's degree in computer aided manufactur like having a crystal ball here, a clearer ing. This is such a new field that insight into what is coming in a few there's a lot of give and take between years in the works. We spend about 15 professors and Western Electric or 16 hours a day here at school. Most professionals. of that time is spent in labs working at Donald Meyer, a product engineer at computer terminals. We have access to the Columbus Works, stresses the im- fine equipment and it's available all portanee of taking courses that are day long—a real plus." relevant to his job. "This particular The list of participating schools has master's program—in computer aided changed since 1957 as a result of manufacturing—is the only one of its changing company needs for specific kind that I'm aware of. This classwork technologies. In 1982, the following impacts directly on my job. I'm in universities offered classes for our volved with printed wiring board manufacture. A good portion of that is Hal Pierce of the Oklahoma CAty people: Brigham Young University, Clemson University, Kansas State Uni computer-controlled. The knowledge Works visits with his daughter Jen versity, New Mexico State University, we are getting here and the skills will nifer, who is also taking summer Purdue University, Texas Tech Univer have an impact on Western's manufac courses at Brigham Young University. sity, and the University of Illinois. turing methods in just a few years. 1 Susan Muller, an information sys want to be able to take advantage of tems developer at the , the changes." program and each summer I've describes how this degree fits into her It takes just over five summers at brought 'back-burner' problems from plans. "Although this course work is the rate of two courses a session to work to the attention of the pro not directly related to my present complete the eourse work and the fessors. We've eome up with some assignment, I expect it, and the mas thesis, design project, or comprehen ereative and viable solutions." ter's degree, will become more and sive exams required by the partici Hal Pierce, a product engineer at more vital to my career. That's why I pating universities to qualify for a the Oklahoma City Works agreed with chose Brigham Young's program rather master's degree. Bill's assessment and added, "The only than one in another discipline at Charlie Cote, a test engineer at the way I could consider going back to another participating school. Right Merrimack Valley Works, is one of school was to do it this way. Night now, it helps me to work better with many students who is anticipating an school takes too much of a toll on my the engineers I provide programming end to his Summer On-Campus "ca family and my job. It's a funny coinci s e r v i c e s f o r. I u n d e r s t a n d n o w w h a t reer." He, like many of his colleagues, dence, but I have two daughters that they are up against. I decided that I looks forward to completing the are in sehool here at Brigham Young, had to go to school in some sort of course work and the degree. "This is and one that just graduated. It's full-time program because I work a lot my third year and it has been really awfully nice to see them here—it's a of overtime and school really suffers if productive. I'm half finished with this long distance from Oklahoma City. Of you don't give it all of your free time. 1 degree and next summer I'll be start eourse, we've had a laugh about study get a great sense of accomplishment ing my thesis. I hope my experience as a contributing editor of the Valley ing together, my children and I in after finishing these 5-week mar college at the same time." a t h o n s — w e a e t l i k e w o r k a h o l i c s f o r a Voice, our location publication, helps T h e We s t e r n E l e c t r i c s t u d e n t s l i v e month and then we can slow down m e w h e n i t c o m e s t i m e t o s t a r t in dormitory-style housing on or near and go back to our real lives—I writing about computer aided design college campuses; they take graduate- suppose knowing that it will end helps and manufacturing." 31 T h i r d Q u a r t e r 1 9 8 2 Pioneers with Insight

Gold Coast Pioneers live up to their 'Tradition of Caring"

When Frank Jarrell, Western Elec- tric's voice; communications manager for account management in Florida, was president of the Gold Coast Chap ter of the Telephone Pioneers in 1980, he was actively searching for a "big" community service project that would simultaneously benefit a lot of people and help bring together his chapter's widely dispersed membership. The chapter's vice president, Whit ley Andrews, and community service chairman, Floyd Neely proposed a fund-raising campaign for Insight for the Blind, a nonprofit organization in Ft. Lauderdale that records books and magazines for blind and handicapped individuals. Specifically, they proposed raising 5200,000 for a new building to replace the cramped storefront the organization currently occupies. Insight for the Blind is one of five volunteer recording studios in the United States that meets the require ments set by the Library of Congress for "Talking Books." It is housed in a small building and has three recording studios. Caroline Mansur, founder and presi dent of Insight, recalls, "In 1975, we were seeking contributions of money, recording equipment, and technical expertise to get the organization would like to make recordings, but building with contributions from pri started and running. I approached the not enough equipment to accommo vate groups and individuals. The Pioneers who agreed to build our date them, and there are many Pioneers prepared the blueprints, three soundproof recording booths. thousands of print-handicapped peo cleared the land, and solicited gifts-in- They provided both the materials and ple who depend on Talking Books for kind for architectural designs, con labor. I should add that for many years information and entertainment." struction, landscaping, engineering, they've also been repairing the play Talking Books—tape-recorded print and legal expertise. The ground break back machines used by the recipients materials—are provided free to blind ing ceremony for the new building of Talking Books throughout the coun and handicapped individuals by the took place March 10, 1982. With try. We are indeed grateful for their Library of Congress. The books are evident pride, Frank calls this project help. And, now, they've agreed to raise composed of cassettes and a tape "the biggest—in terms of dollars—that the money and provide the labor to player. Eligible people can get Talking the Pioneers ever attempted." The 100 build the new building where we will Books from local libraries and return or so guests included some of the have 10 recording booths as well as them by mail free of charge. volunteers who keep Insight operating space for editing and research. We In I98I, Insight for the Blind pur and a number of Telephone Pioneers have a waiting list of people who chased a plot of land for the new for whom this ground breaking was

32 WE A COMMUNITYREcordi® SERVifc^'°® bund i

A. OP AMERICA ^ I FLORIDA GOLD COAST CHAPTER WB3

The Florida Gold Coast Chapter of the Pioneers is helping Insight for the Blind realize a dream of a neiv building and larger facilities.

Don Allen checks pronunciation and timing as Margaret Hunter reads for Insight for the Blind. They are two of the many volunteers who prepare Talking Books.

events are planned. We make planters for living and artificial plants out of unrefurbishable telephone housings. Those planters are selling faster than we can produce them. And there's also the 400-page cookbook produced by the Gold Coast Life Members called A Lifetime of Favorite Recipes.' The first printing has all but sold out. We're getting ready to start a second printing." As Frank Jarrell had hoped, his the culmination of a lot of hard work. material is expensive and for the most Pioneers are working as a team, in As Alice Wilson, Florida Gold Coast part quite bulky. With a greater num volved in one big project, making Chapter administrator, put it, "This ber of recording booths, a greater number of people will get material. In fund-raising presentations, making and building we've been working toward is the end it helps us all. The fund-raising selling planters and cookbooks, plan finally materializing. We have eaten, campaign has gotten off to a big start, ning events, and seeking private slept and lived Insight for the Blind. contributions. Bob Kleinert, President Soon we'll be able to point to the and we already have S83,000 for the of AT&T Long Lines and President of f r u i t s o f o u r e ff o r t s . " building." Doc Horton, an inspector/tester at the Telephone Pioneers of America Lloyd Sauls, contract administrator at the Miami Service Center, is respon the Miami Service Center and presi who assisted at the ground-breaking sible for documenting the history of d e n t o f t h e W E G a t o r s P i o n e e r ceremony, summed up the effort to the project for the WE Gators Council. Council, had only positive words build a new home for Insight for the He explained, "The greatest benefit of about the future of the capital cam Blind. He said, "This is a tremendous this effort is that it makes literature, paign. "We're sure we can meet our project. Its size and scope fit well with textbooks and magazines available to goal. The Pioneers have sponsored a our theme A Tradition of Caring.' It's a blind and handicapped people. Braille 10-mile walk-a-thon, and other such challenge in every sense of the word."

Third Quarter 1982 Who is the intrepid Captain Denver zapping? To find out, turn to page 18 and read "Zap!"

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