Photo Album of Dee Electric Company's Offices, Products, and Employees

Missouri, 1981. Hardcover. Fine. Glossy red decorative paper over boards; 14.25 by 12 inches; contains approx. 50 leaves, each with numerous tipped-on full-color and b/w photographs; 6 issues of the company newsletter, "Shop Talk," laid-in, as well as a typed letter on business stationery. Fine.

The Dee Electric Company was founded in Chicago in 1950 to manufacture heavy duty industrial solder pots for the electronics industry. In 1958, they introduced their first printed circuit board soldering machine, and began creating small standard units as well as special soldering machines, built to order for companies such as IBM, Xerox, Western Electric, Hewlett Packard, Zenith Radio, and Texas Instruments. In 1971, they expanded into hydro-cleaners for the aqueous cleaning of printed circuit boards after soldering -- and with this growth, they opened facilities in Camdenton, Missouri. This album documents Dee Electric's machines, as well as their making -- showing the employees and offices of Dee Electric, the "shop" where the machines are created, and, of course, the machines themselves. And the machines are impressive, large and looming as early computers tended to be, making today's laptops and smart phones tremble in their shadow -- but they're also impressively designed, streamlined, in red or blue or shiny brushed metal -- perhaps even distinctly American. That crisp, clean, and (yes) large look of the machines is nicely captured, and echoed, in this unique album.