YorksPast

Before I get into the YORK connections, I have to give you a little background.  I was an early owner of an Apple II+ Computer and received the Applefest ’81 flyer mailing.  This was the first national-scale exposition devoted exclusively to the Apple computer; it was held in Boston, June 6-7, 1981.

I worked attending Applefest into my vacation swing through the New England States that summer.  I remember this expo as small although high-energy.  The seminars were held in the Grand Ballroom of the Boston Park Plaza Hotel.  The exhibitors displayed their wares in The Castle, a building diagonally opposite the hotel.

Steve Jobs talked about “Personal Computers: The Future,” and Steve Wozniak presented “The Evolution of Apple Computer Technology.”  Jobs and Wozniak were also seen wondering around the exhibit floor on several occasions.  At that time, the IBM PC still had not been released; however there was certainly a lot of speculation about it.

Saturday morning before the expo opened, I was taking an early morning walk around Boston.  A hand-lettered sign in a rare-and-used-bookstore caught my eye; it said, “Steve Jobs shopped here this morning!”  Without that sign, I likely would not have walked into that bookstore.

 

 

Was it fate or some sort of Steve Jobs connection?  I was not in the rare-and-used-bookstore very long when I spotted the following 1901 Catalog of Ice Making, Refrigerating & Other Machinery; Manufactured by the York Manufacturing Company.  It became the first item in my collection of historical stuff related to York International Corporation and prior companies.

After my presentation on the First 60-Years of York Manufacturing Company and York Ice Machinery Corporation at the Agricultural and Industrial Museum for last weekends Second Saturday Program, the huge 1904 A-Frame Ammonia Compressor was demonstrated.  Some questions arose that could have easily been answered by showing sectional drawings appearing in the 1901 Catalog.  I’ll use YorksPast posts over the next few days to answer those questions.

Other posts in this series include:

• Historic Corliss Steam Engine right here in York, Pennsylvania; Part 1
• Historic Corliss Steam Engine right here in York, Pennsylvania; Part 2
• York Manufacturing Company employees and A-Frame Compressor

In 1901, York Manufacturing Company had just gone through a ten-fold expansion; from 50-employees in 1897 to 500-employees.  They opened additional branch offices around the United States, of which Boston was one of them.  The inside cover imprint, under the aerial view of the Main Office and Works in York, PA, indicates the manager of the Boston office was J. A. Stutsman.

York Manufacturing Company evolved into York International Corporation and, as of 2005, Johnson Controls Building Efficiency group.  In 1993, York International Corporation won the contract to supply all of the Air Conditioning Equipment, Air Handlers and Air Volume Control for Apple Computer’s new 856,000-square-foot research and development complex in Cupertino, California.  YORK was the only company to offer an Apple Macintosh interface for its digital Facility Manager system, which controls all the heating, cooling and lighting systems.

Reading the Headlines: A Quick Index to All YorksPast Posts