Hartford Business Journal

8 Hartford Business Journal • December 21, 2015 www.HartfordBusiness.com Q&A Holocaust survivor Gerber reinvents U.S. manufacturing Q&A with David Gerber, author of "The Inventor's Dilemma: The Remarkable Life of H. Joseph Gerber." David is Joseph Gerber's son. Q: You've written a biography of your father called, "The Inven- tor's Dilemma: The Remarkable Life of H. Joseph Gerber." What made you write the book and what were you hoping to accomplish? A: The arc of my dad's life brought him from a labor camp in Nazi Austria to Hartford as a penniless and fatherless refugee, and toward the end of his life to the Oval Office when he received America's highest award in tech- nology. You have to ask yourself: How did he do this? What was the source of his drive and resil- ience? And how could he have remained idealistic after wit- nessing — and experiencing — the Nazi takeover of Austria and the events that followed? The title "The Inventor's Dilemma" also has a policy angle. My dad's story is a lens on the rise — and fall — of U.S. manufactur- ing in the second half of the 20th century. My dad's career shows that inventing new manufactur- ing systems can help to preserve our domestic industrial base, keeping jobs on U.S. soil. It also shows that my dad's ability to invent these systems depended upon his proximity to the industrial base. For example, visiting a fac- tory, he might notice scraps on a workroom floor, see this as wasted resources, and work out a bet- ter approach. Or, some domestic manufacturer might call his company with a problem that he could solve through invention. As American manufacturing goes abroad, these interactions vanish, and invention — specifically, the kind of invention that improves productivity — becomes more difficult. This is a dilemma for inventors as well as for manufacturers in America. Q: Your dad founded Gerber Scien- tific while still in college after inventing the variable scale, according to his New York Times obituary. He remained active there until a week before his death. Tell us the back story. A: My dad invented the Gerber Variable Scale in 1945, as a junior in college. Working late one night, he grew tired of performing time-consuming engineering computations with his ruler and slide rule. It occurred to him that he could solve the problems quickly and easily, if he had a "rubber ruler" whose incre- ment marks could be adjusted further apart or closer together. He removed the elastic from his pajamas, lightly marked out a scale on it, and finished all his homework that night. He patent- ed this device, and with a $3,000 investment, started his company. My dad died in 1996. He was quite sick throughout the last year of his life. He was diagnosed with advanced stage cancer, but contin- ued his work duties, including his product development. Six months into the year, he suffered a stroke. He would not return to the office, but he continued to invent while at the hospital rehabilitation unit. He never stopped inventing. I don't think he could have. Q: A promo for the book says your father "transformed mod- ern manufacturing." In what ways did he accomplish this? A: The scope of my dad's inven- tions, and the other engineers that he presided over, encompassed the manufacture of most of the products we use on a daily basis: cars, clothes, shoes, electronics, eyeglasses, bill- boards, signs, maps and reading materials, among others. Craftsmen once made these products with hand-guided tools. Today, factories and workshops use com- puters and robots to design and fabricate these products. My father and his company introduced the first computerized manufac- turing products for these industries. In some industries, these introductions provided an incentive and framework for other compa- nies to enter the market. In other industries, my dad's company itself introduced and integrated an entire suite of products that automated the manufacturing process. This entailed reinventing the way that products were made — with computer automa- tion. As a result, quality improved and prices dropped. Clothes, for instance, are cheaper and more varied and plentiful today as a result of his automation in the apparel industry. Q: A former vice chairman of GE called your dad a modern-day Thomas Edison. Your father was an inventor with more than 600 patents to his name. Where did his inspiration come from? What drove him? A: My dad was a born inventor. For his sixth birthday, his parents bought him a violin. He got tired of repeatedly play- ing the songs, so he auto- mated the instrument using the components from his construction set. His room at college was decorated with his sketches of bub- ble-domed futuristic cars. He sometimes created and solved problems in his dreams. He loved the chal- lenge of inventing, of solv- ing problems. Inventing was what he once called "the game in my mind." He loved playing that game. He also relished people telling him that a solution was "impos- sible." That just sharp- ened his persistence. My dad's life began with a privileged posi- tion of esteem, love and security. With the Nazis, this was lost. His life thereafter was about regaining the ideals, the position, and the mission that was imparted to him during these early years. His grandfather, a respected physician in Vienna, was my dad's role model as a youth. His grandfather instilled in him the expectation that my dad would contribute to society meaningfully through science. My dad idealized this long lost world. Q: Your father was a Holocaust survi- vor. What role did that play in his person- al and professional life here in the United States? How did it shape him as a man? A: My dad fled Austria for America in the spring of 1940 with his mother when he was 15. He lived under Nazi rule for two full years. He learned to use his wit and know-how to survive. He amplified the reception of his family's radio to hear foreign news broad- casts. He devised a scheme to allow his uncle to send messages outside the country past the Nazi censors using invisible ink. He escaped with his father into Switzer- land, only to be jailed and then turned over to the Gestapo. He and his father were placed on a train headed toward Dachau, but my dad was able to figure out how to disengage a latching mechanism on a window, and they jumped from the train. He also began to give shape to his sense of mission to be productive during this time. When his father was transported to Poland, my dad con- verted an old kero- sene stove and used it to build a hand warm- er for his father to bring on the transport. My dad was cap- tured, and sent to a labor camp outside Vienna, where he worked hard labor, until his fam- ily secured his release because of his young age. As he pulled heavy drums and fetched coffee for the guards, he thought about how he wanted to be pro - ductive in society, not a taker. Much of this time was spent hiding and prepar- ing for possible emigration, punctuated by crises, such as Kristallnacht, and opportunities that had to be seized immediately or they would be lost. This imparted a sense of urgency and an entrepreneurial perspective on risk-taking, namely, that delay and non-action has its own risks. I also think the Holocaust made my dad a humble man, even with his ambition and self-confidence. Q: Your father made quite an impact in his life and was even honored by Presi- dent Clinton with a national technology award. What might surprise people about him that wasn't widely known? A: Although my dad patented inventions that involved software and computer systems, he never personally used a computer in his life. He pioneered computer-based technologies for numerous industries — even computer-aided design. But he himself sketched his engineer- ing designs by hand. He studied dress design, and produced beautiful fashion drawings, which may have prepared him to recognize opportunities to automate apparel manufac- ture. He was talented artistically. n DAVID GERBER Author, "The Inventor's Dilemma — The Remarkable Life of H. Joseph Gerber" DEVELOPER (Hartford Fire Insurance Company – Windsor, CT) Dvlp cost effective s/w apps to address complx client area reqs & processes (e.g., new enhncmnts or maintenance) in Personal Lines Tech deprtmnt. F/T. Reqs Bach's dgr (or f/equiv) in CS, Comp Eng, Elctrnc Eng or rel fld, & 5 yrs' in job offered or 5 yrs' of progressive exp in Mainframe Apps, Web Apps, & KANA product. 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