In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

>> 35 3 From Shoes to Computers to Vapor Mitigation Systems From Shoes to Computers to Mitigation Systems I think someone said that Endicott is ground zero for TCE contamination or something, but I don’t know. But I’ll tell ya, it is definitely where IBM started. Everyone here knows that. —Endicott resident and activist, 2009 We witness a transformation of substances and a dissolution of forms . . . —Deleuze and Guattari (1987:109) Making sure I understood things properly, that I understood the significance of Endicott’s industrial history, I was told by one “plume resident ” during an interview: “You know, Peter, Endicott is where IBM started? It all started right here.” I was reminded of this fact on several occasions, and no matter how many times I heard it, I still found it hard to believe that Endicott, a small village in western New York, was not only IBM’s birthplace, but also the place where some of the earliest computing technologies emerged to help create the “third industrial revolution” (McGraw 1997) and the so-called Information Age. But before IBM, there was the Endicott-Johnson Shoe Company (EJ), and the charismatic force of EJ’s founder, George Francis Johnson (or ‘Georg F’ as locals refer to him). EJ, with the leadership of George F, turned Broome County into the “Valley of Opportunity,” and Endicott was often called “the Magic City” because of the speed at which it shifted from a landscape of farmlands and swamps to a vibrant and profitable 36 > 37 human experience.2 This chapter focuses on some of the products, the machines, developed at the IBM-Endicott factory and their critical role in the modernization of computing technology. After the midpoint of the twentieth century, Endicott, like many other Rust Belt communities of the Northeast and Midwest, shifted from industrial powerhouses to places suffering the symptoms of deindustrialization , dissolving tax bases, the rise and expansion of the service and information economy, the suburbanization of capital and people , and the arrival of a new “global” neoliberal economy. What follows, then, is an historical account of “high tech in the Rust Belt” (Grossman 2006:99) that focuses on Endicott’s industrial and late industrial narrative as it relates to broader themes of Rust Belt reality, including deindustrialization, corporate dynamism, and “creative destruction”3 (e.g., corporate downsizing, cheap labor adventurism, etc.). Included in this discussion, is a brief overview of the current high-tech employer to replace IBM, Endicott Interconnect Technologies, Inc. (EIT). While EIT is staying afloat in the highly competitive high-tech market, residents realize that it will never become the employer that IBM was. Reminding me of Endicott’s Rust Belt status and the dystopia invoked by both IBM’s closure and the toxic spill, one resident told me “IBM cut this community’s throat.” Another goal of this chapter, then, is to expose the toxic leftover of this so-called IBM homicide or what my more modest residents describe as normal corporate “abandonment” or “business-as-usual downsizing.” To do this, I explain the messy history of the IBM-Endicott chemical spill, including the history of the groundwater remediation effort at the site, the government agency response, the emergence of the vapor intrusion risk and mitigation, and, finally, the development of local grassroots advocacy. Endicott-Johnson and the Lure of George F Any discussion of industrial history in Endicott and the greater Broome County area must begin with the widespread influence of the EndicottJohnson Shoe Company (EJ). Chances are that anyone who grew up in Endicott had either a father, grandfather, or other relative who worked at one of EJ’s factories. Incorporated in 1906, EJ was a prosperous manufacturer of shoes based in New York’s Southern Tier region, with 38 > 39 Motivated by the general philosophy of welfare capitalism and other Progressive Era movements of the early twentieth century, George F advocated for the development of parks, churches, libraries, and carousels4 to uplift and empower workers and their families. The deal consisted of worker benefits—even amid harsh economic times— that were generous and innovative for their time, including building homes and offering loans to workers who could not afford down payments , as alluded to in the resident’s quote above. This commitment was for him a matter of viewing the home as a symbol of “security”: “There can be no security—there can be no guarantee of prosperity and industrial space—except through homes owned by the plain citizens. I believe...

Share