<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Martin Cooper<\/strong><\/a> is back in the news. Fifty years ago, he headed the team that <\/strong>developed the cell phone<\/strong><\/a> at Motorola.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I had just taken my first job at Motorola after graduating from the University of Wisconsin. I worked in an office and lab a few feet from Martin Coper\u2019s office. Motorola had a variety of two way radio products, and I was learning about their pocket pagers.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I was aware that the only blacks that worked at Motorola fed the incinerator outside the plant. They were not allowed to enter the building. When I asked about this, I was told by more than one employee – nominally professional employees like myself – that \u201cIf we keep the unions out, Motorola will keep the niggers out\u201d. This was the Motorola of the late 1950\u2019s in Chicago. There may be vehement denials of what I have just said. But no one can deny that Motorola signed a <\/strong>consent decree<\/strong><\/a> that led to the first black hires. It was either that or lose their lucrative government contracts for two way radios.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Fifty years is a long time. I didn\u2019t last long at Motorola. I went on to Zenith Radio Corporation, where I worked for five years. Zenith was not perfect, but it was a different world from Motorola. But Martin Cooper has never spoken about the virulent racism that existed a Motorola.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Robert Gilchrist Huenemann, M.S.E.E.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n April 5, 2023<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Martin Cooper is back in the news. Fifty years ago, he headed the team that developed the cell phone at Motorola. I had just taken my first job at Motorola after graduating from the University of Wisconsin. I worked in an office and lab a few feet from Martin Coper\u2019s office. Motorola had a variety […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":176,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/341"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/341\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":344,"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/341\/revisions\/344"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rghuenemann.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}