January 2023 | ISE Magazine 29
Dear members and friends of IISE: As we honor
milestones in our personal and professional lives,
we can all take great pride that the Institute
has reached its own landmark event. IISE has
achieved diamond status with its 75th birthday
in 2023!
Congratulations to our industrious and inno-
vative champions past, present and future who have made
this momentous anniversary possible. You are one of those
champions. Your IISE leadership and sta thank you for your
involvement in collectively elevating the profession and ex-
panding your network and inuence through the Institute.
I encourage you to keep up and step up your involvement
and activities with us. Your participation is an investment in your career, ensuring the lon-
gevity of the profession, its impact on society and the organizations we serve that count on
industrial and systems engineering to thrive.
75th webpage with call for stories
Share in the celebration of #IISE75 – Blazing trails to future innovation. Visit our 75th web-
page, iise.org/75, oen as we continually unveil our history through pictures, interesting facts,
shared experiences, and timelines throughout 2023. Yearlong coverage of the Institute’s dy-
namic past with eyes forward on a bright industrial and systems engineering future will be
ongoing on this webpage, in our social media and in our ISE magazine.
Also included on the 75th webpage is a call to share your story. You are a crucial part of
IISE’s continuing evolution. We want to hear from you. Please consider sharing your memo-
ries, thoughts, photos and achievements via the online form available on the webpage.
If you’ve aended an IISE conference and have great experiences to share, don’t hesitate
to let us know. Were you motivated by an IISE chapter volunteer role, an IISE mentor who
made a dierence in your career, or a speaker presentation you aended that helped you and/
or your organization make changes spurred by your learnings at an IISE or Society event? Let
us know.
I’m excited about this anniversary year and have been siing through the treasure trove of
memories I have of the Institute from when I was a student member at Georgia Tech until now
as IISE’s CEO. What an adventure we all share as innovators in our own high-impact profes-
sion through the Institute over the years.
ISE continues impactful drive to 100
It seems like yesterday that we were honoring the Institute’s 50th anniversary in 1998. Now in
2023, we’re commemorating 75 years and counting as we march toward a century of Institute
members solving the complex and critical problems of the world in healthcare seings, manu-
facturing plants, entertainment venues and warehouse facilities, to name a few. Our process
improvement knowledge applied to any workplace is essential to growth and ecient opera-
tions that can save lives and improve boom lines.
Together through IISE, we will continue to make a dierence, share research, build friend-
ships and expand our skill sets as technology drives us forward.
To that end, it’s more than ing that we celebrate together in New Orleans May 20-23 at
IISE’s Annual Conference & Expo (iise.org/Annual). Aer all, where beer to have a birthday
party than the Crescent City? On behalf of the IISE leaders and sta, we look forward to let-
ting those good times roll together with you this year and for many years to come.
Cheers and happy birthday, IISE!
Don Greene, CAE, is a Fellow and CEO of IISE.
D
Don Greene
Our process
improvement
knowledge applied
to any workplace is
essential to growth
and ecient
operations that
can save lives
and improve
boom lines.
30 ISE Magazine | www.iise.org/ISEmagazine
IISE in 2023: 75 years and counting
The device that saved AIIE’s records after fire
The following is from a 1973 letter sent by Columbus Chapter No. 1 president George L. Smith Jr. to executive director Jack F. Jericho at AIIE
headquarters in Norcross, Georgia. It concerns the 1952 fire that hit the Institute’s headquarters in Columbus, Ohio, and the device used to
salvage the damaged documents.
Dear Jack:
This mangle is presented to the AIIE National Headquarters by Columbus Chapter No. 1
in commemoration of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of AIIE, Inc.
On the night of December 9, 1952, fire swept the AIIE National Headquarters, then
located on the third floor of 40 West Gay Street, Columbus, Ohio. The surviving records
ended up in the basement covered with water. The next morning, Miss Charlotte
Patterson, secretary and oce manager, groped about in the still smoldering ruins and
icy water to salvage what she could, until ordered out of the building by the fire captain.
Later, she and Joe Southern transferred the wet records to their homes and, with the
help of Steve Viers and Wyllys Stanton, tried to dry the documents in their kitchen ovens.
They came out dry but krinkled (sic) and, in some instances, toasted.
Joe Southern and Frank Geyer discussed better ways of drying the papers. Frank volunteered the use of his mangle. It worked magnificently.
It not only dried the papers but smoothed the krinkles (sic), processed several papers at once, and treated the fragile documents with
gentleness, thanks to the care and skill of Charlotte.
Thus, many records were preserved that may have been lost at a critical time in the history of AIIE.
This is the original mangle as it appeared in 1952. It is in operating condition.
Its use after the fire was an application of Ralph M. Barnes’ I.E. Principle 2, “I combine operations whenever possible” and his Motion
Economy Principle 19, “the hand should be relieved of all work that can be better performed by a machine.”
A gathering of the Board of Trustees in 1961.
A mangle, a device used to press water out
of materials between rollers, was credited to
helping to preserve AIIE records after the 1952
fire at its Columbus, Ohio, headquarters. It was
presented to the Institute as a keepsake in 1973
by the Columbus chapter.
Celebrate the Institute’s
history each month in ISE
“On the evening of January 12, 1948, a group of
twelve men met at my home in Columbus, Ohio,
in response to an invitation to gather and discuss
the problems, methods and potentialities of a new
organization specializing in the problems and
interests of the industrial engineers.”
This is how founder Wyllys G. Stanton described the
founding of AIIE in a 1988 book, Origins of Industrial
Engineering, published by the Institute.
Throughout the year, look for IISE 75th Anniversary
Throwback Moments featured in The Institute
section of each ISE issue recalling a milestone from
IISE’s history. You can oer your ideas or memories
to share in a form on iise.org/75.
Here’s a sample of historic images to begin
our 75th year.
January 2023 | ISE Magazine 31
“Industrial Engineers
Organize AIIE”
From The Ohio Engineer, 1948
A new technical society has been founded. The organization is
known as The American Institute of Industrial Engineers (AIIE).
Realizing the ever increasing importance of Industrial
Engineering in industry, the organization has been formed
to raise the standards of the engineers’ profession; to protect
society and industry through the identification of qualified
Industrial Engineers; to cooperate with and promote the aims
of the National Society of Professional Engineers; and to aid, in
all ways possible, colleges and universities devoted to teaching
Industrial Engineering.
Membership is based upon professional attainment in the
field. Only graduates from accredited curricula in Industrial
Engineering; licensed professional Industrial Engineers; or
men with neither of the foregoing qualifications, but who can
show professional accomplishment in the field, may apply for
membership.
The organization, at present, numbers some forty members
and is growing steadily. Mr. Eldon D. Raney of Ranco
Incorporated, of Columbus, Ohio, is the present national
president, and Wyllys G. Stanton, Associate Professor of
Industrial Engineering at Ohio State University, is national
executive secretary.
For further information concerning the organization please
write Professor Wyllys G. Stanton, 214 Industrial Engineering
Building, Ohio State University, Columbus 10, Ohio.
The first page
of The Ohio
Engineer
publication by
the Ohio Society
of Professional
Engineers notes
the founding of
AIIE in 1948.
Eldon Rainey served as first
president of the Institute from
1948-49.
Wyllys G. Stanton founded the
American Institute of Industrial
Engineers in a meeting of 11 other
men at his Columbus, Ohio, home
Jan. 12, 1948. The Institute was
ocially incorporated on
Sept. 14, 1948.
A 1957 telegram from
President Dwight D.
Eisenhower congratulates
AIIE on the eve of its eighth
national convention held at
the Hotel Statler in New York.
The cover of the third edition
of The Journal of Industrial
Engineering published in 1949
by AIIE.
AIIE sta are seen at work in 1956 at the Institute’s Columbus, Ohio,
headquarters.
