June 17, 2002

Our museum, the Museum of American Heritage in Palo Alto, Calif.,
recently received as a very welcome donation an old Xerox machine
dating to the 1950s.  This was - specifically - the Model D processor
with the Camera 4 and both the heat fuser and the vapor fuser, and
was the first commercially available Xerox.

It's peculiarity lies in that it is an entirely hand-develop machine,
from charging the plate, exposing the plate in the camera, developing
the plate by experience-gauged hand operation, and finally fusing it
by heat or vapor.  An experienced operator could make about one copy
every four minutes.  Two experienced operators, however, could by
working together average about a copy a minute and keep it up for
several hours.

So far as I have been able to determine, this is the only OPERATING
example of the first Xerox in the country, perhaps in the world.
Xerox Archives in Rochester doesn't know of one, nor do they have a
set up working example themselves.

My question is:  Do any of you in the vast Museum-L audience know of
an actual operating example of this particular machine anywhere in
the world?  If I'm unable to track one down, I'd love to advertise
ours as the only operating machine in the country.  But I want to do
my homework first, so please let me know if you know or have heard of
one.

Also, we are in need of manuals, advertising, spare parts, operating
supplies, etc.

In addition, to clean the plates between copies, we need some sort of
wide (about a foot wide) brush made of the softest non-scratch
material imaginable.  What would that be and where can I get one?

-Jim
--
-Jim Lyons

[log in to unmask]
http://www.jimlyons.com

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