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Memorial Tributes Volume 22 (2019) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:

DONALD E. PROCKNOW
Pages 285-290

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Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.


From page 286...
... After high school Don attended the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, which was expanding its science and engineering programs. World War II interrupted his studies and he enlisted in the Navy, serving in the Pacific as the engineering officer aboard an infantry landing craft (that was subsequently used for repatriated refugees throughout the South China Sea)
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From page 287...
... The company's Hawthorne Works in Cicero, Illinois, had been the site of a landmark industrial relations study in the 1920s and 1930s. Researchers studied how different light levels affected assembly line workers and found that productivity rose as the light was increased, but didn't fall as the lights were turned down again.
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From page 288...
... "We were dealing along family lines," Don told the New York Times, "and we won't have the family business anymore." "I took the approach that we didn't ask for this, we didn't want it," he later remembered, "but it's here and we've got to take advantage of the opportunities that it presents." And thanks to the steps he had taken to prepare the company for greater competition, he could add, "We're not afraid at all." When the breakup occurred two years later, in 1984, the Western Electric name was simply retired and the company folded into other divisions of AT&T. As vice chair, Don remained with AT&T for a year to help with the transition.
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From page 289...
... He spent the balance of his retirement doing yardwork at his home in Buckingham, Pennsylvania, and continuing a lifelong devotion to community service by preparing and serving food to the homeless and bringing gifts to inmates in local prisons. True to his "get things done" nature, he played a fast version of golf and was known to tell the others in his foursome, "Take your time, but hurry up." Don is survived by Esther, sons Eugene and Charles, and five grandchildren.
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Key Terms

  • manufacturing arm
  • clarkson university
  • boy scouts
  • industrial relations
  • south dakota

  • dakota school
  • storied hawthorne
  • electric manufacturing
  • home administration
  • antitrust suit

  • simply retired
  • family business
  • researchers studied
  • china sea
  • york times

  • electric name
  • sales functions
  • held leadership
  • dramatically changing
  • line workers

  • logistics management
  • landing craft
  • leadership positions
  • statistical quality
  • south china

  • product line
  • levels affected
  • largest manufacturers
  • relations literature
  • telephone companies


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