First photocopy machine in the world | The history of photocopiers

When was the first photocopy machine

First photocopy machine in the world | The history of photocopiers

Who invented the world's first photocopy machine

We all have used it at one time or another to copy our school documents, or parts of books borrowed from the library, or anything else. By pressing a button on the Xerox machine, hey presto! A piece of paper comes out at one end, an exact duplicate of the document we needed to copy!

However, when the invention was first patented, no one wanted anything to do with it. Major corporations such as IBM, Kodak and General Electric turned down offers to develop it, perhaps regretting the decision to this day! But its inventor Chester F. Carlson's blood, sweat and tears were not wasted, proving the success of today's machine!

Chester Carlson, the inventor of this machine was born in Seattle on February 8, 1906 but grew up in California. In 1930, he received a degree in physics from the California Institute of Technology.

Chester Carlson invented photocopying

However, it was the Depression era and there were no jobs to be found. Finally Carlson New York City PR. Mallory, gets a job at a battery manufacturing company. During this time, Carlson studied law at night school and got a somewhat steady job at Mallory in their patent department as a patent 'lawyer'.


Carlson discovered that each patent had to be copied or photographed by hand many times before it was submitted to the patent office. Both methods were tedious and time consuming.
The anxiety we take for granted today is the main reason Carlson invented the much-needed photocopier. Carlson reasoned that there must be a better way to make copies, and he set out to find one.

He spent months going through various scientific articles but found no solution. He argued that the answer lay in the new field of photoconductivity, a field recently discovered by Hungarian physicist Paul Szelny. He discovered that when light strikes the surface of certain chemicals or metals, their conductivity (the flow of electrons) increases.

A Brief History of the Office Photocopy Machine

Carlson realized that if an image of a document or photograph was projected onto a photoconductive surface, current would flow only in the areas where the light fell.
He worked on his invention from his home kitchen and arrived at something called 'Electrophotography'. His first patent was filed in October 1937.

Initially, large corporations showed no enthusiasm for the project as it would cost them millions of dollars in initial investment.
During this time Carlson contacted the Battle Memorial Institute, a non-profit organization that invests in technological research. Battle promises to help Carlson and signs a contract giving Carlson a 40% share of the proceeds.

Battle assigned the project to Roland M. Schaffert, a research physicist and former printer. Schaffert worked on the project for about a year. He then improved on Carlson's technique by using a new photoconductive plate coated with selenium, a good photoconductor.
War researchers also developed a dry ink, which they called toner. This toner was made with ammonium chloride salt and a plastic material to get a clear image.

On January 2, 1947, Battle signed a contract with a small company called Haloid to develop this electrophotography technology, and in 1949 the first photocopier was brought to market.

However, the flat plate process took too long and was impractical when making a dozen or more copies. Some suggest at this time that Halide coined the term xerography for this technique, from the Greek words xeros "to dry" and graphos "to write". Halloy thus named his first photocopier the Xerox Model A. In 1958, Haloid officially changed their name to Haloid Xerox and finally to Xerox in 1961.

Halogen didn't really hit Xerox until the Model 914 was introduced in 1959. It is called the '914' because it can handle 9 inch x 14 inch legal size paper.

This model was such a hit that by 1965 Xerox had grossed over $500 million and today Xerox is such a household name that people confuse the company name for the process called photocopying!
Sometimes we mistakenly say "Can I have a xerox of this document?" Don't we? Now you know why it is wrong to say!


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