118 years
I read with great sadness a January 26 WSJ article – Recession Batters Law Firms, Triggering Layoffs, Closings.
The article leads with the closing of 118 year-old San Francisco firm Heller Ehrman, and further recounts 160 year-old New York firm Thatcher Proffitt & Wood’s closing.
My sadness was not simply because the article signaled again how hard hit every industry is during a financial crisis, but because centuries-old companies are forced to close their doors. The US itself has only 233 years under our belt, so a 100-year-old company says a lot.
And each time I hear of another American institution shuttering its doors, I despair. Each community, each industry has their own landmark institutions – in Minnesota they include 107-year-old 3M, makers of Scotch Tape; the dry goods company General Mills, founded in 1928; and the nearly-50-year-old Target, originally a subsidiary of another, now since gone, MN icon – Dayton’s. Target opened its first store in Roseville, MN in 1962. My family shopped at that very Target store from that first year. Now, I shop at the Super Target on that same footprint in Roseville.
Members of the Blue Grotto team worked on 3M’s centennial celebration, producing a significant publication that documented not just ad campaigns of Scotch Tape, but their 100 year road to success – with the bumps and bruises that come with being a centenarian. Think of your own family, your grandparents…if they lived to be 100…what they could tell you. Not simply nostalgia (in MN, it’s stories about walking to school, up a hill, in -5 degrees, in the middle of a blizzard, before Thinsulate), but having lived through war(s), Depression, recessions, Presidential firsts like JFK – the first Catholic president, and Ronald Regan – the first divorced president, the Cold War, and the coldest year on record. One hundred years of life buys a lot of experience, for people and businesses alike.
Maybe your grandparents were small business owners, or big business owners, and you are responsible for the next generation of success. Maybe you are following in their footsteps as a lawyer, a grocer, an ad exec, a mechanic, a publisher, a CEO. Maybe you are carving your own niche and you are the pioneer for your family. What would you most want to pass down to the next generation of your family, your employees, your community?
With extremely harsh financial conditions, the kind that force 118-year-old law firms to close up shop, it’s hard to justify spending money on your history. But, if for nothing other than posterity, think about how you would/could/should take an accounting of your organization’s past. And how you would like to be remembered.
Email me with examples of ways you are capturing and communicating your organization’s history. I’m pretty sure the folks at Heller Ehrman did not expect that their 118th anniversary party would be their last.
Yvonne Hundshamer
President, Blue Grotto Inc.
www.bluegrottoinc.com
The article leads with the closing of 118 year-old San Francisco firm Heller Ehrman, and further recounts 160 year-old New York firm Thatcher Proffitt & Wood’s closing.
My sadness was not simply because the article signaled again how hard hit every industry is during a financial crisis, but because centuries-old companies are forced to close their doors. The US itself has only 233 years under our belt, so a 100-year-old company says a lot.
And each time I hear of another American institution shuttering its doors, I despair. Each community, each industry has their own landmark institutions – in Minnesota they include 107-year-old 3M, makers of Scotch Tape; the dry goods company General Mills, founded in 1928; and the nearly-50-year-old Target, originally a subsidiary of another, now since gone, MN icon – Dayton’s. Target opened its first store in Roseville, MN in 1962. My family shopped at that very Target store from that first year. Now, I shop at the Super Target on that same footprint in Roseville.
Members of the Blue Grotto team worked on 3M’s centennial celebration, producing a significant publication that documented not just ad campaigns of Scotch Tape, but their 100 year road to success – with the bumps and bruises that come with being a centenarian. Think of your own family, your grandparents…if they lived to be 100…what they could tell you. Not simply nostalgia (in MN, it’s stories about walking to school, up a hill, in -5 degrees, in the middle of a blizzard, before Thinsulate), but having lived through war(s), Depression, recessions, Presidential firsts like JFK – the first Catholic president, and Ronald Regan – the first divorced president, the Cold War, and the coldest year on record. One hundred years of life buys a lot of experience, for people and businesses alike.
Maybe your grandparents were small business owners, or big business owners, and you are responsible for the next generation of success. Maybe you are following in their footsteps as a lawyer, a grocer, an ad exec, a mechanic, a publisher, a CEO. Maybe you are carving your own niche and you are the pioneer for your family. What would you most want to pass down to the next generation of your family, your employees, your community?
With extremely harsh financial conditions, the kind that force 118-year-old law firms to close up shop, it’s hard to justify spending money on your history. But, if for nothing other than posterity, think about how you would/could/should take an accounting of your organization’s past. And how you would like to be remembered.
Email me with examples of ways you are capturing and communicating your organization’s history. I’m pretty sure the folks at Heller Ehrman did not expect that their 118th anniversary party would be their last.
Yvonne Hundshamer
President, Blue Grotto Inc.
www.bluegrottoinc.com
posted by Blue Grotto Inc. @ 10:27 AM
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