John H. Dessauer
| John H. Dessauer | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Hans Dessauer 13 May 1905 Aschaffenburg, Germany |
| Died | 12 August 1993 (aged 88) Pittsford, New York |
| Education | |
| Occupation | Chemical engineer |
| Organization | Xerox |
| Parent(s) | Hans Dessauer |
| Relatives |
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John H. Dessauer, also known as Hans Dessauer, (13 May 1905 – 12 August 1993) was a German-American chemical engineer and an innovator in developing xerography. He was instrumental in turning a $7 million company of the 1930s into Xerox, a billion-dollar copier company.
He was born Hans Dessauer in Aschaffenburg in a family of industrialists who owned the Aschaffenburger Buntpapierfabrik, a leading coloured paper factory with a long tradition. His parents were Hans Dessauer and his wife Bertha (née Thywissen). The physicist Friedrich Dessauer was an uncle. He had one older half-sister, four brothers and one sister. The physicist Guido Dessauer was his younger brother.
Dessauer attended the Gymnasium in Aschaffenburg, before studying chemistry in Freiburg where he joined the Katholische Studentenverein Brisgovia, in the Cartellverband. In 1926, he received a B.S. degree from the Technical University Munich. At the RWTH Aachen University, he earned an M.S. degree in 1927 and his doctorate in 1929 with a thesis on the chemical process industry (Neue Ringisomerisationen in der Camphenreihe).
He left Germany in 1929 and went to the US, initially working at Ansco for six years in Binghamton, New York. He went to work for the Rectigraph Company in Rochester, New York in 1935, which was bought by the Haloid Company. At Haloid, he became director of research in 1938, and was instrumental in turning it from a $7 million company into a billion-dollar copier company, which became the Xerox Corporation. It was Dessauer who spotted an article about electrostatic photography, later known as xerography in Monthly Abstract Bulletin in April 1945 and recognized its potential for copying. Together with Chester Carlson who discovered the process and businessman Joseph C. Wilson (entrepreneur), they developed its use for reproducing documents and letters. The copier was first sold in 1959.
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