The Highest Rung of the Ladder: Achieving the American Dream

By Deane May Zager

Deane May Zager and Diana Turner were two young women with a dream when they opened the first data processing service bureau in Orange County, California, in June 1962.

Within twenty-four hours after the idea of a business was conceived, they had a small office. John Dewey said, The highest mark of intelligence is to recognize and grasp a genuine opportunity. They did.

Using the slogan Accuracy Is Our Key Word, they included their home phone numbers on business cards, pledged not to miss a call, and vowed never to date anyone in authority to award contracts because it wasnt good business.

As executive women in the data processing field at that time, they were an anomaly, but they earned respect and built a booming business a mans worldall while enjoying an active family and social life.

Their story is filled with laughs galore at some their unorthodox business adventures. It demonstrates the value of friendship and confirms that with little more than a dream and determination, anyone can blaze a trail in business and reach The Highest Rung of the Ladder.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Feb 25, 2015
• ISBN: 9781480815599

Deane May Zager

Deane May Zager was president of Orange County Data Processing Inc. for thirty years and taught school for ten years. She was honored as the Outstanding Business Woman of the Year in 1991 by the American Business Women of America, Orange County California Chapter. She currently resides in Winchester, California.

Book preview

1

The Beginning

I’m against a homogenized society, because I want the cream to rise."

—Robert Frost

A t the moment I inserted my last dime, a small handwritten note at the bottom of the phone caught my eye—Out of Order. I slammed the receiver hard with an expletive that would have sent my granny scurrying for a trusty switch, when suddenly, nickels, dimes, and quarters began pouring out of the coin box onto the floor. I thought, I must be on Candid Camera , but looking around, I saw no one. Then the front of the service station came into view, and there was a sign clearly posted on the front door: closed . It looked as though it had been closed for quite some time, and I could see why with little or no traffic on this road.

Many roads in Orange County were lined with palm trees, orange trees, and strawberry fields, but Jamboree Road, being part of Irvine Ranch, was lined mostly with bean fields. Known for many years for producing oranges, cauliflower, and grapes, the ranch now produced mostly barley and beans. The road ran all the way from Irvine Lake to Pacific Coast Highway. It was actually built and named for a Boy Scout Jamboree in 1953. Since Orange County was deemed a country cousin to Los Angeles, the Boy Scout Jamboree was a big event and one of the key things that put Orange County on the map.¹

In 1957, Irvine Ranch granted Ford Motor Company a lease of two hundred acres on a hilltop overlooking Newport Beach. This was beautiful property. Ford Motor Company had the foresight to build in this pristine setting, and it was the only company in that area for several years. The road off Jamboree leading to Ford’s stately buildings was named—what else?—Ford Road.

Speeding along in Diana’s yellow convertible, it was so clear that day that we could see Catalina Island. Down the road a short distance, I saw a service station and a phone booth. Our appointment with Mr. White was at eleven o’clock, so I said, Diana, we have plenty of time. Would you stop at that station so I can call home? Judy, my six-year-old, had a cold, and I wanted to check with the babysitter to see how she was feeling. Diana pulled into the gravel parking lot, and I hopped out and ran over to the phone booth. Here I now stood, looking down at all that money spewed out across the phone booth floor. Quickly I knelt and gathered it up in my skirt and took off running for the car. Flying across the gravel, I called out, Look, Di, look! We can eat now! Before we’d left the office that morning, we had discussed the possibility of having lunch after our meeting. Between the two of us, we didn’t have enough money for one hamburger; now we did.

That’s the way it was for two young women who, with nothing more than intestinal fortitude and a dream, opened the first data processing service bureau in Orange County, California, in June of 1962. Three months prior to this sunshiny day, Diana and I were sitting in the coffee shop at Lynwood Bowling Alley, and Orange County Key Punch Service became a thought, a determined action, and then a few days later, a reality.

Diana and I met four years earlier when I went to work at Hughes Tooling in Fullerton. She was one of the first persons I met, and it wasn’t long before our friendship was cemented. About six months after I started at Hughes, I had the opportunity to go to work for Alpha Beta Acme Foods, and with a salary increase of eighty dollars a month, I was out of there. Alpha Beta was a little farther out than Hughes, but Diana and I continued to meet most Friday nights after work. We worked second shift, which was 4:30 p.m. to 1:00 a.m. The two of us, along with the rest of the nondrinkers, would stop at the bowling alley for a hamburger. The drinkers went to a bar called the Mill, a short distance away.

That Friday night, we settled into our favorite booth, ordered our hamburgers, and, as usual, the conversation drifted toward work. There were no service bureaus in Orange County at the time, and companies had no choice but to send their overflow work to Los Angeles. Hughes Tooling in Fullerton, owned by Howard Hughes, was using a service bureau there, and more often than not the work came back with many errors and sometimes was not done at all. This particular Friday night, the work was returned in a mess, and more than one person at Hughes was fed up.

As we discussed this situation, Diana casually said, Deane—pronounced Deanie—we should open a service bureau, and then she took another bite of her hamburger. The words resounded in my head as if a trumpet had blown. Without a moment’s hesitation, I slammed my hand down hard on the table and said, We will! We will; yes, we will. Not, Do you really think we should? or Let’s think about it, or I’ll give that some thought, or That sounds like a good idea, but a positive, absolutely no-doubt-about-it yes. And a plan was already forming in my head. I was never sure if Diana was serious about this or if it was just a passing thought. We had never discussed anything remotely like it before, but as far as I was concerned, it was a done deal.

That night as I lay in my bed, my brain wouldn’t turn off. The committee was working overtime. I knew this was the opportunity I had been looking for. I had a lot of responsibilities, and I needed a lot of money. My brother had died three months earlier at the age of thirty-seven with cancer of the lung, and he’d left three children. Along with my three girls, his two boys, Billy and Richard, would be making their home with us. His daughter, Pat, who was the love of his life, would stay in Texas with Mom, but I needed to provide extra money for her too.

The following day was Saturday, and I called my good friend Bill O’Brien. He, along with his partner, owned hospitals, doctors’ offices, and a shopping center. I told him what Diana and I wanted to do, and he was almost as excited as I was. I had called just to get his thoughts and advice on our decision, but he went a step further with an offer of a small office, rent-free, until we could get started. It was in their shopping center, which was near both of our homes. This was fantastic news, and I knew we were on our way. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, Goodness is the only investment in life that never fails. Bill’s kindness was goodness personified.

The following Monday, after our big decision Friday night at the bowling alley, we paid a visit to IBM in Long Beach, California. Harvey Thronson never knew what hit him. In our minds, we were ready to do big business, so it was a real shock to learn that we were only going to be able to lease three machines. The contract required six-months’ rental paid in advance on each machine. We were beginning this operation on the proverbial shoestring. In my bank account, I had $500, and Diana borrowed the same amount from the credit union at Hughes. That’s all the money we had to start this great enterprise with. (In 2014, with inflation, $500 would be a little over $3,800, and I daresay that one would be hard pressed to start a business today with $7,600, not to mention the regulations that small and large business must contend with now.) As we signed the contract for two keypunch machines and one verifier, we got another shock: our machines would not be delivered for three months. I remember words spewing of our mouths like, What? Can’t you do something about that? You’re putting us out of business before we even get started. Poor Harvey. This was the beginning of a long and sometimes painful relationship for him.

In 1943, Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, said, I think there is a world market for maybe five computers. Mr. Watson was a man with great intellect, but he missed this one by a million miles. IBM was to have an amazing growth, and Big Blue, as the company came to be known, enjoyed a monopoly status for years. Everything that involved electronic data processing was completely in IBM’s pocket, with no chance for outside competition. The going joke for years was How can we get IBM machines? The answer: Piece by piece and part by part.

But all that changed in 1952. The government won the antitrust suit they had filed against IBM in 1932. After a twenty-year fight, IBM lost its legal battle and was forced to lease and sell its equipment; however, it wasn’t until 1956 that it became a reality. The government’s pending antitrust suit was the third one it had filed against IBM. The earlier suits (1932 and 1952) concerned the company’s activities in the tabulating industry, but the 1956 consent decree (which settled the 1952 suit) placed significant restrictions on IBM’s computer business and is responsible for the very existence of some segments of the computer industry. It required IBM to sell its machines as well as lease them. As it turned out, we got our three machines in two months, probably because Harvey was weary of our calls almost every day. Within eight months, we had six keypunch machines and six verifiers, and within twelve months of our first order, we had twelve of each and then forty—and then computers and so on.

We had hired Ronnie, Diana’s son, to clean the office on Saturday after the work was finished. Diana and I had cautioned him to be careful of the electrical outlets when he mopped the tile floor. One Saturday, I told him again that he was using too much water near the outlets, and he smarted something back at me. I said, Okay. You’re fired.

He said, Good. I’ll just get my unemployment.

I started to laugh because it was obvious this twelve-year-old kid was smarter than I was. I said, No, you’re not fired, but you can stick to keypunching. I had taught him to keypunch, and he picked it up faster than anyone I ever saw, even to doing his own program cards. It was not surprising that he became a good doctor when he grew up.

So the next Saturday afternoon, after we finished work and the girls had all left, Diana and I decided to give the office a good cleaning. We had been in business about six months and were still in our small quarters, which made cleaning easy. We had worked half the night and all that day and neither of us looked fresh as the first rose of summer. Unfortunately, just as we were in the middle of our chore, a friend of Diana’s dropped by. It was an uncomfortable moment, and the only time I ever saw Diana embarrassed. I think he was sweet on her, and maybe she had a little thing for him too. He didn’t hang around long and after he left, sizing up the way we both looked, we had a good laugh. Success is costly in many areas, and being barefoot with a mop in your hand doesn’t do a lot for romance. (That’s my own proverb.)

Giving us that little office rent-free was such a leg up, and Bill would have our gratitude for life. Within four months of opening our doors, we were able to start paying rent. We were also able to reciprocate by doing data entry at no cost for a construction company he and his partner owned.

Another opportunity to reciprocate came along about five years later when Bill and his partner woke up one morning to the surprise and horror of their financial life. I was in Palm Springs and had picked up a newspaper when I went to breakfast. I opened the front page, and just under the headlines was an article about two doctors in Orange County who were losing their shirts. Their business manager had made some unwise decisions, without their knowledge, and now their medical offices were in jeopardy, not to mention their hospitals. Every asset they owned was frozen, and they needed money that very day just to keep their medical offices open and be able to see their patients.

I left Palm Springs that morning, and shortly after I got home, Bill called me. As a young doctor, right out of medical school, Bill had been my aunt Dona’s doctor. She just loved him, and he greatly admired her. When her blood pressure began to be a cause for concern, he wanted to check her twice a month. Her insurance would only pay for one office visit a month, so every other visit was at no charge. He was one of the kindest men I ever knew, and he had done so much for my family and me that I could never repay him. At the top of the list was the beautiful baby girl he helped my sister and her husband adopt. It was my privilege to loan him the needed funds. I was grateful to God that I could do it.

At the bowling alley that previous Friday night, I had no doubt, no fear, and no reservations about starting this business. The 90% guts and 10% brains were at work. With youth, it’s natural to think you are clever and smart. Later on as you get older, real wisdom sets in, hopefully. The older you get, the more you realize the less you know. In any case, we were ready to go, and what an adventure it would be. There were times when we were like a surfer riding the crest of the wave; of course, there were times when we missed it royally, but we never crashed so far down that we didn’t bounce back and land on our feet. Somehow we always managed to figure out what the situation required and rose to the occasion one way or another.

The people that occupied the office before us were only open in the daytime, but we knew once we got started we would have two and possibly three shifts, so I made draperies for the windows. We each kept our night jobs and worked during the day at our office, developing our strategy. We planned where our machines would go, sat on phone books to make calls, and named our company Orange County Key Punch Service (later incorporated as Orange County Data Processing Inc.) We had a sign painted, and the day it was hung, we stood out front gazing up at it as if it were General Motors (and that was a good thing in those days.)

Naturally, since our name was Orange County Key Punch Service, we chose orange stationery, orange business cards, orange delivery slips, and orange invoices. This was a little unorthodox, and we knew it, but at least it would get attention. We worked diligently for hours on our introductory letter announcing the opening of our data processing service bureau; it consisted of few words.

June 2, 1962

Orange County Key Punch Service

1226 ½ South Brookhurst

Anaheim, CA (There were no zip codes then)

We are happy to announce that of June 2, 1962, right here in Orange County, you will be able to have fast, accurate keypunch and verifying service by experienced, capable operators. In the event that you have a need of our service, we feel confident that we will prove very satisfactory and that you will be a return account. We would appreciate the opportunity of talking with you at your convenience.

Our slogan—Accuracy Is Our Key Word—was printed at the bottom of our stationery and on our business cards. We also had our home phone numbers on the business cards right along with the office number. We were not going to miss a call. We mailed the letter along with two business cards to every company of any size in Orange County and also a few to Los Angeles. Later on, we would do work for companies as far away as San Diego. We were there to save the businesses of Orange County. We knew they needed us, and we hoped to be remembered by our choice of orange paper products—and as it turned out, we were.

The first response to our introductory letter came on August 1 from Excelsior Creamery in Santa Ana. They had a job for us to look at, a real job. The morning of our appointment, I went by Diana’s house to pick her up. We were very excited as we headed out for the twenty-minute drive to Santa Ana. I parked in front of an ancient building on a street lined with beautiful, old trees. We walked on sidewalks that were cracked and uneven from the roots of those trees. It gets hot in Southern California in August, and even after our short walk, it was a relief to get inside the cool building. We gave our names to the receptionist, and she came from behind her desk and directed us to an elevator. It laboriously delivered us to the top floor, which we later dubbed the Crow’s Nest.

In 1962, electronic data processing hadn’t yet come into its own, and consequently, the EDP department was either relegated to the lowest part of the basement or a room in the attic. This particular department was located in what had once evidently been the attic. We tried to look confident and professional as we met the Data Processing Manager and the Supervisor. They showed us the documents; we discussed the procedure, the programming, and the date they needed the job back. Then the question came: What is the cost going to be? I looked at Diana, hoping for something, and she looked at me. Who knew? Oops. I think it hit both of us at the same time that neither of us had any idea in this world how to bid a job. It may seem odd but we had never discussed quoting or bidding a job or what we should charge. In the frenzy of getting the company up and going, money evidently was not the first thing on our minds, and now it seemed we had overlooked a very important part. One of us had the sense to say, Is there someplace we can go to talk? We thought surely there was an office somewhere in this ancient building where we could sit down, look this job over a little more, and come up with a price quote. We needed to share some ideas, and we didn’t want anyone to hear our desperate cry of What in the world do we do now?

The supervisor stood, and we followed her, assuming she was taking us to another room. What a surprise when she opened the door and stepped out on the roof, holding the door for us to follow. Yep, it was the roof, all right, and not a chair or a bench in sight. Obviously having done this before, she gave no explanation but turned and went back inside. Seeing nothing else on the roof but the air-conditioning unit, we each took our perch on that. With traffic whizzing by below and the hot sun beating down on our backs, we put our heads together and looked the documents over again. The conversation went something like this:

Diana: We’re doing the job ourselves with no payroll costs. The charge should be about this amount.

Me: No, Diana, we need to charge enough to cover payroll costs, and anyway, we do have rent to pay on our machines.

That day, on the roof, set the precedent for our bidding from that day forward. It wasn’t long before we became experts at bidding contracts—large contracts, small contracts, annual contracts, or one-time jobs—but with every job, Diana always wanted to bid low, and I always opted to bid higher. We finally came to an agreement for this small job and took it back to the office, and about three hours later, it was done. We delivered it the next day, and a week later, we received our first check in the amount of $300. We knew this was just the beginning. It has been said that an idiot with a plan has a better chance of succeeding than a genius without one. Well, we had a plan, and with everything we had in us, by the grace of God, we were going to strive to be the best in the business. Every company we served would be number one; no number twos in our company. We would never make our problems their problems. Whatever it took to meet their schedules and needs, we would provide. It sounds grandiose, I know, but this was our goal, and it was the only way to reach the highest rung of the ladder, which is the maximum pinnacle you can achieve when standing at the highest rung.

2

We Meet the Men

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.

—Mark Twain

O ur second job was for Collins Radio, and we met Al Young. He took an interest in us and invited us to a Data Processing Managers Association dinner meeting. Al explained that it would be of great benefit to us to get acquainted with the department heads of the many companies that were members of this organization. We appreciated the invitation, and three weeks later, we attended our first meeting at the Jolly Roger Restaurant on Katella in Anaheim. Al had told us there were no women members, and we were a little apprehensive, so in keeping with our modus operandi to laugh at ourselves, just before we reached the door, I said, Tell you what, Di: let’s make a grand entrance, I’ll trip, and you fall over me. My mom never approved of being pusillanimous (that’s a five-dollar word for fainthearted or cowardly) about anything. Anytime I was going for a job interview or a new venture at school and was a little shaky, she would say, Oh, go ahead, don’t be afraid. They might kill you, but they sure can’t eat you. I never knew exactly how that was supposed to encourage me to buck up, but for some reason, it did.

So Diana and I went where angels feared to tread and entered the world of businessmen. Al welcomed us, and after dinner, when the meeting started, he introduced us and told the group a little about our company. We knew we were something of an enigma to them because women were just not in management in the data processing field yet, and here we were, owners of a data processing firm, small though it was. As it turned out, there was no reason to be apprehensive at all; everyone was friendly and welcoming.

At the end of the meeting, we gleaned a few business cards, and the next day, more letters of introduction went out. That meeting and word of mouth proved very helpful in getting known. Calls began to come in to bid on work. We became members, and a few months later, Diana was asked to give the invocation at the next month’s meeting. (Yes, the meetings were opened with prayer, and there were all types of faith embraced in that group—Jews, Methodists, Baptists, and Catholics. No one was offended. It makes you wonder what happened to real tolerance.)

Diana worked on her prayer at the office a week or so before the meeting and tried it out on me. It sounded good, and she felt confident that she was prepared. As I was parking the car the night of the meeting, Diana looked in her purse and let out a groan, saying, Deane, I forgot my notes. Looking over at her, I said, You won’t need them. You’ll do fine.

Growing up in a home where prayer was a part of everyday life, I thought she was making too much of it. Our family prayed on every occasion. We prayed before every meal, before taking a trip, or to pass a test; we even prayed for parking places. Mom never thought of calling a doctor when anyone got sick. She called the preacher from our church. Other than going for stitches for a head wound once and shots for prevention of diphtheria (after my six-year-old friend died from that horrible disease), I had never seen a doctor in my life until I was married and expecting my first child.

Actually, as it ended up, Diana gave a lovely invocation, but was I surprised when,