End of An Era
In the 1970s, as the viability of Edmund's business model waned, Norman Edmund's son Robert Edmund refashioned the business into two new ones, Edmund Scientifics and Edmund Optics. Edmund Scientifics marketed to consumers and specialized in science-themed toys, vaguely high-tech household gadgets, and "science gifts." Edmund Optics did not have a public showroom like Edmund Scientifics, although the two organizations shared the same building. The large back room of Edmund Scientifics still sold military surplus from WWII and other wars well into the 1980s and into the mid 1990s. Some of the items in the surplus room were from German and other non-American militaries. None of these items were in the mail-order catalogs. They also sold other surplus wares of interest to hobbyists, including specialized motors and other miscellaneous electronics, parts from toys, and other household items.
In line with their focus on optics, Edmund Scientifics's entrance vestibule housed a pale-blue working WWII Japanese submarine periscope. Children were often drawn to this periscope. Drawing on the periscope's popularity, sometime in the 1970s a hall of mirrors, complete with black lights, was installed towards the rear of the building.
The Barrington, NJ, store closed in 2001 when Edmund Scientific was acquired by its current owner, Science Kit and Boreal Laboratories.
As of 2007, Edmund Optics continues to offer brand-new stock optics, as well as offering custom and specialized optics to corporations and higher education institutions.
Read more about this topic: Edmund Scientific Corporation
Famous quotes containing the word era:
“The era of the political was one of anomie: crisis, violence, madness and revolution. The era of the transpolitical is that of anomaly: an aberration of no consequence, contemporaneous with the event of no consequence.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)