GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- When William S. Reed saw the first copier in the late 1950s, he knew the machines would be indispensable to businesses.
Reed didn’t invent the ubiquitous office technology, but his Grand Rapids firm sold the first models in the region. That foresight helped him build the largest office equipment dealer in West Michigan.
“My father is responsible for creating more paperwork in West Michigan than anybody else,” quips Reed's son, Russ.
The Grand Rapids resident, who was a veteran of both World War II and the Korean War, died Thursday, Oct. 30, at the Porter Hills Retirement Community. He was 90.
Commercial Equipment Company, the Grand Rapids firm Reed founded in 1957, placed tens of thousands of copy and printing equipment in offices across West Michigan over six decades.
The Thermo fax copier, the first model he sold, produced smelly paper that needed to be peeled back one copy at a time. Eventually the technology evolved to machines that could print in color, fax, collate, staple and scan. And the latest versions now print in 3D.
When Reed first saw the Thermo Fax in action nearly 60 years ago, he bought the Grand Rapids franchise from manufacturer, Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Co., now known as the 3M Company.
Reed believed the office copier business was destined to grow into huge industry, he told a Grand Rapids Press reporter for an executive profile that ran October 25, 1987.
Business quickly grew and he traded his one-room office at 1316 Burton St. SE for the company's current Grand Rapids location at 2225 Oak Industrial Drive NE.
After graduating from Allegan High School in 1942, Reed joined the U.S. Army Air Forces the following year. He was assigned to the 20th Air Force as a radio operator on B-29 planes flying out of Guam. Reed and his crew flew 27 missions over Japan without a mishap. He was called back into service for a short stay during the Korean War in 1951.
After World War II, Reed married Hilda Helen Miller in 1945 and enrolled at the University of Michigan. He graduated in 1948 with a Bachelor's degree in accounting, and went to work for the Burroughs Corporation in Detroit as a salesman.
In 1957, he moved to Grand Rapids to start his own business in the office equipment field, and eventually owned three companies, including W.S. Reed Company and Reed Office Systems.
When he retired in 1991, he sold the businesses to his three sons - Michael, Russell and Thomas - who operated them until 2002, when they were bought by the Tampa, Fla-based Global Imaging Systems, which is now part of Xerox.
WS Reed company, now Michigan Office Solutions and located at 2859 Walkent Dr NW, has more than 400 employees.
Reeds' photo still hangs in the lobby of MOS, and two of his grandchildren, Stacey Reed Ruter and Dave Reed, now work at the company.
“I remember Bill as a true gentleman who was passionate about the art of selling and who sincerely cared about his employees and their families," said longtime employee Bill Orr, the firm's senior vice president of sales, wrote in an email. "He went out of his way to provide opportunities for them to prosper and become financially secure.”
Visitation at Metcalf & Jonkhoff Funeral Service, at 4291 Cascade Rd SE, will be 2-4 p.m. and 6-8 p.m. Monday, and services will be 11 a.m. Tuesday, St. Robert of Newminster Catholic Church, at 6477 Ada Dr SE in Ada.