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6 SMT007 MAGAZINE I DECEMBER 2025 A Tribute to Iola —and Automation In the 1960s and '70s, when the west side of the Portland, Oregon, metro area was dominated by Tektronix, my grandmother worked as one of the "assembly ladies." Known as "Tek," the company was an economic juggernaut, driving the economy of the cities of Beaverton, Tigard, and Hillsboro. The only employer larger than Tektronix was the state of Oregon itself; virtually every Portlander had some connection to Tek. Fun side note: It was so large that the company published its own newspaper, TekWeek, every Friday, and classified ads were Beaverton's pre- internet version of Craigslist. Even if you didn't work at Tektronix, you would seek out a copy of TekWeek just so you could shop the classifieds. In those days, through-hole parts were the state of the art, and assembly meant hand-soldering. For a huge OEM like Tektronix, that translated into massive single-story industrial buildings with open floor plans across the metro area. These were just big empty shells, filled with rows of soldering work- benches, and assembly operating around the clock. My grandma, Iola Searles, worked in assem- bly from the late 1950s until her retirement in the mid-'80s. She would tell me stories about Howard Vollum, co-founder and president, using the back of a pickup truck in the parking lot as a stage to talk to his staff, and she marveled at the growth of the company from a thriving startup of 200 people to an industry megacorp. N O L A N ' S N OT E S by N o l a n J o h n so n , I- C o n n ect0 07 Image credit: Creative Commons, Engradio 2012 In 1961, Tektronix marketed the model 321 oscilloscope, which was totally portable (rechargeable batteries or AC) and transistorized.