page_title: Monroe Systems for Business
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Monroe Systems for Business / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Jay Randolph Monroe
context_page_description: Monroe Systems for Business is a provider of electric calculators, printers, and office accessories such as paper shredders to business clients. Originally known as the Monroe Calculating Machine Company, it was founded in 1912 by Jay Randolph Monroe as a maker of adding machines and calculators based on a machine designed by Frank Stephen Baldwin. It was later known as Monroe THE Calculator Company, and Monroe Division of Litton Industries.
context_section_description: In 1911, Jay Randolph Monroe first saw the Baldwin Calculator, the invention of Frank Stephen Baldwin. Although Mr. Baldwin's machine had been patented in 1874 and had been judged by the Franklin Institute as the most noteworthy invention of that year winning the John Scott Medal, it had not been developed for commercial use. Mr. Monroe recognized the merits of the Baldwin Calculator, and in April 1912 he organized the Monroe Calculating Machine Company, and in a small rented room near Newark, New Jersey, the manufacture of the first Monroe Adding-Calculator was begun.
  The following year the firm moved to Orange, New Jersey. The factory personnel consisted of only nine men and the entire heavy factory equipment was a lathe and two small presses. Even with these meager tools, tolerances were maintained to within thousandths of an inch to insure the accurate performance of the finished machine. The first Monroe was offered to the business world in 1914.
  In 1932, the company was awarded the Franklin Institute's John Price Wetherill Medal.
  For many years, Monroe was headquartered in Orange, New Jersey and Morris Plains, New Jersey with its manufacturing plants in New Jersey, Bristol, Virginia and Amsterdam.  In 1958, the company was acquired by Litton Industries. Litton sold it in 1984. In the mid-1980s, the company diversified and began carrying a line of private-labeled copiers (manufactured by Mita Corp.) and cross-cut paper shredders, but those items have been discontinued.
  In the 1970s and 1980s, the company had some 300 sales and service branch offices in the United States.  In 1972, Monroe announced a pocket-sized electronic display calculator at $269. As low cost electronic calculators from Japan became readily available through retail distribution, the mechanical calculator companies like Monroe, Friden, and Marchant declined even as they introduced programmable calculators.
  In 1980, the company name was changed to Monroe Systems for Business. This change in name was to reflect the diversification of the company from a calculator-only company to one which addressed the broader needs of the office. During this period, Monroe introduced bookkeeping machines, magnetic stripe ledger card accounting machines, programmable calculators, computers, copiers, facsimile and shredders.
  Since 2016, Monroe Systems for Business has been owned by Arlington Industries. Bill Ault serves as chief operating officer.
  As of 2019, in addition to calculators, the company has expanded the products it offers to include a number of complementary products for businesses and professionals with a focus on accounting functions – this includes high-security shred solutions, currency counting machines, replacement toner cartridges, and more. 
  In 2019, Monroe acquired Typewriters.com, a 61-year-old, all-in-one typewriter supplier who specializes in IBM, Nakajima and Brother reconditioned typewriters, as well as the supplies, parts and manuals that go with them. Founder, Jim Riegert, now leads the charge for sales, operations and customer service for the company. 
  Also in 2019, Monroe became an Amazon channel partner.
caption: Portrait of Jay Randolph Monroe
exif: {}