Encyclopedia Dubuque
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Affiliated with the Local History Network of the State Historical Society of Iowa, and the Iowa Museum Association.
SCHMITT, Joseph R.
SCHMITT, Joseph R. ( ). Elected president and chief executive officer of A.Y. MCDONALD MANUFACTURING COMPANY in 1970, Schmitt left the company in 1979 to establish J. R. Schmitt Cpnsulting Inc. of Dubuque. Working as the marketing businessman with his daughter-in-law, Glenda, as the programmer, he established the LNW Small Business and Professional Accounting Series which moved the management of small business accounts from record books to the computer.
The system kept track of a company's bills and alerted the firm when the money should be available for the payment of bills. It recorded the payroll, wrote checks and provided the information needed for government records. It computed income and expense reports; kept a brief informational file on each employee; produced mailing labels; and listed the status of individual vendor accounts.
After a low-key beginning, interest in the program soared as the need for such innovation became obvious. Their big break came when Joseph took the idea to LNW Computers in Tustin, California. Within a year, the Schmitt program was being shipped with each LNW80 Model 2 computer.