IBM Kingston
Back when companies relied on mainframe computers to crunch their numbers and process their words, times were good at IBM’s Kingston, NY, plant. Workers were well paid, families were invited to picnics on the company’s sprawling campus, and prosperity was real for thousands of hardworking Ulster County residents. As technology changed, so too did the demand for mainframe computers and IBM’s sales plummeted, taking with them the jobs, benefits and economic security many IBMers thought would last forever. Layoffs started in 1993, creating a seismic shift in the economy of the Hudson Valley – one from which we have yet to fully recover. These days, visitors to the grounds that once housed IBM see little more than vestiges of what once was. The massive buildings are still there and the grass is freshly cut. A few new tenants have even moved in. But the IBM workforce and the hum of machines pressing out mainframes, are long gone.