Company: Electro-Mechanical Research, Inc. (EMR) Based: Sarasota, Fl. Founded: 1957 as a division of Weston Instruments, Inc Specialty: Designed and developed telemetry processing equipment and computerized systems for aircraft and space industries, cockpit voice recorders (CVR) and flight data recorders (FDR) |
Electro-Mechanical Research EMR Electronic Components Paperweight (1982)

This Acrylic paperweight from Electro-Mechanical Research features a sampling of electronic, electrical, and mechanical components of the types used in many of their products.
It was hand created to be a one of a kind piece, awarded to a person retiring from the company in 1982. It has an actual EMR equipment name plate embedded inside, custom machine stamped with the employees name, employee number, and hire and retirement dates (our image edited to hide the persons name).
Embedded inside the Lucite paperweight are a variety of individual electronic components dated from the early 1980's, including a J2N2 bipolar transistor, resistor, diode, capacitor, and an Hewlett Packard Integrated Circuit, as well as various mechanical hardware components including tooling and machining bits.
EMR started in 1957 as a division of Weston Instruments, but has since been aquired by numerous other parent companies including Fairchild, Schlumberger, Loral, Lockheed Martin, and L-3 Communications.
EMR specialized in building telemetry equipment, as well as computerized systems, for government contracts. EMR products were used in many space projects during the 1960's and 70's including Project Mercury, Project Gemini, Ranger 7, Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 missions, Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar space plane, and the Skylab space station.
In the 1970s, EMR built the telemetry systems for project Celoscope for the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Also in the 1970s they built computer systems for aircraft including the Fairchild Republic A-10 ground-attack aircraft, Boeing 747 passenger jet, and Gates Learjet private business jets. In the 1980's computer and telemetry systems were built for government aerospace test ranges including locations at Edwards Air Force Base (CA.), White Sands Missile Range (NM.) and Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake (CA.).
EMR was also a key manufacturer of Flight Data Recorders (FDR), and Cockpit Voice Recorders (CVR). EMR has also built computer systems for nuclear reactors, wind energy turbines, water managment and hydroelectric monitoring, weather monitoring, and automotive testing.