As Bell Labs marks a century, look back at a former Lehigh Valley partner Western Electric

As Bell Labs marks a century, look back at a former Lehigh Valley partner Western Electric

As the iconic Bell Labs marks 100 years in 2025 as a research arm of former communications giants AT&T and Bell Telephone System, it has a historic, corporate tie-in to the Lehigh Valley: Allentown’s Western Electric. Eighty years ago this October, Western Electric President Clarence G. Stoll visited the area at the invitation of the Allentown Chamber of Commerce. He found a 40-acre parcel of farmland that he liked off Union Boulevard. That land…