October 2001

Cornell Student Earns BDC Intern Fellowship

Charles W. Jermy III, a local Homer resident and junior at Cornell University in the department of applied economics and management, has earned the annual intern fellowship awarded by the Cortland County Business Development Corporation to a promising local college student interested in economics, public policy and business development.

The intern fellowshship award was established last year to encourage young people to take an active role in the future development of their community. The first recipient, Jasmine Gatto, a resident of the City of Cortland, majored in international studies at Hamilton College and worked with the BDC in summer 2000 on an export promotion project, linking Cortland businesses with international investment opportunities..

Chip is a 1999 graduate of Cortland Christian Academy and a 2001 graduate of Tompkins Cortland Community College (TC3) with an associate degree in business administration. He is co-historian of the Village of Homer and is also active in the Glen Haven Historical Society. Perhaps not coincidentally, his first assignment is updating Cortland's Industrial and Major Employer Directory, first produced in 1895. The project involves a survey of employers in various industry sectors with a description of their NASIC code, product or service lines, range of employment levels and key company contact information. The directory will be available in a print format, as well as on-line. This will mark the first time that an Industrial Directory will ever be available in a digital version.

"It was commonplace to find the first 1895 Industrial Directory when business formation in Cortland was in its heyday," noted Jermy. Company names then would have included Brewer-Titchener, Champion Sheet Metal, the Cortland Ice Company, the Brockway Wagon Company, and Wickwire Brothers, Inc. It even included the Coca Cola Bottling Company which first put up bottles in Cortland in 1893. Those companies, and others that followed like Smith Corona, NCC and Rubbermaid have slipped from the pages, but they have been replaced by major new employers like Pall Trinity Micro, Marietta, BorgWarner Morse TEC and world class technology companies like Photon Vision Systems and WetStone Technologies. "It's ironic that more than 100 years later, even noting periods where the economy slumped, that this directory reflects a genuine rebound as the economy today has the ability to not only meet but surpass the 'grand old days' of industry at the turn of the last century," noted Chip. "This area has incredible untapped potential."

Chip's involvement with the BDC is the outgrowth of two major research papers he did as a student at TC3. The first traced the growth of a high tech industry in Cortland County and the other measured the economic impact of investments in tourism. With a goal to potentially pursue an MBA with a focus on management and marketing, Chip's fascination with local history has led to an appreciation of early Cortland entrepreneurs and their role in shaping both industry and development patterns in the county. He has also become involved as a volunteer with the Tioughnioga River Trail and part of his fellowship will include helping develop narrative for the interpretive signage that will eventually be part of the trail system.