Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
"ENIAC was the prototype from which most other modern computers evolved," wrote
Martin H. Weik in 1961. "It embodied almost all the components and concepts of today's
high-speed, electronic digital computers. Its designers conceived what has now become
standard circuitry such as the gate (logical 'and' element), buffer (logical 'or' element) and
used a modified Eccles-Jordan flip-flop as a logical, high-speed storage-and-control device.
The machine's counters and accumulators, with more sophisticated innovations, were made
up of combinations of these basic elements. ... The primary aim of the designers was to
achieve speed by making ENIAC as all-electronic as possible. The only mechanical ele-
ments in the final product were actually external to the calculator itself."
The first six programmers of ENIAC were female, in large measure because this func-
tion was seen as being rudimentary, almost clerical, compared to the engineering side of
things. Nothing could have been further from the truth. "These women, being the first to
enter this new territory, were the first to encounter the whole question of programming,"
comments Paul E. Ceruzzi, a computer historian at the Smithsonian Institution. "And they
met the challenge." Well versed in mathematics, Kay Antonelli, Jean Bartik, Betty Holber-
ton, Marlyn Meltzer, Frances Spence and Ruth Teitelbaum did groundbreaking work, cre-
ating fundamental approaches that would influence all generations of programmers going
forward. These women built the first sort routine, developed the first software application
and instruction set, and defined the first classes in programming. They were innovators of
the first rank, without whom the ENIAC would have been a mere shell: a brain sans a mind.
But, as the
New York Times
has noted: "When the ENIAC was shown off at the
University of Pennsylvania in February 1946 ... the attention was all on the men and the
machine. The women were not even introduced at the event" even though the demonstra-
tion program being run was of their invention. Decades would pass before these ladies re-
ceived formal recognition for their trailblazing efforts. (The last of the ENIAC's initial pro-
gramming team, Jean Bartik, died at age 86 in March of 2011.)
The primary developers of the ENIAC had big plans for the future commercial use of
computers. Founded in March of 1946 as the Electronic Control Company and incorporated
in December 1947 as the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation, J. Presper Eckert's and
John Mauchly's firm was in 1950 acquired by Remington Rand. (Remington Rand eventu-
ally merged with Sperry Corporation, becoming Sperry Rand, which later [1986] merged
with Burroughs to form Unisys.)
Eckert and Mauchly's UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer) had been commis-
sioned by the United States Census Bureau in 1948 with an eye toward having the machine
ready to play an integral role in the 1950 national census. (The computer was delivered in
March of 1951.) The term "universal" was meant to convey the fact that the machine was
designed to handle both scientific and business applications, the latter being described by a
new term:
data processing.
To develop the UNIVAC, Eckert and Mauchly hired a number
