Moore School Lectures
Encyclopedia
Theory and Techniques for Design of Electronic Digital Computers (popularly called the "Moore School Lectures") was a course in the construction of electronic digital computers held at the University of Pennsylvania
's Moore School of Electrical Engineering
between July 8, 1946 and August 30, 1946, and was the first time any computer topics had ever been taught to an assemblage of people. The course disseminated the ideas developed for the EDVAC
(then being built at the Moore School as the successor computer to the ENIAC
) and initiated an explosion of computer construction activity in the United States
and internationally, especially in Great Britain
.
was at the center of developments in high-speed electronic computing. On February 14 of that year it had publicly unveiled the ENIAC
, the first general-purpose electronic digital computer, developed in secret beginning in 1943 for the Army's Ballistics Research Laboratory. Prior even to the ENIAC's completion, work had begun on a second-generation electronic digital computer, the EDVAC
, which incorporated the stored program model. Work at the Moore School attracted such luminaries as John von Neumann
, who served as a consultant to the EDVAC project, and Stan Frankel
and Nicholas Metropolis
of the Manhattan Project
, who arrived to run one of the first major programs written for the ENIAC, a mathematical simulation for the hydrogen bomb project.
World War II
had spawned major national efforts in many forms of scientific research—continued in peacetime—that required computationally intensive analysis; the thirst for information about the new Moore School computing machines had not been slaked, but instead intensified, by the distribution of von Neumann's notes
on the EDVAC's logical design. Rather than allow themselves to be inundated with requests for demonstrations or slow progress in computer research by withholding the benefits of the Moore School's expertise until papers could be published formally, the administration, including Dean Harold Pender
, Prof. Carl Chambers, and Director of Research Irven Travis, respectively proposed, organized, and secured funding for what they envisioned as a lecture series for between 30 to 40 participants enrolled by select invitation.
The 8-week course was conducted under the auspices of the U.S. Army's Ordnance Department and the U.S. Navy's Office of Naval Research
, who promised (by verbal authorizations) the $3,000 requested to cover lecturer salaries and fees and $4,000 for travel, printing, and overhead. ($1,569 over this figure was ultimately claimed.)
Even as the Moore School found itself in the computing spotlight, its computer design team was disintegrating into splinter groups who hoped to advance computing research commercially, or academically at more prestigious institutions. In the former group were ENIAC co-inventors J. Presper Eckert
and John Mauchly
, who the previous March had departed the Moore School amidst a patent rights dispute to found the first computer company, the Electronic Control Company (later renamed to Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation
), and took many on the Moore School staff with them; in the latter group were Herman Goldstine (the Army's liaison to the Moore School who served as administrative overseer of the ENIAC's construction) and Arthur Burks
(a Moore School professor on the ENIAC design team), lured to the Institute for Advanced Study
by von Neumann. Despite the somewhat acrimonious fracturing of the ENIAC/EDVAC group, these figures gave the majority of the Moore School Lectures, with Eckert and Mauchly receiving the highest salaries ($1,200 each), while Goldstine and the others received only travel expenses and an honorarium ($50 per lecture).
Many of the pioneers of computer development contributed to the Moore School Lectures, most prolifically Pres Eckert, followed by John Mauchly and Herman Goldstine. The topics covered virtually all facets of electronic computing relevant to the construction and operation of digital computers, and included, by popular demand, an unscheduled presentation of the ENIAC during the latter half of the sixth week and the first half of the seventh week, with lectures by Mauchly, Sharpless, and Chu. Discussions of the ENIAC were resisted since its logical design had been obsoleted even before its completion by ongoing work on the EDVAC with its stored-program concept; nevertheless, it was the only electronic digital computer then in operation and the students petitioned to see demonstrations and learn of its design.
The initial plan for the lectures, outlined by Chambers in a June 28, 1946 memorandum, was for them to be grouped into four major headings, with the second and third being presented concurrently after the completion of the first: General Introduction to Computing, covering the history, types, and uses of computing devices; Machine Elements, focusing on hardware and, indeed, software, under the term "code and control"; Detailed Study of Mathematics of Problems, what today might constitute a course in programming, including the Goldstine/Burks lectures on numerical mathematical methods and Mauchly's lectures on sorting, decimal-binary conversion and error accumulation; and finally a series of lectures on overall machine design called Final Detailed Presentation of Three Machines, though it actually came to include six machines, including the ENIAC, which despite its fame had not been an intended focus of any of the lectures.
The actual record of the lectures is incomplete. While many of the lectures were recorded on a wire recorder by Herman Lukoff
and Dick Merwin, the recorder frequently broke down mid-lecture, and the recordings took several months to be transcribed and proofed by the lecturers. It wasn't until two years after the lectures, in 1948, that all of the material was assembled and published in four volumes edited by the Moore School's George W. Patterson, who was on the EDVAC staff. Some of the gaps have since been filled in with the notes of student Frank M. Verzuh.
Uninvited attendees saw at least some of the lectures:
Additionally, many of the lecturers attended a number of the lectures by others.
The individuals and institutions represented at the Moore School Lectures went on to be involved with numerous successful computer construction projects in the late 1940s and early 1950s, including EDSAC
, BINAC
, UNIVAC
, CALDIC
, SEAC
and SWAC
, the IAS machine
, and the Whirlwind
.
The success of the Moore School Lectures prompted Harvard University
to host the first computer conference in January, 1947; that same year the Association for Computing Machinery
was founded as a professional society to organize future conferences.
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
's Moore School of Electrical Engineering
Moore School of Electrical Engineering
The Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania came into existence as a result of an endowment from Alfred Fitler Moore on June 4, 1923. It was granted to Penn's School of Electrical Engineering, located in the Towne Building...
between July 8, 1946 and August 30, 1946, and was the first time any computer topics had ever been taught to an assemblage of people. The course disseminated the ideas developed for the EDVAC
EDVAC
EDVAC was one of the earliest electronic computers. Unlike its predecessor the ENIAC, it was binary rather than decimal, and was a stored program computer....
(then being built at the Moore School as the successor computer to the ENIAC
ENIAC
ENIAC was the first general-purpose electronic computer. It was a Turing-complete digital computer capable of being reprogrammed to solve a full range of computing problems....
) and initiated an explosion of computer construction activity in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and internationally, especially in Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...
.
Background
In 1946 the Moore School in Philadelphia, PennsylvaniaPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...
was at the center of developments in high-speed electronic computing. On February 14 of that year it had publicly unveiled the ENIAC
ENIAC
ENIAC was the first general-purpose electronic computer. It was a Turing-complete digital computer capable of being reprogrammed to solve a full range of computing problems....
, the first general-purpose electronic digital computer, developed in secret beginning in 1943 for the Army's Ballistics Research Laboratory. Prior even to the ENIAC's completion, work had begun on a second-generation electronic digital computer, the EDVAC
EDVAC
EDVAC was one of the earliest electronic computers. Unlike its predecessor the ENIAC, it was binary rather than decimal, and was a stored program computer....
, which incorporated the stored program model. Work at the Moore School attracted such luminaries as John von Neumann
John von Neumann
John von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician and polymath who made major contributions to a vast number of fields, including set theory, functional analysis, quantum mechanics, ergodic theory, geometry, fluid dynamics, economics and game theory, computer science, numerical analysis,...
, who served as a consultant to the EDVAC project, and Stan Frankel
Stan Frankel
Stanley Phillips "Stan" Frankel was an American computer scientist. He was born in Los Angeles, attended graduate school at the University of Rochester, received his PhD in physics from the University of California, Berkeley, and began his career as a post-doc student under J. Robert Oppenheimer...
and Nicholas Metropolis
Nicholas Metropolis
Nicholas Constantine Metropolis was a Greek American physicist.-Work:Metropolis received his B.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in physics at the University of Chicago...
of the Manhattan Project
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development program, led by the United States with participation from the United Kingdom and Canada, that produced the first atomic bomb during World War II. From 1942 to 1946, the project was under the direction of Major General Leslie Groves of the US Army...
, who arrived to run one of the first major programs written for the ENIAC, a mathematical simulation for the hydrogen bomb project.
World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
had spawned major national efforts in many forms of scientific research—continued in peacetime—that required computationally intensive analysis; the thirst for information about the new Moore School computing machines had not been slaked, but instead intensified, by the distribution of von Neumann's notes
First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC
The First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC was an incomplete 101-page document written by John von Neumann and distributed on June 30, 1945 by Herman Goldstine, security officer on the classified ENIAC project...
on the EDVAC's logical design. Rather than allow themselves to be inundated with requests for demonstrations or slow progress in computer research by withholding the benefits of the Moore School's expertise until papers could be published formally, the administration, including Dean Harold Pender
Harold Pender
Harold Pender was an American academic, author, and inventor. He was the first Dean of the University of Pennsylvania's Moore School of Electrical Engineering, a position he held from the founding of the School in 1923 until his retirement in 1949...
, Prof. Carl Chambers, and Director of Research Irven Travis, respectively proposed, organized, and secured funding for what they envisioned as a lecture series for between 30 to 40 participants enrolled by select invitation.
The 8-week course was conducted under the auspices of the U.S. Army's Ordnance Department and the U.S. Navy's Office of Naval Research
Office of Naval Research
The Office of Naval Research , headquartered in Arlington, Virginia , is the office within the United States Department of the Navy that coordinates, executes, and promotes the science and technology programs of the U.S...
, who promised (by verbal authorizations) the $3,000 requested to cover lecturer salaries and fees and $4,000 for travel, printing, and overhead. ($1,569 over this figure was ultimately claimed.)
Even as the Moore School found itself in the computing spotlight, its computer design team was disintegrating into splinter groups who hoped to advance computing research commercially, or academically at more prestigious institutions. In the former group were ENIAC co-inventors J. Presper Eckert
J. Presper Eckert
John Adam Presper "Pres" Eckert Jr. was an American electrical engineer and computer pioneer. With John Mauchly he invented the first general-purpose electronic digital computer , presented the first course in computing topics , founded the first commercial computer company , and...
and John Mauchly
John Mauchly
John William Mauchly was an American physicist who, along with J. Presper Eckert, designed ENIAC, the first general purpose electronic digital computer, as well as EDVAC, BINAC and UNIVAC I, the first commercial computer made in the United States.Together they started the first computer company,...
, who the previous March had departed the Moore School amidst a patent rights dispute to found the first computer company, the Electronic Control Company (later renamed to Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation
Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation
The Eckert–Mauchly Computer Corporation was founded by J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, and was incorporated on December 22, 1947. After building the ENIAC at the University of Pennsylvania, Eckert and Mauchly formed EMCC to build new computer designs for commercial and military applications...
), and took many on the Moore School staff with them; in the latter group were Herman Goldstine (the Army's liaison to the Moore School who served as administrative overseer of the ENIAC's construction) and Arthur Burks
Arthur Burks
Arthur Walter Burks was an American mathematician who in the 1940s as a senior engineer on the project contributed to the design of the ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic digital computer. Decades later, Burks and his wife Alice Burks outlined their case for the subject matter of the...
(a Moore School professor on the ENIAC design team), lured to the Institute for Advanced Study
Institute for Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study, located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States, is an independent postgraduate center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It was founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner...
by von Neumann. Despite the somewhat acrimonious fracturing of the ENIAC/EDVAC group, these figures gave the majority of the Moore School Lectures, with Eckert and Mauchly receiving the highest salaries ($1,200 each), while Goldstine and the others received only travel expenses and an honorarium ($50 per lecture).
Lecturers and lectures
Lectures were given 5 days a week on weekdays and were up to 3 hours long; the afternoons were typically reserved for informal seminars.Many of the pioneers of computer development contributed to the Moore School Lectures, most prolifically Pres Eckert, followed by John Mauchly and Herman Goldstine. The topics covered virtually all facets of electronic computing relevant to the construction and operation of digital computers, and included, by popular demand, an unscheduled presentation of the ENIAC during the latter half of the sixth week and the first half of the seventh week, with lectures by Mauchly, Sharpless, and Chu. Discussions of the ENIAC were resisted since its logical design had been obsoleted even before its completion by ongoing work on the EDVAC with its stored-program concept; nevertheless, it was the only electronic digital computer then in operation and the students petitioned to see demonstrations and learn of its design.
From the Moore School team
- J. Presper EckertJ. Presper EckertJohn Adam Presper "Pres" Eckert Jr. was an American electrical engineer and computer pioneer. With John Mauchly he invented the first general-purpose electronic digital computer , presented the first course in computing topics , founded the first commercial computer company , and...
of the Electronic Control Company:- "A Preview of a Digital Computing Machine" (July 15, 1946)
- "Types of Circuits—General" (July 18, 1946)
- "Reliability of Parts" (July 23, 1946)
- "Adders" (July 26, 1946) (with Sheppard)
- "Multipliers" (July 29, 1946)
- "Tapetypers and Printing Mechanisms" (August 1, 1946)
- "Continuous Variable Input and Output Devices" (August 6, 1946)
- "Reliability and Checking" (August 7, 1946)
- "Electrical Delay Lines" (August 14, 1946)
- "A Parallel-Type EDVAC" (August 22, 1946)
- "A Parallel Channel Computing Machine" (August 26, 1946)
- John W. MauchlyJohn MauchlyJohn William Mauchly was an American physicist who, along with J. Presper Eckert, designed ENIAC, the first general purpose electronic digital computer, as well as EDVAC, BINAC and UNIVAC I, the first commercial computer made in the United States.Together they started the first computer company,...
of the Electronic Control Company:- "Digital and Analogy Computing Machines" (July 8, 1946)
- "The Use of Function Tables with Computing Machines" (July 12, 1946)
- "Sorting and Collating" (July 25, 1946)
- "Conversion Between Binary and Decimal Number Systems" (July 29, 1946)
- "Code and Control II: Machine Design and Instruction Codes" (August 9, 1946)
- "Introduction to the ENIAC" (August 15, 1946) (unscheduled)
- "Block Diagrams of the ENIAC III" (August 20, 1946) (unscheduled)
- "Accumulation of Errors in Numerical Methods" (August 30, 1946)
- Herman Goldstine of the Institute for Advanced StudyInstitute for Advanced StudyThe Institute for Advanced Study, located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States, is an independent postgraduate center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It was founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner...
, Princeton, New JerseyPrinceton, New JerseyPrinceton is a community located in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. It is best known as the location of Princeton University, which has been sited in the community since 1756...
:- "Numerical Mathematical Methods I" (July 10, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods II" (July 11, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods III" (July 16, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods V" (July 22, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods VI" (July 30, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods VII" (August 2, 1946)
- Arthur W. BurksArthur BurksArthur Walter Burks was an American mathematician who in the 1940s as a senior engineer on the project contributed to the design of the ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic digital computer. Decades later, Burks and his wife Alice Burks outlined their case for the subject matter of the...
of the Institute for Advanced StudyInstitute for Advanced StudyThe Institute for Advanced Study, located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States, is an independent postgraduate center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It was founded in 1930 by Abraham Flexner...
, Princeton, New JerseyPrinceton, New JerseyPrinceton is a community located in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. It is best known as the location of Princeton University, which has been sited in the community since 1756...
:- "Digital Machine Functions" (July 12, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods IV" (July 22, 1946)
- "Numerical Mathematical Methods VIII" (August 2, 1946)
- T. Kite Sharpless of the Moore School:
- "Switching and Coupling Circuits" (July 19, 1946)
- "Block Diagrams of the ENIAC I" (August 16, 1946) (unscheduled)
- "Block Diagrams of the ENIAC II" (August 19, 1946) (unscheduled)
- "Description of Serial Acoustic Binary EDVAC I" (August 28, 1946)
- "Description of Serial Acoustic Binary EDVAC II" (August 28, 1946)
- Chuan Chu of the Moore School:
- "Magnetic Recording" (July 31, 1946)
- "Block Diagrams of the ENIAC IV" (August 21, 1946) (unscheduled)
- C. Bradford SheppardCharles Bradford SheppardC. Bradford Sheppard was an American working as a radio engineer for Hazeltine Electronics during World War II. Sheppard, who worked on radar in the design office, wished to fight Nazi Germany in the armed forces but was turned down by the US Army due to blindness in one eye...
of the Moore School:- "Elements of a Complete Computing System" (July 15, 1946)
- "Adders" (July 26, 1946) (with Eckert)
- "Memory Devices" (July 24, 1946)
- "Code and Control I" (August 8, 1946) (filling in for Eckert)
- "Code and Control III" (scheduled but not given)
- "A Four-Channel Coded-Decimal Electrostatic Machine" (August 27, 1946)
- Irven Travis of the Moore School:
- "The History of Computing Devices" (July 8, 1946)
- Sam B. Willams, consultant to the Moore School:
- "Reliability and Checking in Digital Computing Systems" (August 7, 1946)
From the University of Pennsylvania
- Hans RademacherHans RademacherHans Adolph Rademacher was a German mathematician, known for work in mathematical analysis and number theory.-Biography:...
:- "On the Accumulation of Errors in Numerical Integration on the ENIAC" (July 22, 1946)
From Harvard University
- Howard AikenHoward AikenHoward Hathaway Aiken was a pioneer in computing, being the original conceptual designer behind IBM's Harvard Mark I computer....
:- "The Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator" (July 16, 1946)
- "Electro-Mechanical Tables of the Elementary Functions" (July 17, 1946)
From the U.S. Navy Office of Research and Inventions
- Perry Crawford, Jr.:
- "Applications of Digital Computation Involving Continuous Input and Output Variables" (August 5, 1946)
From the National Bureau of Standards
- John H. Curtiss:
- "A Review of Government Requirements and Activities in the Field of Automatic Digital Computing Machinery" (August 1, 1946)
From the University of California, Berkeley
- Derrick H. Lehmer:
- "Computing Machines for Pure Mathematics" (July 9, 1946)
From the University of Manchester
- Douglas HartreeDouglas HartreeDouglas Rayner Hartree PhD, FRS was an English mathematician and physicist most famous for the development of numerical analysis and its application to the Hartree-Fock equations of atomic physics and the construction of the meccano differential analyser.-Early life:Douglas Hartree was born in...
:- "Some General Considerations in the Solutions of Problems in Applied Mathematics" (July 9, 1946)
From the Naval Ordnance Laboratory
- Calvin N. MooersCalvin MooersCalvin Northrup Mooers , was an American computer scientist known for his work in information retrieval and for the programming language TRAC....
:- "Code and Control IV: Examples of a Three-Address Code and the Use of 'Stop Order Tags'" (August 12, 1946)
- "Discussions of Ideas for the Naval Ordnance Laboratory Computing Machine" (August 26, 1946)
From the Institute for Advanced Study
- John von NeumannJohn von NeumannJohn von Neumann was a Hungarian-American mathematician and polymath who made major contributions to a vast number of fields, including set theory, functional analysis, quantum mechanics, ergodic theory, geometry, fluid dynamics, economics and game theory, computer science, numerical analysis,...
:- "New Problems and Approaches" (August 13, 1946)
Independent consultant
- George StibitzGeorge StibitzGeorge Robert Stibitz is internationally recognized as one of the fathers of the modern digital computer...
:- "Introduction to the Course on Electronic Computers" (July 8, 1946)
The initial plan for the lectures, outlined by Chambers in a June 28, 1946 memorandum, was for them to be grouped into four major headings, with the second and third being presented concurrently after the completion of the first: General Introduction to Computing, covering the history, types, and uses of computing devices; Machine Elements, focusing on hardware and, indeed, software, under the term "code and control"; Detailed Study of Mathematics of Problems, what today might constitute a course in programming, including the Goldstine/Burks lectures on numerical mathematical methods and Mauchly's lectures on sorting, decimal-binary conversion and error accumulation; and finally a series of lectures on overall machine design called Final Detailed Presentation of Three Machines, though it actually came to include six machines, including the ENIAC, which despite its fame had not been an intended focus of any of the lectures.
The actual record of the lectures is incomplete. While many of the lectures were recorded on a wire recorder by Herman Lukoff
Herman Lukoff
Herman Lukoff was a computer pioneer and fellow of the IEEE.Lukoff was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Aaron and Anna Lukoff. He graduated from the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania in 1943. While at the Moore School, he helped develop the ENIAC and...
and Dick Merwin, the recorder frequently broke down mid-lecture, and the recordings took several months to be transcribed and proofed by the lecturers. It wasn't until two years after the lectures, in 1948, that all of the material was assembled and published in four volumes edited by the Moore School's George W. Patterson, who was on the EDVAC staff. Some of the gaps have since been filled in with the notes of student Frank M. Verzuh.
Students
28 students were invited to attend the Moore School Lectures, each a veteran engineer or mathematician:- Sam N. Alexander, Edward W. Cannon, and Roger Curtis of the National Bureau of Standards
- Mark Breiter of the War DepartmentUnited States Department of WarThe United States Department of War, also called the War Department , was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army...
's Office of the Chief of Ordnance - Arthur B. Horton, Warren S. Loud, and Lou D. Wilson of MITMassachusetts Institute of TechnologyThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
- David R. Brown and Robert R. Everett of the MIT Servomechanisms Laboratory
- Frank M. Verzuh of MIT's Rockefeller Electronic Computer Project
- Howard L. Clark and G.W. Hobbs of General Electric Co.
- R.D. Elbourne of the Naval Ordnance LaboratoryNaval Ordnance LaboratoryThe Naval Ordnance Laboratory , now disestablished, formerly located in White Oak, Maryland was the site of considerable work that had practical impact upon world technology. The White Oak site of NOL has now been taken over by the Food and Drug Administration.-History:The U.S...
, who worked for John Vincent AtanasoffJohn Vincent AtanasoffJohn Vincent Atanasoff was an American physicist and inventor.The 1973 decision of the patent suit Honeywell v. Sperry Rand named him the inventor of the first automatic electronic digital computer... - Herbert Galman and Joshua Rosenbloom of the Frankford ArsenalFrankford ArsenalThe Frankford Arsenal was a United States Army ammunition plant located adjacent to the Bridesburg neighborhood of Northeast Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, north of the original course of Frankford Creek.-History:...
- Orin P. Gard of Wright FieldWright-Patterson Air Force BaseWright-Patterson Air Force Base is a United States Air Force base in Greene and Montgomery counties in the state of Ohio. It includes both Wright and Patterson Fields, which were originally Wilbur Wright Field and Fairfield Aviation General Supply Depot. Patterson Field is located approximately...
's Armament Laboratory - Simon E. Gluck of the Moore School
- D.H. Gridley and Louis Suss of the Naval Research Laboratory
- Samuel Lubkin of Aberdeen Proving GroundAberdeen Proving GroundAberdeen Proving Ground is a United States Army facility located near Aberdeen, Maryland, . Part of the facility is a census-designated place , which had a population of 3,116 at the 2000 census.- History :...
's Ballistics Research Laboratory - James T. Pendergrass of the OP-20-GOP-20-GOP-20-G or "Office of Chief Of Naval Operations , 20th Division of the Office of Naval Communications, G Section / Communications Security", was the US Navy's signals intelligence and cryptanalysis group during World War II. Its mission was to intercept, decrypt, and analyze naval communications...
CNOChief of Naval OperationsThe Chief of Naval Operations is a statutory office held by a four-star admiral in the United States Navy, and is the most senior uniformed officer assigned to serve in the Department of the Navy. The office is a military adviser and deputy to the Secretary of the Navy...
Navy Department - David ReesDavid Rees (mathematician)David Rees ScD Cantab, FIMA, FRS is an emeritus professor of pure mathematics at the University of Exeter, having been head of the Mathematics / Mathematical Sciences Department at Exeter for many years....
of Manchester University, England - Albert Sayre of the Army Security AgencyUnited States Army Security AgencyThe United States Army Security Agency was the United States Army's signal intelligence branch. Its motto was "Vigilant Always." The Agency existed between 1945 and 1976 and was the successor to Army signal intelligence operations dating back to World War I...
- Phillip A. Shaffer, Jr. of the Naval Ordnance Testing Station, Pasadena, CaliforniaPasadena, CaliforniaPasadena is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although famous for hosting the annual Rose Bowl football game and Tournament of Roses Parade, Pasadena is the home to many scientific and cultural institutions, including the California Institute of Technology , the Jet...
- Claude E. ShannonClaude Elwood ShannonClaude Elwood Shannon was an American mathematician, electronic engineer, and cryptographer known as "the father of information theory"....
of Bell Telephone LaboratoriesBell LabsBell Laboratories is the research and development subsidiary of the French-owned Alcatel-Lucent and previously of the American Telephone & Telegraph Company , half-owned through its Western Electric manufacturing subsidiary.Bell Laboratories operates its... - Albert E. Smith of the Navy Office of Research and Inventions
- Maurice V. Wilkes of Cambridge University, who joined the course only for its final two weeks after numerous problems with his travel
- H.I. Zagor of the Reeves Instrument Company
Uninvited attendees saw at least some of the lectures:
- Cuthbert HurdCuthbert HurdCuthbert Corwin Hurd was an American computer scientist and entrepreneur, who was instrumental in helping the International Business Machines Corporation develop its first general-purpose computers.-Life:...
of Allegheny CollegeAllegheny CollegeAllegheny College is a private liberal arts college located in northwestern Pennsylvania in the town of Meadville. Founded in 1815, the college has about 2,100 undergraduate students.-Early history:... - Jay ForresterJay Wright ForresterJay Wright Forrester is a pioneer American computer engineer, systems scientist and was a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Forrester is known as the founder of System Dynamics, which deals with the simulation of interactions between objects in dynamic systems.- Biography :Forrester...
of MIT - Unidentified representatives of the MIT Servomechanisms Laboratory who took the place of Brown and Everett on any given week
Additionally, many of the lecturers attended a number of the lectures by others.
The individuals and institutions represented at the Moore School Lectures went on to be involved with numerous successful computer construction projects in the late 1940s and early 1950s, including EDSAC
EDSAC
Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator was an early British computer. The machine, having been inspired by John von Neumann's seminal First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC, was constructed by Maurice Wilkes and his team at the University of Cambridge Mathematical Laboratory in England...
, BINAC
BINAC
BINAC, the Binary Automatic Computer, was an early electronic computer designed for Northrop Aircraft Company by the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation in 1949. Eckert and Mauchly, though they had started the design of EDVAC at the University of Pennsylvania, chose to leave and start EMCC, the...
, UNIVAC
UNIVAC
UNIVAC is the name of a business unit and division of the Remington Rand company formed by the 1950 purchase of the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation, founded four years earlier by ENIAC inventors J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, and the associated line of computers which continues to this day...
, CALDIC
CALDIC
CALDIC was an electronic digital computer built with the assistance of the Office of Naval Research at the University of California, Berkeley between 1951 and 1955 to assist and enhance research being conducted at the university with a platform for high-speed computing.CALDIC was designed to be...
, SEAC
SEAC (computer)
SEAC was a first-generation electronic computer, built in 1950 by the U.S. National Bureau of Standards and was initially called the National Bureau of Standards Interim Computer, because it was a small-scale computer designed to be built quickly and put into operation while the NBS waited for...
and SWAC
SWAC (computer)
The SWAC was an early electronic digital computer built in 1950 by the U.S. National Bureau of Standards in Los Angeles, California. It was designed by Harry Huskey...
, the IAS machine
IAS machine
The IAS machine was the first electronic computer built by the Institute for Advanced Study , in Princeton, New Jersey, USA. It is sometimes called the von Neuman machine, since the paper describing its design was edited by John von Neumann, a mathematics professor at both Princeton University...
, and the Whirlwind
Whirlwind (computer)
The Whirlwind computer was developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It is the first computer that operated in real time, used video displays for output, and the first that was not simply an electronic replacement of older mechanical systems...
.
The success of the Moore School Lectures prompted Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
to host the first computer conference in January, 1947; that same year the Association for Computing Machinery
Association for Computing Machinery
The Association for Computing Machinery is a learned society for computing. It was founded in 1947 as the world's first scientific and educational computing society. Its membership is more than 92,000 as of 2009...
was founded as a professional society to organize future conferences.
External links
- The 48 Moore School Lectures and a Digest of the Final Lectures by Dr. Brian Napper
- The Moore School Lectures and the British Lead in Stored Program Computer Development (1946 -1953) by John R. Harris
- Oral history interviews on Moore School, Charles Babbage InstituteCharles Babbage InstituteThe Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking....
, University of Minnesota. Includes interviews with Carl Chambers, J. Presper EckertJ. Presper EckertJohn Adam Presper "Pres" Eckert Jr. was an American electrical engineer and computer pioneer. With John Mauchly he invented the first general-purpose electronic digital computer , presented the first course in computing topics , founded the first commercial computer company , and...
, Irven A. Travis, S. Reid Warren, Arthur W. Burks, Alice BurksAlice BurksAlice Rowe Burks is an American author of children's books and books about the history of electronic computers.Born Alice Rowe, she began her undergraduate degree at Oberlin College on a competitive mathematics scholarship and transferred to the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia where she...
, James T. Pendergrass, and others. - Frank M. Verzuh Moore School Lecture Notes 1946, Charles Babbage InstituteCharles Babbage InstituteThe Charles Babbage Institute is a research center at the University of Minnesota specializing in the history of information technology, particularly the history since 1935 of digital computing, programming/software, and computer networking....
, University of Minnesota. Personal lecture notes on the theory and techniques for the design of electronic digital computers, July 8-August 31, 1946