[vcf-midatlantic] ENIAC day

Evan Koblentz evan at snarc.net
Mon Feb 15 20:14:43 EST 2016


Today is the 70th anniversary of when the University of Pennsylvania Moore School of Engineering and the Army ordnance department unveiled ENIAC to the public in 1946. The computer was in production use several months prior and ran until the early 1950s at Aberdeen (Maryland) Proving Ground.

I represented VCF today at a ceremony at the Moore School. They showed a computer simulated walk-through of the classroom-sized ENIAC and debuted a 3D printed model of it. I'm going to follow up and see if we can get the files to make our own. :)  There was also a lecture by professional historians Thomas Haigh and Mark Priestley, who are two of the three co-authors of the new book ENIAC in Action which is the best examination yet of how the machine worked and was actually used.

Several friends-of-VCF were there including Bill Mauchly, IEEE History Center staff, Dick Moberg, etc. .... Also met a Penn CS professor who learned programming on a PDP-8 and IBM 1130, so of course I invited him to visit us.


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