Come for ENIAC, Stay for UNIVAC and Skeduflo

This article has a striking absence, that being the name "John Atanasoff"[0], whose electronic digital calculator was seen and examined by Mauchly in 1941, and who spoke to Mauchly multiple times during the years when ENIAC was being built.

It was this connection that ultimately blocked Eckert and Mauchly from patenting the idea of the digital computer.[1]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Vincent_Atanasoff [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Vincent_Atanasoff#Patent_...

I was hoping Minnesota would be mentioned, I had an older relative that once worked for UNIVAC. I didn't realize how spread out it was.

From Wikipedia:

>The UNIVAC was manufactured at Remington Rand's former Eckert-Mauchly Division plant on W Allegheny Avenue in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[1][9] Remington Rand also had an engineering research lab in Norwalk, Connecticut, and later bought Engineering Research Associates (ERA) in St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1953 or 1954 Remington Rand merged their Norwalk tabulating machine division, the ERA "scientific" computer division, and the UNIVAC "business" computer division into a single division under the UNIVAC name.

I'm guessing all the coolest stuff had long since happened before my relative was there.

Quoting a Time article in 1962[0]:

> Definitely not yet on the market, but envisioned by Dr. John W. Mauchly, is a miniature computer for household use that will not only make shopping lists obsolete but will also mark the extinction of the grocery clerk and the checkout-counter man. Before going to market, a woman will slip her computer into her purse (it will have an inventory of what she needs in the way of staples and supplies stored in its wafer-thin memory cells). Once at the market, she will plug her computer into a socket in a vacant “delivery alcove” and wait for the results. The computer will carry out the business of identifying itself, making the proper accounting entries in its own memory, and authorizing the charge against its mistress’ universal checking account. In less than a minute the order slides down a chute, and the housewife brings home the electronic bacon. Dr. Mauchly, who invented some of the original big computers and has already built one the size of a suitcase, is working on the pocket monster.

[0] https://time.com/archive/6625605/the-marketplace-build-small...

I recently read a fascinating book I found in the library by an engineer who worked under Mauchly and Eckert and talks about working on ENIAC, BINAC, EDVAC, LARC, and UNIVAC. The book is "From Dits to Bits" by Herman Lukoff.

For a while I worked at what was then the Sperry Rand Corporation (now Unisys) which had some pride in their heritage as the descendant of the Univac Corporation founded by ENIAC inventors Eckert and Mauchly. In a glass case there was a vacuum tube circuit said to be a memory unit of the original ENIAC. No one seemed to know much about it, casting doubt on the claimed provenance of the device. The tube circuit resembled the ones shown in the photo linked below (although none of those in the photo are from ENIAC).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Women_holding_parts_of_th...

(This is a repost of an older comment I made)

The capitalization of "SkeduFlo" in the photo of the newspaper article made the intended pronunciation more apparent to me.

It was this connection that ultimately blocked Eckert and Mauchly from patenting the idea of the digital computer.[1]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Vincent_Atanasoff [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Vincent_Atanasoff#Patent_...

I was hoping Minnesota would be mentioned, I had an older relative that once worked for UNIVAC. I didn't realize how spread out it was.

From Wikipedia:

I'm guessing all the coolest stuff had long since happened before my relative was there.

Quoting a Time article in 1962[0]:

[0] https://time.com/archive/6625605/the-marketplace-build-small...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Women_holding_parts_of_th...

(This is a repost of an older comment I made)

That’s a really good book!

If it looked like the one on the left then it was probably an ENIAC decade ring counter. It could store 1 digit from 0 to 9 and could selectively count pulses to increment the value, with carry to the next one. The 10 tubes on the right (out of 36) were the actual flip flops of the counter.

The capitalization of "SkeduFlo" in the photo of the newspaper article made the intended pronunciation more apparent to me.

That’s a really good book!

As you are reading this post, you are almost certainly looking at a computer … a desktop, a laptop, a tablet, or a smartphone. As I look around my shared workspace, I can see, without moving from my desk, 6 computers besides my own as well as a slew of smartphones. This is simply the world in which we live.

ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer), first general purpose electronic computer (invented at Penn, 1946, by John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert), Ms. Coll. 925, box 205, folder 4

But the world in which John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert were living in the early 1940s had no computers. The ENIAC, which they invented during the World War II years was from their imagination. Combined with math, engineering, and science knowledge and a pure will to solve problems, they created something utterly new. It is mind boggling when you really stop and think about it.

In 1982, Joel L. Shurkin wrote, “rarely have so few people altered the world as much as [ENIAC’s] inventors, yet gained so little for having done so,” (page 33). And yet, while Mauchly and Eckert absolutely gained less than they should have, they continued to innovate and developed no less than three unique computers (BINAC, first electronic stored-program computer ever sold commercially; EDVAC, first modern computer designed from the ground up to store both instructions and data in its internal memory; and UNIVAC, the first commercial electronic computer). Mauchly added one more computer, the Skeduflo, to his portfolio after he started his own company, Mauchly Associates. In an article following his death in 1980, it was stated that Mauchly “unlocked the secrets that spawned an industry which will continue to change our world in remarkable ways” (Sperry/UNIVAC News, volume 4, number 4, page 1).

Skeduflo, computer in a suitcase

UNIVAC I (Universal Automatic Computer), Ms. Coll. 925, box 172, Folder 9

EDVAC (Electronic Discrete Variable Automatic Computer), Ms. Coll. 925, Box 205, Folder 3

BINAC (Binary Automatic Computer), Ms. Coll. 925, Box 205, Folder 1

In a controversial move, I am going to say that while the ENIAC was revolutionary and a pivotal moment in the history of computing, my favorite part of John Mauchly’s papers is not the material related to the ENIAC, but instead is the material related to the UNIVAC and especially from the UNIVAC Applications and Research Center (UARC), which Mauchly headed from 1953 to 1959, and which was “devoted to creating better methods of using the new equipment and exploring novel applications,” (Sperry UNIVAC Sphere, vol. 10, no. 1, 1980 January).

Today we take computers for granted … when faced with a problem, we think, how can a computer solve the problem faster and more accurately than a human slogging away. Even when creating the ENIAC, that is what Mauchly and Eckert did … they needed to compute World War II ballistic firing tables and they knew, in their hearts and brains (not because it had been done before), that a computer could make that happen.

Are Computers Newsworthy? Written in 1951 with additions in 1955, Ms. Coll. 925, box 170, folder 20

What I love about Mauchly’s role in UARC is that he did the opposite. Instead of looking to computers to solve problems, Mauchly looked for problems that could be solved by computers. He used every ounce of imagination, creativity, thoughtfulness, and ingenuity to show the world that computers were newsworthy; that businesses, governments, and institutions should invest in them; and that computers were the future. He had a bird’s eye view on what was necessary, what was possible, and what he needed to do to help things along. Because of this environment of innovation and ingenuity, Mauchly and his colleagues were enormously productive … records from this time period fill dozens of record center boxes and feature enormous progress in the development of the UNIVAC (Universal Automatic Computer) the world’s first general purpose commercial computer able to handle a wide variety of applications. At the same time, the team that Mauchly assembled was a driving force in the field of programming—Admiral Grace Murray Hopper was one such pioneer in computer programming and her work helped pave the way for modern data processing.

Meet the Computer Industry’s “First Citizens,” Ms. Coll. 925, Box 172, Folder 9

Mauchly did not stop with his successes with the UNIVAC … instead, he and a colleague went on to create Skeduflo, a computer in a suitcase to work with Critical Path Method (CPM), a system for construction scheduling by computer. In the promotion that followed, Mauchly was interviewed and predicted (in 1967) that businessmen would be carrying computers around in their pockets by 1980. He was a little ambitious, but I am guessing that many of the readers of this post are carrying a computer in your pockets. The ENIAC filled the basement of the Moore School … how did the man that created that computer also anticipate a computer that would fit in a pocket?

John Mauchly at work, Ms. Coll. 925, Box 206, Folder 5

Following Mauchly’s death, J. Presper Eckert gave a eulogy in which he stated: “the first thing that comes to my mind when I think of John is that the was certainly one of the most brilliant people I ever knew. But I think brilliant is a cold word. And for all his being brilliant, I think it is more important to say that John was a good man.” (SperryUNIVAC News, Vol. 4, No. 4, page 6).

Come visit the Kislak Center and get to know this brilliant and good man through his rich and immense collection. Or read other blog posts about him: not only was he brilliant and good, he was also heaps of fun!

Works cited:

“Dr. John Mauchly: Chairman of the Board,” (biographical sketch) (box 202, folder 12)

“It’s a better world, thanks to John,” SperryUNIVAC News, Volume 4, Number 4, February 1980 (box 202, folder 12)

“John Mauchly dies.” Sperry UNIVAC Sphere, Volume 10, Number 1, January 1980 (box 202, folder 12)

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Come for ENIAC, Stay for UNIVAC and Skeduflo

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