First_Electronic_Computer

First Electronic Computer The Atanasoff Story 2/15/2010 Tonya Devoto The Atanasoff –Berry Computer was the first Electronic digital computer. It was built by John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry at Iowa State University during 1937-42. It incorporated several major innovations in computing including the use of binary arithmetic, regenerative memory, parallel processing and separation of memory and computing functions. John Vincent Atanasoff was born on 4 October 1903 a few miles west of Hamilton, New York. His father was a Bulgarian immigrant named Ivan Atanasov. His last name was changed to Atanasoff by immigration officials at Ellis Island when he arrived with an uncle in 1889, and later on, his first name was changed to John. His mother was Iva Lucena Purdy, a mathematics schoolteacher. The couple had nine children (one of whom died): John, Ethelyn, Margaret, Theodore, Avis, Raymond, Melva, Irving. After John Vincent's birth, his father accepted an electrical engineering position is Osteen, Florida, and subsequently, in Brewster, Florida. It was here that JV completed grade school and started understanding the concepts of electricity. The Atanasoff home in Brewster was the first house they lived in with electricity, and JV, as a 9-year-old boy found and corrected faulty electric wiring in a back-porch light. Clifford E. Berry was born in Gladbrook, Iowa on 19 April 1918 to Fred Gordon Berry and Grace Strohm. He was the oldest of four children born to the couple: Clifford, Keith, Frederick, and Barbara. When Clifford was a small child, his father Fred had an electrical appliance and repair store in Gladbrook, where he had several electrical projects. By far the greatest of his projects was a radio--the first radio in Gladbrook. This prompted a stream of town visitors to get a glimpse at the machine. Fred taught his son about the construction of the radio and it was here that Clifford started tinkering with electricity and radio. When he was eleven, he built his first ham radio, under his father's supervision. On the morning of a spring day in 1939 the two brilliant men had their first conversation about the concepts and the basic problems they would have to solve in the construction of the prototype of an electronic digital computer. In October 1973 on the 19th day US Federal Judge Earl R Larson signed his decision following a lengthy court trial which declared the ENIAC patent of Mauchly and Eckert invalid and named Atanasoff the inventor of the electronic digital computer. The Atanasoff-Berry Computer or the ABC. In recognition of his achievement Atanasoff was awarded the National Medal of Technology by President George Bush at the White House on November 13, 1990. References | | The First Electronic Computer, The Atanasoff Story, Alice R. Burks and Arthur W. Burks, The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1988. | | | | First Electronic Digital Calculating Machine Forerunner To Cornell's FPS-164/MAX, J. Gustafson, Floating Point Systems, Inc., Forefronts, Center for Theory and Simulation in Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Vol. 1, Number 6, October 1985. | | | | The ENIAC: First General Purpose Electronic Computer, Alice R. Burks and Arthur W. Burks, The University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1981. | | Atanasoff, John Vincent, Clark R. Mollenhoff in Ralston, Anthony, and Edwin D. Reilly Jr., Encyclopedia of Computer Science and Engineering, Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, 1983. | | Computing Machine for the Solution of Large Scale Systems of Linear Algebraic Equations, John V. Atanasoff, reprinted in Randell, Brian, Origins of Digital Computers: Selected Papers, Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg, 1982. | | Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Order for Judgement (sic), File No. 4-67 Civ. 138, E.R. Larson, Honeywell Inc. vs. Sperry-Rand Corp. and Illinois Scientific Developments Inc., US District Court, District of Minnesota, Fourth Division, Oct. 19, 1973. | | Computer Pioneers, J.A.N. Lee, IEEE CS Press, Los Alamitos, California, 1995. | | Amending the ENIAC Story, John W. Mauchly, Datamation, Vol. 25, No. 11, and 1979. | | | | Atanasoff: Inventor, Problem-Solver, and Inventor of the Real Computer, Jo Campbell, Ecotopics International News Service. | | Atanasoff: Forgotten Father of the Computer, Computer Science Department, Iowa State University. |