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2008-2009 at Furman was designated as the Year of the Sciences!
Special events and activities featured lectures by distinguished scholars, presentations by alumni, and sessions featuring undergraduate research accomplishments. Academic departments engaged in teaching and research in scientific disciplines were represented: Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Earth & Environmental Sciences (EES), Health & Exercise Science (HES), Mathematics, Physics, and Psychology. |
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Shaking Up Computer History: Finding the Women of the Eniac
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Event Description |
CLP? |
Mon., Nov. 17, 2008, 4:45pm
Riley Hall 106 |
"Shaking Up Computer History:
Finding the Women of the Eniac"
Speaker: Kathryn Kleiman
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Yes |
For information about the Eniac research project, see http://eniacprogrammers.org.
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| 1946 U.S. Army Photograph of ENIAC and ENIAC Programmers, Courtesy of the University of Pennsylvania Archives |
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This CLP event will overview the interesting story of the development of the Eniac and the women programmers that were instrumental in its success but who were left out of historical documents. Six young women mastered the power of the ENIAC an 80 foot long, 8 foot tall, black metal machine and harnessed its power through an archaic programming interface using dozens of wires and 3000 switches. They programmed ENIAC to perform a ballistics trajectory, a differential calculus equation important to the WWII effort, and they succeeded brilliantly. When the ENIAC was unveiled to the public on February 14, 1946, their program captured the imagination of the press and made headlines across the country. Afterwards, the ENIAC became a legendary machine and its engineers (all men) became famous. Never introduced or credited at the ENIAC events of the 1940s, the programmers story disappeared from history. They became invisible.
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| Kathryn Kleiman |
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Kathryn Kleiman has spent the last 20 years researching the stories of the Eniac programmers and documenting them in oral histories that will be used in a video documentary. Kleiman will discuss her journey to uncover these stories and the issues surrounding why their contributions were left out of historical documents. In addition, she will discuss why it is important to include their contributions within Computing History documents. Kleiman will play a short 8 minute preview of the documentary. |
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