Interview with Eleanor Kolchin

February 5, 2013 8:27 AM

The Face Of A 'Computer' From 1946
posted by infini (4 comments total)

Yeah, some of my favorite parts of the Feynman books are him describing how he organized rooms of women and high school boys to be computers by passing computations around.
posted by DU at 9:27 AM on February 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

What was most frustrating about the computers you worked with in the early part of your career?
Every time a new machine came out, you had to throw out everything you knew and start from scratch.

I so agree with her. And they're still doing it. Windows8 Booo.

I was actually working at home a lot because I was doing a lot of programming from home. I would write out the program on paper using Fortran ....

Oh wow, I'm sure she was using forms like these, which had almost completely disappeared by the time I used computers. For me they evoke a nostalgia for a time I never actually experienced.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:54 AM on February 5, 2013

We used them to "learn" some Fortran during Computer 1. But that was back in Fall 82 or Spring of 83 of my senior year in high school. Teacher showed us the forms.
posted by infini at 12:05 PM on February 5, 2013 [1 favorite]

Between this woman, Rear Admiral Gracy Hopper, and of course Ada Lovelace herself, it seems like computer science has been a rare venue where women were actually allowed to excel based on abilities.... even competing with men for jobs, in some cases.
posted by IAmBroom at 2:05 AM on February 9, 2013