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135-853: The laboratory is perhaps best known for commissioning the creation of the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), the first electronic general-purpose digital computer. The history of the Ballistic Research Laboratory dates back to World War I with the Office of the Chief of Ordnance (OCO) within the U.S. Army. During the first year of U.S. involvement in the war, OCO was responsible for supervising ballistic firings at Sandy Hook Proving Ground in New Jersey and computing firing tables for

270-564: A scholarship , he was admitted to Johns Hopkins University and graduated with honors after only three years. He earned a M.S. in physics in 1916. His thesis was titled, "Airplanes: An Introduction to the Physical Principles Embodied in their Use." In 1918, Dryden joined the National Bureau of Standards , becoming an inspector of gauges. With the help and influence of Dr. Joseph S. Ames , he obtained

405-510: A "Giant Brain" by the press. It had a speed on the order of one thousand times faster than that of electro-mechanical machines. ENIAC was formally accepted by the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps in July 1946. It was transferred to Aberdeen Proving Ground in Aberdeen, Maryland in 1947, where it was in continuous operation until 1955. The 1948 Manchester Baby was the first machine to contain all

540-446: A Scientific Advisory Council and appointed eminent American scientists and engineers to undertake various assignments for BRL. The original members of the committee consisted of aerodynamicist Hugh Dryden , physicist Albert Hull , physical chemist Bernard Lewis , astronomer Henry Russell , physicist Isidor Rabi , physical chemist Harold Urey , aerospace engineer Theodore von Karman , and mathematician John von Neumann . For most of

675-518: A book on the six female ENIAC programmers in 2022. These early programmers were drawn from a group of about two hundred women employed as computers at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania. The job of computers was to produce the numeric result of mathematical formulas needed for a scientific study, or an engineering project. They usually did so with

810-468: A factor of five. In July 1953, a 100-word expansion core memory was added to the system, using binary-coded decimal , excess-3 number representation. To support this expansion memory, ENIAC was equipped with a new Function Table selector, a memory address selector, pulse-shaping circuits, and three new orders were added to the programming mechanism. Mechanical computing machines have been around since Archimedes ' time (see: Antikythera mechanism ), but

945-477: A failure was 116 hours—close to five days. ENIAC could be programmed to perform complex sequences of operations, including loops, branches, and subroutines. However, instead of the stored-program computers that exist today, ENIAC was just a large collection of arithmetic machines, which originally had programs set up into the machine by a combination of plugboard wiring and three portable function tables (containing 1,200 ten-way switches each). The task of taking

1080-401: A large portion of the basic research was directed toward the development of predictive mathematical models and computer programs. While terminal ballistics played a large role in weapon design and evaluation, BRL used the experimental data to develop protective technologies as well, including various kinds of tank armor. The lab also conducted research into the effects of laser beams starting in

1215-432: A major Army priority, BRL played a major role in the development of the modern computer as the lab worked to increase the pace of military calculations. In addition to aiding the development of some of the world's earliest electronic computers, BRL focused on making advancements in both hardware and software with an emphasis on augmenting the speed of operation, ease of programming, and overall economy of their computers. After

1350-874: A major internal reorganization within BRL. While BRL’s Interior, Exterior, and Terminal Ballistics Laboratories remained unchanged, the Ballistic Measurements Laboratory became the Signature and Propagation Laboratory, and the Weapons System Laboratory was assigned to AMSAA. In 1969, after ARDC was officially established, the Nuclear Defense Laboratory was absorbed by BRL and renamed the Nuclear Effects Laboratory. In September 1972,

1485-454: A mechanical adding machine . ENIAC had 20 ten-digit signed accumulators , which used ten's complement representation and could perform 5,000 simple addition or subtraction operations between any of them and a source (e.g., another accumulator or a constant transmitter) per second. It was possible to connect several accumulators to run simultaneously, so the peak speed of operation was potentially much higher, due to parallel operation. It

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1620-412: A mechanical calculator. The women studied the machine's logic, physical structure, operation, and circuitry in order to not only understand the mathematics of computing, but also the machine itself. This was one of the few technical job categories available to women at that time. Betty Holberton (née Snyder) continued on to help write the first generative programming system ( SORT/MERGE ) and help design

1755-590: A month of the meeting with Webb and Dryden, President Kennedy announced the Apollo Project -scale goal of putting a man on the Moon within 10 years, the goal that Apollo 11 was ultimately to meet. In setting the goal, the president did not credit Dryden's input, according to Wolfe. Dryden is also a founding member of the National Academy of Engineering . Dryden was portrayed by George Bartenieff in

1890-443: A number to a register, read a number from a register, or add/subtract two numbers. A multiplication of a 10-digit number by a d -digit number (for d up to 10) took d +4 cycles, so the multiplication of a 10-digit number by 10-digit number took 14 cycles, or 2,800 microseconds—a rate of 357 per second. If one of the numbers had fewer than 10 digits, the operation was faster. Division and square roots took 13( d +1) cycles, where d

2025-596: A principal research establishment for conducting investigations in the fields of the physical and mathematical sciences to design and improve the Army's weapons systems. Beyond just munitions, BRL engaged in a wide range of research areas as a part of its mission. Its research included the atmospheric sciences , although the work in this field was eventually transferred to the Atmospheric Sciences Laboratory in 1976. As high-speed computation became

2160-435: A problem and mapping it onto the machine was complex, and usually took weeks. Due to the complexity of mapping programs onto the machine, programs were only changed after huge numbers of tests of the current program. After the program was figured out on paper, the process of getting the program into ENIAC by manipulating its switches and cables could take days. This was followed by a period of verification and debugging, aided by

2295-586: A projectile's behavior such as the effects of the Magnus force and moment. Both theoretical and experimental studies helped BRL researchers create new techniques for designing aerodynamically stable missiles. One of the most important tasks that BRL performed was developing techniques for predicting the dynamic stability of proposed spin-stabilized missile designs. However, researchers also analyzed designs for fin-stabilized projectiles as well. Other areas of research included analysis on boundary layers, heating rates, and

2430-561: A quiet, reserved man who was self-effacing and diligent. He was patient, a good teacher, and effective when collaborating with others. He was also a devout Methodist , who, as a result, had a dislike of self-promotion. He served as a lay minister for his entire adult life. He was married to Mary Libbie Travers, and the couple had four children. Tom Wolfe credited Dryden with having been the individual who spoke up, with President John F. Kennedy in April, 1961, and suggested that crewed flight to

2565-722: A result of efforts by President Jimmy Carter ’s administration to decrease the number of committees used by federal agencies. Members of the last committee were chemist Joseph E. Mayer , aerospace engineer Homer J. Stewart , Army Maj. General Leslie Earl Simon , Army Lt. General Austin Betts, explosives expert J. V. Kaufman, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army Charles Poor, computer scientist Morris Rubinoff, physicist Martin Summerfield , and aeronautical engineer Herbert K. Weiss. The Ballistic Research Laboratory served as

2700-558: A series of forty-eight lectures given in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; all together called The Theory and Techniques for Design of Digital Computers —more often named the Moore School Lectures . Half of these lectures were given by the inventors of ENIAC. ENIAC was a one-of-a-kind design and was never repeated. The freeze on design in 1943 meant that it lacked some innovations that soon became well-developed, notably

2835-482: A special divider/square-rooter unit to perform up to 40 division operations per second or three square root operations per second. The other nine units in ENIAC were the initiating unit (started and stopped the machine), the cycling unit (used for synchronizing the other units), the master programmer (controlled loop sequencing), the reader (controlled an IBM punch-card reader), the printer (controlled an IBM card punch),

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2970-423: A technician. During World War II , while the U.S. Army needed to compute ballistics trajectories, many women were interviewed for this task. At least 200 women were hired by the Moore School of Engineering to work as " computers " and six of them were chosen to be the programmers of ENIAC. Betty Holberton , Kay McNulty , Marlyn Wescoff , Ruth Lichterman , Betty Jean Jennings , and Fran Bilas , programmed

3105-424: A ten-digit decimal number in memory. Numbers were passed between these units across several general-purpose buses (or trays , as they were called). In order to achieve its high speed, the panels had to send and receive numbers, compute, save the answer and trigger the next operation, all without any moving parts. Key to its versatility was the ability to branch ; it could trigger different operations, depending on

3240-405: A transfer to the bureau's Wind Tunnel division, and began taking graduate courses in fluid dynamics to complete his Ph.D. In 1919 at the age of 20, he was awarded his degree in physics and mathematics from Johns Hopkins University, the youngest person ever to have received a doctorate from that institution. His thesis was on the "Air Forces on Circular Cylinders". In 1920 Dryden was appointed

3375-499: Is the number of digits in the result (quotient or square root). So a division or square root took up to 143 cycles, or 28,600 microseconds—a rate of 35 per second. (Wilkes 1956:20 states that a division with a 10-digit quotient required 6 milliseconds.) If the result had fewer than ten digits, it was obtained faster. ENIAC was able to process about 500 FLOPS , compared to modern supercomputers' petascale and exascale computing power. ENIAC used common octal-base radio tubes of

3510-531: The Atanasoff–Berry computer (ABC), prototyped in 1939 by John Atanasoff and Clifford Berry  – U.S. patent 3,120,606 for ENIAC, applied for in 1947 and granted in 1964, was voided by the 1973 decision of the landmark federal court case Honeywell, Inc. v. Sperry Rand Corp. . The decision included: that the ENIAC inventors had derived the subject matter of the electronic digital computer from Atanasoff; gave legal recognition to Atanasoff as

3645-701: The Guggenheim Aeronautical Laboratory of the California Institute of Technology was commissioned with designing a wind tunnel that could produce velocities up to Mach 4.3. However, the wind tunnel was not constructed until the fall of 1943 and was not ready for use until November 1944. Upon its completion, Edwin Hubble , the Chief of the External Ballistics Branch, was arranged as the first head of

3780-713: The Human Engineering Laboratory , the Coating and Chemical Laboratory, the Nuclear Defense Laboratory, and the Army Materiel Systems Analysis Agency (AMSAA) to form the Aberdeen Research and Development Center (ARDC). In this new organizational structure, each of the five laboratories was managed by a civilian technical director who reported directly to a shared commanding officer. This change coincided with

3915-523: The IBM 7030 Stretch . In 1967, BRL developed a solid-state digital computer called the BRLESC II, which was designed to run 200 times faster than ORDVAC. BRLESC I and II became the last computers designed and developed by BRL. After performing around-the-clock operations for more than a decade, both BRLESC I and II were shut down in 1978. Despite this, BRL continued to conduct research on high-speed computing and

4050-880: The Nike Zeus anti-ballistic missile , the Polaris ballistic missile , the Skybolt ballistic missile , the Sergeant surface-to-surface missile , the Mercury launch vehicle, and the Saturn V rocket . BRL participated in several large-scale research programs that led to notable scientific milestones. These include the following: 39°28′32″N 76°6′41″W  /  39.47556°N 76.11139°W  / 39.47556; -76.11139 ENIAC ENIAC ( / ˈ ɛ n i æ k / ; Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer )

4185-632: The Space Race , BRL assisted in the development of several spacecraft, including the Mercury , Gemini , and Apollo Projects. The lab also engaged in research regarding high altitude atmospheric physics research, fluid physics, and experimental aeroballistics as well as the development of intercontinental ballistic missiles . Terminal ballistics research at BRL studied the underlying effects of weapons upon striking their target. BRL researchers in this field conducted experimental and theoretical work on

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4320-648: The U.S. Army's Ordnance Department . One of the major events that took place at BRL during the war was the installation of the first supersonic wind tunnel in the United States. The recommendation to construct a wind tunnel at Aberdeen Proving Ground was made in 1940 by Theodore von Karman, a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee. Karman proposed that a wind tunnel would greatly enhance ballistic research since it could produce both subsonic and supersonic velocities. Soon afterwards,

4455-675: The United States Army 's Ballistic Research Laboratory (which later became a part of the Army Research Laboratory ). However, its first program was a study of the feasibility of the thermonuclear weapon . ENIAC was completed in 1945 and first put to work for practical purposes on December 10, 1945. ENIAC was formally dedicated at the University of Pennsylvania on February 15, 1946, having cost $ 487,000 (equivalent to $ 6,900,000 in 2023), and called

4590-597: The United States Army Ordnance Department to compute firing tables for artillery, which was done by graduate students under John Mauchly's supervision. Mauchly began to wonder if electronics could be applied to mathematics for faster calculations. He partnered up with research associate J. Presper Eckert , as Mauchly wasn't an electronics expert, to draft an electronic computer that could work at an excellent pace. In 1942, Mauchly proposed an all-electronic calculating machine that could help

4725-766: The 1930s and 1940s are considered the beginning of the modern computer era. ENIAC was, like the IBM Harvard Mark I and the German Z3 , able to run an arbitrary sequence of mathematical operations, but did not read them from a tape. Like the British Colossus , it was programmed by plugboard and switches. ENIAC combined full, Turing-complete programmability with electronic speed. The Atanasoff–Berry Computer (ABC), ENIAC, and Colossus all used thermionic valves (vacuum tubes) . ENIAC's registers performed decimal arithmetic, rather than binary arithmetic like

4860-612: The 1960s. Around the end of World War II, BRL was assigned by the Office of the Chief of Ordnance to conduct vulnerability analysis of combat aircraft and munitions and to implement plans to reduce those vulnerabilities. Over time, BRL expanded this role to evaluate all types of weapon systems and vehicles and applied their findings to improve future designs. The laboratory not only conducted vulnerability analysis on American weapon systems to enhance their performance but also analyzed enemy combat systems to pinpoint their weaknesses. While this

4995-522: The 1990s Kleiman learned that most of the ENIAC programmers were not invited to the ENIAC’s 50th anniversary event. So she made it her mission to track them down and record their oral histories. The documentary, intended to inspire young women and men to get involved in programming. "They were shocked to be discovered," Kleiman says. "They were thrilled to be recognized, but had mixed impressions about how they felt about being ignored for so long." Kleiman released

5130-664: The Aberdeen Research and Development Center was dismantled, and BRL returned to being a Class II Activity under AMC. Shortly afterwards, BRL created the Concepts Analysis Laboratory and the Radiation Laboratory to replace its Signature and Propagation Laboratory and Nuclear Effects Laboratory, respectively. In 1976, the Ballistic Research Laboratories merged all of the existing laboratories under its command to become

5265-657: The Army to fund the project, which put him in charge to oversee it for them. Assembly for the computer began in June 1944. ENIAC was designed by Ursinus College physics professor John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert of the University of Pennsylvania, U.S. The team of design engineers assisting the development included Robert F. Shaw (function tables), Jeffrey Chuan Chu (divider/square-rooter), Thomas Kite Sharpless (master programmer), Frank Mural (master programmer), Arthur Burks (multiplier), Harry Huskey (reader/printer) and Jack Davis (accumulators). Significant development work

5400-457: The Army. These firing tables played a vital role in the war effort, because field artillery units heavily relied on them to determine the proper angle of elevation that a specific projectile required to hit a target at a specific range with a given propellant charge. They were also used to predict the projectile's trajectory and correct for variations in atmospheric temperature, air density, wind, and other factors. However, Sandy Hook Proving Ground

5535-517: The Bush differential analyzer could compute a 60-second trajectory in about 15 minutes, ENIAC could do the same in about 30 seconds. In 1948, BRL converted ENIAC into an internally stored-fixed program computer and used it to perform calculations for not just ballistics but also weather prediction , cosmic ray studies, thermal ignition, and other scientific tasks. In addition, it was also made available to universities free of charge. But even before ENIAC

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5670-498: The Colossus machines were dismantled in 1945; the remaining two were used to decrypt Soviet messages by GCHQ until the 1960s. The public demonstration for ENIAC was developed by Snyder and Jennings who created a demo that would calculate the trajectory of a missile in 15 seconds, a task that would have taken several weeks for a human computer . For a variety of reasons – including Mauchly's June 1941 examination of

5805-642: The Computational and Information Sciences Directorate. Lastly, BRL's vulnerability analysis component became a part of ARL's Survivability/Lethality Analysis Directorate. From 1940 to 1977, the Scientific Advisory Committee helped advise the Director of BRL on the scientific and technical aspects of ballistic weapons. The committee was first established by BRL director Hermann Zornig with the aid of American mathematician Oswald Veblen , BRL's chief scientist. Composed of highly acclaimed scientists and engineers,

5940-744: The Dryden-Blagonravov agreement, which was formalized in October of that year, the same time the two countries were in the midst of the Cuban Missile Crisis . The agreement was formally announced at the United Nations on December 5, 1962. It called for cooperation on the exchange of data from weather satellites, a study of the Earth's magnetic field, and joint tracking of the U.S. Echo II balloon satellite . Unfortunately, as

6075-448: The ENIAC to perform calculations for ballistics trajectories electronically for the Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory . While men having the same education and experience were designated as "professionals", these women were unreasonably designated as "subprofessionals", though they had professional degrees in mathematics, and were highly trained mathematicians. These women were not "refrigerator ladies", i.e., models posing in front of

6210-667: The Future Weapons System Agency to provide an unbiased source of advice on new weapon development programs to the Ordnance Corps. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, BRL increased its focus on target acquisition, guidance, and control technology and expanded its research to include more sophisticated weapon systems. At the same time, the lab discontinued research on technologies that were deemed sufficiently matured and transferred much of its routine or service operations to other agencies. This transition included

6345-922: The Manufacturing Service, the Field Service, and the Technical Staff—in accordance with peacetime operations requirements. In 1935, the Research Division was created at Aberdeen Proving Ground and placed under the control of the Technical Staff. Led by Colonel Hermann H. Zornig, the Research Division initially consisted of only 30 people. Despite the small staff size, however, the group supervised six different sections of ballistic work: Interior Ballistics, Exterior Ballistics, Ballistics Measurements, Ordnance Engineering, Computing, and War Reserve. The Internal Ballistics Section

6480-564: The Moon was the way to "catch up" with the Soviets in the space race . Wolfe describes President Kennedy as having been in "a terrible funk" at the time of the meeting with James E. Webb , the NASA administrator, and Dryden, his deputy, as the president wrestled with the string of Soviet "firsts" in space flight which had started with Sputnik 1 in 1957 and, that month in 1961, had extended to include Yuri Gagarin 's Earth-orbital flight. Within

6615-516: The OCO had his attention on the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania . Gillon, who oversaw the ballistic computations needed for the firing and bombing tables, knew that an upgraded version of the Bush differential analyzer existed at the Moore School. In 1942, John Mauchly and John Presper Eckert at the Moore School submitted a proposal to BRL that detailed

6750-587: The Ordnance Engineering Laboratory with another laboratory called the Weapons Systems Laboratory to increase research in weapon effectiveness and vulnerability assessment. The post-war era also saw BRL administer more of its research through private contractors and other government agencies. About 25 percent of the total appropriation for research from 1953 to 1956 was channeled in this way. In 1958, BRL established

6885-576: The Ordnance Engineering Section performed kinematic and mechanical analyses of gun mechanisms and gun mounts. The Computing Section was tasked with preparing firing and bombing tables for standard ammunition and bombs, and the War Reserve Section was responsible for the surveillance of stored ammunition. In 1938, the Research Division was renamed the Ballistic Research Laboratory in order to give greater emphasis to

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7020-748: The Scientific Advisory Committee to the President. From 1941 until 1956 he was editor of the Journal of the Institute of the Aeronautical Sciences . After NACA became NASA, he became the deputy director of that organization, serving until his death. After John Glenn 's orbital flight , an exchange of letters between President John F. Kennedy and Soviet Premiere Nikita Khrushchev led to a series of discussions led by Dryden and Soviet scientist Anatoli Blagonravov . Their talks in 1962 led to

7155-407: The Scientific Advisory Committee. These members included cosmic ray physicist Thomas H. Johnson , mathematician Edward J. McShane , physicist David L. Webster , and aeronautical scientist Clark Millikan . The Scientific Advisory Committee was later disbanded in 1969 but re-established again by BRL director Robert Eichelberger in 1973. However, the committee was permanently abolished in April 1977 as

7290-568: The Supersonic Wind Tunnel with BRL Assistant Director Robert Kent assigned as the second head. The wind tunnel was primarily used to obtain basic design information for the development and modification of bombs, rockets, and other fin-stabilized projectiles. During the interwar period between the First and Second World War, the need for a faster and more efficient method of constructing artillery firing tables prompted BRL to consider

7425-618: The U.S. Army Research Laboratory. Its operations were divided into three parts, each of which merged into different ARL directorates. The bulk of BRL formed the core of the Weapons Technology Directorate, which later became the Weapons and Materials Research Directorate. BRL's computer technology elements migrated to the Advanced Computational and Information Sciences Directorate, which later became

7560-492: The U.S. Army calculate complex ballistics tables. The U.S. Army Ordnance accepted their plan, giving the University of Pennsylvania a six-months research contract for $ 61,700. The construction contract was signed on June 5, 1943; work on the computer began in secret at the University of Pennsylvania 's Moore School of Electrical Engineering the following month, under the code name "Project PX", with John Grist Brainerd as principal investigator. Herman H. Goldstine persuaded

7695-619: The Z3, the ABC and Colossus. Like the Colossus, ENIAC required rewiring to reprogram until April 1948. In June 1948, the Manchester Baby ran its first program and earned the distinction of first electronic stored-program computer . Though the idea of a stored-program computer with combined memory for program and data was conceived during the development of ENIAC, it was not initially implemented in ENIAC because World War II priorities required

7830-565: The ability to execute the program step by step. A programming tutorial for the modulo function using an ENIAC simulator gives an impression of what a program on the ENIAC looked like. ENIAC's six primary programmers, Kay McNulty , Betty Jennings , Betty Snyder , Marlyn Wescoff , Fran Bilas and Ruth Lichterman , not only determined how to input ENIAC programs, but also developed an understanding of ENIAC's inner workings. The programmers were often able to narrow bugs down to an individual failed tube which could be pointed to for replacement by

7965-420: The ability to store a program. Eckert and Mauchly started work on a new design, to be later called the EDVAC , which would be both simpler and more powerful. In particular, in 1944 Eckert wrote his description of a memory unit (the mercury delay line ) which would hold both the data and the program. John von Neumann, who was consulting for the Moore School on the EDVAC, sat in on the Moore School meetings at which

8100-491: The ballistic performance of the projectiles. In order to test the performance of different projectiles under various conditions, the lab relied heavily on the supersonic wind tunnels and aerodynamic ranges installed at Aberdeen Proving Ground. The wind tunnels were used extensively during the late 1950s for BRL's cross-wind program, which arose from the Army's need to obtain aerodynamic data in order to prepare firing tables for aircraft rounds fired at large initial yaw angles. During

8235-461: The blast from a nuclear weapon. In general, BRL functioned as the Army's lead laboratory in vulnerability analysis in regard to combat and other external damage, whereas the Army's Vulnerability Assessment Laboratory conducted vulnerability analysis in regard to electronic warfare susceptibility. Weapon systems research at BRL generally referred to the study of various munitions from an operational analysis viewpoint. These studies focused on enhancing

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8370-476: The chemical interactions between the travelling projectile and the surrounding air and electric fields. BRL's exterior ballistics division was not just responsible for developing better projectiles and firing techniques. This section of the lab was also in charge of preparing the firing and bombing tables for soldiers in the field. During World War II, weapon accuracy became a critical focal point for BRL researchers, who directed much of their wartime effort to refining

8505-448: The chemistry of flames, the mechanics of the launching process, and the propellants’ physical and chemical properties. Desired research targets included increased muzzle velocity, better burning of propellants, the elimination of hang fires , the reduction of bore erosion, the reduction of muzzle flash and smoke, decreased gun weight, and better recoil mechanisms. Early in its history, BRL's two principal objectives were to learn more about

8640-439: The committee influenced many of BRL's decisions regarding new facilities, kept the lab informed about the latest advancements in various scientific fields, and provided insight into the causes of common problems. Members of the Scientific Advisory Committee were also generally available for individual consultation on specific matters. Original members of the Scientific Advisory Committee Over time, several prominent figures joined

8775-450: The competition between the two nation's crewed space programs heated up, efforts to further cooperation at that point came to an end. They would be revived in 1969 by NASA Administrator Thomas O. Paine and led to the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project . He died from cancer on December 2, 1965. Michael Gorn, chief historian at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center (now: NASA Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center (AFRC)), described Dryden as

8910-420: The constant transmitter, and three function tables. The references by Rojas and Hashagen (or Wilkes) give more details about the times for operations, which differ somewhat from those stated above. The basic machine cycle was 200 microseconds (20 cycles of the 100 kHz clock in the cycling unit), or 5,000 cycles per second for operations on the 10-digit numbers. In one of these cycles, ENIAC could write

9045-407: The construction of a new generation of electronic computing machines, including Electronic Delay Storage Automatic Calculator (EDSAC) at Cambridge University, England and SEAC at the U.S. Bureau of Standards. A number of improvements were made to ENIAC after 1947, including a primitive read-only stored programming mechanism using the function tables as program ROM , after which programming

9180-552: The creation of a high-speed computation device for computing ballistic trajectories. On June 5, 1943, the Army Ordnance Corps and the University of Pennsylvania signed a six-month contract in the amount of $ 61,700 for the construction of the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer , or ENIAC. Known as “Project PX,” the secret construction of the pilot model took place at the Moore School with Eckert as chief engineer and Mauchly as principal consultant. However, building ENIAC proved to be more arduous than expected. By 1944, only two of

9315-435: The current (2020) Army supercomputers Jean , Kay , and Betty are named after Jean Bartik (Betty Jennings), Kay McNulty , and Betty Snyder respectively. The "programmer" and "operator" job titles were not originally considered professions suitable for women. The labor shortage created by World War II helped enable the entry of women into the field. However, the field was not viewed as prestigious, and bringing in women

9450-446: The day; the decimal accumulators were made of 6SN7 flip-flops , while 6L7s, 6SJ7s, 6SA7s and 6AC7s were used in logic functions. Numerous 6L6s and 6V6s served as line drivers to drive pulses through cables between rack assemblies. Several tubes burned out almost every day, leaving ENIAC nonfunctional about half the time. Special high-reliability tubes were not available until 1948. Most of these failures, however, occurred during

9585-488: The demonstration were invited to the formal dedication nor to the celebratory dinner held afterwards. The original contract amount was $ 61,700; the final cost was almost $ 500,000 (approximately equivalent to $ 9,000,000 in 2023). It was formally accepted by the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps in July 1946. ENIAC was shut down on November 9, 1946, for a refurbishment and a memory upgrade, and was transferred to Aberdeen Proving Ground , Maryland in 1947. There, on July 29, 1947, it

9720-549: The design of future munitions. By the mid-20th century, the lab had started developing propellants for advanced rockets and large caliber ammunition. Researchers were also engaged in studies pertaining to ignition, combustion, weapon kinematics, and gun barrel erosion. Exterior ballistics research at BRL focused on the outward design of Army missiles and the aerodynamic phenomena that influence their flight. In addition to known forces such as drag and lift, BRL researchers were tasked with analyzing potential factors that could influence

9855-547: The development of ENIAC. Under Herman and Adele Goldstine 's direction, the computers studied ENIAC's blueprints and physical structure to determine how to manipulate its switches and cables, as programming languages did not yet exist. Though contemporaries considered programming a clerical task and did not publicly recognize the programmers' effect on the successful operation and announcement of ENIAC, McNulty, Jennings, Snyder, Wescoff, Bilas, and Lichterman have since been recognized for their contributions to computing. Three of

9990-691: The director of the Aerodynamics Division of the National Bureau of Standards, a newly created section. Collaborating with Dr. Lyman J. Briggs , he performed studies of airfoils near the speed of sound. He also performed pioneering aerodynamics research on the problems of airflow, turbulence , and especially the boundary layer phenomenon. His work contributed to the design of the wings for the P-51 Mustang , as well as other aircraft designed during World War II . By 1934, Dryden

10125-561: The effectiveness of various weapons such as guns and rockets against a wide variety of targets from personnel to armed tanks. This research was primarily done to assess and predict how each weapon system would perform in a given situation. Beginning in the early 1950s, BRL relied on operations research techniques to evaluate both the weapon systems and the experimental approach with which they were evaluated. The lab also incorporated concepts from game theory to develop programs that simulated battles that allowed them to analyze different tactics and

10260-541: The electronic computer revealed several flaws in the proposed design of the bomb that would have been nearly impossible to identify otherwise. The formal dedication of ENIAC took place on February 15, 1946, at the Moore School, and the machine was moved to its permanent home at Aberdeen Proving Ground in January 1947. During a formal demonstration of ENIAC in 1946, the Army showed the machine could solve 5,000 addition problems or 50 multiplication problems in one second. While

10395-400: The electronic speed of computation and the electromechanical speed of input/output, almost any real-world problem was completely I/O bound , even without making use of the original machine's parallelism. Most computations would still be I/O bound, even after the speed reduction imposed by this modification. Early in 1952, a high-speed shifter was added, which improved the speed for shifting by

10530-612: The elements essential to a modern electronic digital computer, as it could be reprogrammed electronically to hold stored programs instead of requiring setting of switches to program as ENIAC did. ENIAC's design and construction was financed by the United States Army, Ordnance Corps, Research and Development Command, led by Major General Gladeon M. Barnes . The total cost was about $ 487,000, equivalent to $ 6,900,000 in 2023. The conception of ENIAC began in 1941, when Friden calculators and differential analyzers were used by

10665-522: The first commercial electronic computers, the UNIVAC and the BINAC , alongside Jean Jennings. McNulty developed the use of subroutines in order to help increase ENIAC's computational capability. Herman Goldstine selected the programmers, whom he called operators, from the computers who had been calculating ballistics tables with mechanical desk calculators, and a differential analyzer prior to and during

10800-473: The following institutions: ENIAC was named an IEEE Milestone in 1987. Hugh Latimer Dryden Hugh Latimer Dryden (July 2, 1898 – December 2, 1965) was an American aeronautical scientist and civil servant . He served as NASA Deputy Administrator from August 19, 1958, until his death. Dryden was born in Pocomoke City, Maryland , the son of Samuel Isaac and Nova Hill Culver Dryden, and

10935-518: The following: The Ballistic Research Laboratory also tested and evaluated a wide variety of weapons and other technologies: In addition, BRL provided research support for the development of the following missiles: the Atlas , Titan , and Minuteman ballistic missiles, the two-stage Pershing tactical missile , Hawk and Lance ground-to-air missiles, the Davy Crockett nuclear weapon system ,

11070-413: The four accumulators were completed. Meanwhile, BRL had only fallen further behind the demand for firing tables. Although the number of table requests reached 40 a week, BRL could only produce about 15. But despite the slow progress, the finished accumulators performed twice as fast as the initial stipulated speed, operating at 200,000 pulses a second. Impressed by this demonstration, BRL agreed to increase

11205-418: The fundamental processes of interior ballistics to design better guns and to develop more accurate methods of predicting how those guns would perform. This meant that many of the studies that the lab conducted concentrated on issues surrounding how the propellant interacted with the munition. BRL researchers also focused heavily on the physical chemistry of the propellants as well as the thermodynamic qualities of

11340-461: The girl computers do the work more rapidly and accurately than they would. This is due in large measure to the feeling among the engineers that their college and industrial experience is being wasted and thwarted by mere repetitive calculation." Following the initial six programmers, an expanded team of a hundred scientists was recruited to continue work on the ENIAC. Among these were several women, including Gloria Ruth Gordon . Adele Goldstine wrote

11475-920: The impact behavior of projectiles and investigated topics such as the mechanisms of penetration, fragmentation, wound ballistics, detonation, shockwave propagation, and combustion. During the post-World War II era in particular, BRL intensified its terminal ballistics research in response to the Army's need for more destructive weapon systems with greater firepower. This division of the lab also focused on investigating nuclear physics and participated in nuclear blast field tests. BRL developed and provided all instrumentation for measuring air blasts, shock velocities, and hydrostatic pressures for Operation Buster-Jangle and Operation Tumbler-Snapper in 1952, Operation Upshot-Knothole in 1953, Operation Castle in 1954, and Operation Teapot in 1955. The laboratory also conducted air blast research during Operation Blowdown in 1963 and Operation Distant Plain in 1966 and 1967. In addition,

11610-525: The inventor of the first electronic digital computer; and put the invention of the electronic digital computer in the public domain . The main parts were 40 panels and three portable function tables (named A, B, and C). The layout of the panels was (clockwise, starting with the left wall): An IBM card reader was attached to Constant Transmitter panel 3 and an IBM card punch was attached to Printer Panel 2. The Portable Function Tables could be connected to Function Table 1, 2, and 3. Pieces of ENIAC are held by

11745-449: The machine for press photography, as then computer scientist undergrad Kathryn Kleiman discovered in her own research as opposed to what she was told by a historian in computing. However, some of the women did not receive recognition for their work on the ENIAC in their entire lifetimes. After the war ended, the women continued to work on the ENIAC. Their expertise made their positions difficult to replace with returning soldiers. Later In

11880-433: The machine to be completed quickly, and ENIAC's 20 storage locations would be too small to hold data and programs. The Z3 and Colossus were developed independently of each other, and of the ABC and ENIAC during World War II. Work on the ABC at Iowa State University was stopped in 1942 after John Atanasoff was called to Washington, D.C. , to do physics research for the U.S. Navy, and it was subsequently dismantled. The Z3

12015-906: The new Ballistic Research Laboratory once more. As a result, the seven laboratories were turned into six new divisions: the Interior Ballistics Division, the Launch and Flight Division, the Terminal Ballistics Division, the Ballistic Modeling Division, the Vulnerability Analysis Division, and the Computer Support Division. In 1992, the Ballistic Research Laboratory was one of the seven Army laboratories that were consolidated to form

12150-480: The number of accumulators in ENIAC from four to twenty, delaying its completion even further but obtaining a much more powerful machine in exchange. As a result, ENIAC wasn't finished until November 1945, three months after the end of the war. Throughout the course of ENIAC's construction, nine additional supplements were made to the initial contract, increasing Project PX's overall cost to $ 486,800. ENIAC never saw use during World War II, so its first job upon completion

12285-472: The optimum bomb pattern for bombing runs, improving the accuracy of aerial gunnery, and conducting studies on the vulnerability of the German 88-mm gun to fragmenting shells. Near the end of the war, BRL also conducted a series of experiments assessing the vulnerability and survivability of U.S. Army aircraft. In August 1943, Ordnance Department Order 80 designated the BRL as the principal research organization of

12420-512: The organization’s basic mission, and Colonel Zornig became its first director. The following year, the Army Air Corps contributed funds to BRL for a new building to house additional laboratory facilities as a show of gratitude for the lab's work on bomb ballistics. This building was designated as Building 328 and was completed in 1941. The Ballistics Research Laboratory further expanded its capabilities and quickly rose to prominence during

12555-407: The original technical description of the ENIAC. Several language systems were developed to describe programs for the ENIAC, including: Although the Ballistic Research Laboratory was the sponsor of ENIAC, one year into this three-year project John von Neumann , a mathematician working on the hydrogen bomb at Los Alamos National Laboratory , became aware of the ENIAC. In December 1945, the ENIAC

12690-455: The possibility of total nuclear war and thus focused heavily on evaluating intercontinental ballistic missiles, air defense platforms, and advanced submarine systems. BRL also conducted numerous studies that took factors such as cost-effectiveness and ammunition availability into consideration. The Ballistic Research Laboratory participated in the development of many original technologies and techniques as part of its Army mission. Examples include

12825-467: The potential applications of digital computation. In 1935, before the Research Division became BRL, the Technical Staff acquired a copy of the Bush differential analyzer , which could compute a 60-second trajectory in about 15 minutes compared to about 20 hours performed by a person with a desk calculator. However, even the differential analyzer was not enough to keep up with the needs of the U.S. Army. By 1941,

12960-466: The powder gases produced from burning the propellant. BRL research in interior ballistics led to a wider range of propellants for different weapon systems that achieved higher velocities. As artillery technology became more sophisticated, BRL used its electronic computers to develop digital programs that simulated the interior ballistic performance of its weapon systems. Interior ballistic data from gun firings also helped BRL researchers create models to guide

13095-649: The production of firing tables was so far behind that BRL rushed to find any means of expediting the ballistic computation process. To ease the burden of work, the laboratory trained almost 100 female graduates from colleges all over the Northeast to calculate ballistic firing tables. When the Women's Army Corps was formed, those assigned to ballistic computation were trained in Philadelphia and deployed to Aberdeen Proving Ground. During this time, Colonel Paul Gillon of

13230-508: The provision of information regarding various weapon effects. Unlike civilian laboratories whose productions were inherently restricted by anticipations of market demand, BRL owed a significant portion of its success to how the development of their instruments and technologies reflected only what the Army needed. Enough flexibility was provided to the laboratory so that it could improvise solutions to particular problems and later refine those improvisations for wider use. In 1940, Zornig established

13365-409: The public the evening of February 14, 1946, featuring demonstrations of its capabilities. Elizabeth Snyder and Betty Jean Jennings were responsible for developing the demonstration trajectory program, although Herman and Adele Goldstine took credit for it. The machine was formally dedicated the next day at the University of Pennsylvania. None of the women involved in programming the machine or creating

13500-579: The rapidly increasing demand for firing tables and other ballistic data. Major Forest Moulton , a former astronomy professor at the University of Chicago , served as the first head of the Ballistics Branch. During his tenure, Moulton revamped how the branch conducted its ballistics work and recruited a large number of highly educated scientists to expand the staff. In 1919, the OCO was reorganized into four major parts—the General Office,

13635-506: The reader from standard IBM cards. The "first production run" of the new coding techniques on the Monte Carlo problem followed in April. After ENIAC's move to Aberdeen, a register panel for memory was also constructed, but it did not work. A small master control unit to turn the machine on and off was also added. The programming of the stored program for ENIAC was done by Betty Jennings, Clippinger, Adele Goldstine and others. It

13770-482: The sign of a computed result. By the end of its operation in 1956, ENIAC contained 18,000 vacuum tubes , 7,200 crystal diodes , 1,500 relays , 70,000 resistors , 10,000 capacitors , and approximately 5,000,000 hand- soldered joints. It weighed more than 30 short tons (27 t), was roughly 8 ft (2 m) tall, 3 ft (1 m) deep, and 100 ft (30 m) long, occupied 300 sq ft (28 m ) and consumed 150 kW of electricity. Input

13905-801: The six branches at BRL were raised to laboratory status in August 1945, leading to the formation of the Interior Ballistics Laboratory, the Exterior Ballistics Laboratory, the Terminal Ballistics Laboratory, the Ordnance Engineering Laboratory, the Ballistic Measurements Laboratory, and the Computing Laboratory. These six labs were collectively referred to as the Ballistic Research Laboratories. In 1953, BRL replaced

14040-533: The stored program concept was elaborated. Von Neumann wrote up an incomplete set of notes ( First Draft of a Report on the EDVAC ) which were intended to be used as an internal memorandum—describing, elaborating, and couching in formal logical language the ideas developed in the meetings. ENIAC administrator and security officer Herman Goldstine distributed copies of this First Draft to a number of government and educational institutions, spurring widespread interest in

14175-531: The successful demonstration of its early electronic computers, BRL continued to invest heavily in high speed computation research. In 1956, researchers at BRL began developing a new computer on their own called the Ballistic Research Laboratories Electronic Scientific Computer , or BRLESC. Completed in 1961, it was briefly considered the world's fastest computer before it was quickly outperformed by

14310-404: The time) to investigate the distance that neutrons would likely travel through various materials. John von Neumann and Stanislaw Ulam realized the speed of ENIAC would allow these calculations to be done much more quickly. The success of this project showed the value of Monte Carlo methods in science. A press conference was held on February 1, 1946, and the completed machine was announced to

14445-413: The timespan of World War II . Compared to its initial staff of 65 people with a $ 120,000 annual budget in 1940, BRL grew to have over 700 personnel with an annual budget of $ 1.6 million by 1945. It was responsible for conducting basic and technical research in ballistics and other related scientific fields as well as overseeing the development of computing techniques, the preparation of ballistic tables, and

14580-612: The transfer of its Pulse Radiation Facility to the Army Test and Evaluation Command , the transfer of the Tandem Van de Graaff Accelerator to the University of Pennsylvania , and the closure of the BRL wind tunnels. With the dissolution of the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps in 1962, BRL was placed under the new U.S. Army Materiel Command (AMC) alongside organizations such as the Harry Diamond Laboratory. However, BRL

14715-465: The use of particular weapons in certain situations. Data collected from these studies, largely with the assistance of BRL's electronic computers, helped guide weapon development for the Army as BRL researchers formulated which weapon system performed best against specific targets under various circumstances. After 1968, the focus of weapon systems research shifted to developing new technical approaches to solving Army problems. BRL researchers also planned for

14850-729: The war, Dryden became the Director of Aeronautical Research for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) in 1946. While at the NACA he supervised the development of the North American X-15 , a rocket plane used for research and testing. He also established programs for V/STOL aircraft, and studied the problem of atmospheric reentry. He held the position of Director of NACA, NASA 's predecessor, from 1947 until October 1958. In addition he served on numerous government advisory committees, including

14985-448: The war, a substantial amount of the BRL effort was directed toward testing weapons and computing firing and bombing tables. However, the laboratory was also involved in significantly improving the quality control of stockpiled ammunition as well as training and deploying technical service teams to calibrate guns on the battlefield. In addition, BRL provided technical analysis assistance to the U.S. Army and Army Air Forces, such as determining

15120-402: The warm-up and cool-down periods, when the tube heaters and cathodes were under the most thermal stress. Engineers reduced ENIAC's tube failures to the more acceptable rate of one tube every two days. According to an interview in 1989 with Eckert, "We had a tube fail about every two days and we could locate the problem within 15 minutes." In 1954, the longest continuous period of operation without

15255-481: The work on both ENIAC and EDVAC and was among those who supported funding the EDVAC project. In October 1944, the Ordnance Department issued a contract and $ 105,600 in funding for the development of this new machine with supervision of the project assigned to BRL. Built as a collaborative effort between BRL, the Moore School, the Institute for Advanced Studies, and the National Bureau of Standards , EDVAC

15390-582: Was a relatively small duty compared to some of its other functions, vulnerability analysis and reduction nevertheless became the central focus for an entire division within BRL as researchers conducted studies concerning methods to increase the effectiveness of Army technology. Throughout the Vietnam War , BRL researchers were tasked with continually analyzing combat damage to U.S. aircraft. The laboratory also tested nuclear weapons effects on aerial vehicles and missiles by using high explosive charges to simulate

15525-408: Was added to ENIAC. ENIAC used ten-position ring counters to store digits; each digit required 36 vacuum tubes, 10 of which were the dual triodes making up the flip-flops of the ring counter. Arithmetic was performed by "counting" pulses with the ring counters and generating carry pulses if the counter "wrapped around", the idea being to electronically emulate the operation of the digit wheels of

15660-540: Was appointed the bureau's Chief of the Mechanics and Sound Division, and in 1939 he became a member of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). With the start of World War II , Dryden served in an advisory capacity to the Air Force . He led the development of the " Bat ", a radar -homing guided bomb program that was successfully employed in combat in April, 1945 to sink a Japanese destroyer . After

15795-491: Was classified as a Class II Activity, which made it independent from the administration of the Aberdeen Proving Ground Command and allowed BRL to receive funds directly from AMC. As the Army continued to streamline its research facilities in an effort to eliminate overlapping functions, the Ballistic Research Laboratories underwent several organizational changes. In 1968, the Army consolidated BRL,

15930-477: Was closed down in 1917 due to its inadequate size and its close proximity to New York Harbor . Operations were subsequently moved to the newly established Aberdeen Proving Ground in Harford County . By early 1918, almost all of OCO's test firings were conducted at Aberdeen Proving Ground. As the war continued, the Chief of Ordnance created a Ballistics Branch for the OCO on April 6, 1918, to keep up with

16065-534: Was completed and installed at BRL in 1949. However, it wasn't operational until 1952 due to design issues. By then, BRL had already acquired the Ordnance Discrete Variable Automatic Computer (ORDVAC), which the lab had commissioned the University of Illinois to build. As a result, BRL was the world's largest computer center for a brief time in 1952 with ENIAC, EDVAC, and ORDVAC all in its possession. After World War II,

16200-606: Was destroyed by the Allied bombing raids of Berlin in 1943. As the ten Colossus machines were part of the UK's war effort their existence remained secret until the late 1970s, although knowledge of their capabilities remained among their UK staff and invited Americans. ENIAC, by contrast, was put through its paces for the press in 1946, "and captured the world's imagination". Older histories of computing may therefore not be comprehensive in their coverage and analysis of this period. All but two of

16335-474: Was done by setting the switches. The idea has been worked out in several variants by Richard Clippinger and his group, on the one hand, and the Goldstines, on the other, and it was included in the ENIAC patent . Clippinger consulted with von Neumann on what instruction set to implement. Clippinger had thought of a three-address architecture while von Neumann proposed a one-address architecture because it

16470-428: Was first demonstrated as a stored-program computer in April 1948, running a program by Adele Goldstine for John von Neumann. This modification reduced the speed of ENIAC by a factor of 6 and eliminated the ability of parallel computation, but as it also reduced the reprogramming time to hours instead of days, it was considered well worth the loss of performance. Also analysis had shown that due to differences between

16605-511: Was involved in the development of new hardware and software such as the Heterogeneous Element Processor and ping . Interior ballistics research at BRL focused primarily on improving the propulsion of munitions and increasing the speed of Army missiles. In working toward this goal, BRL developed new propellants that provided more power and energy while maintaining stability and control. Such work entailed analyzing

16740-486: Was named after a popular local Methodist clergyman. During the financial panic of 1907, his father lost his job and the family moved to Baltimore, Maryland . As a student, Dryden excelled in mathematics . He graduated from Baltimore City College , a high school , at the age of 14, and was the youngest student ever to graduate from that school. He was awarded the Peabody Prize for excellence in mathematics. With

16875-555: Was operational, BRL had already started to plan for the development of a stored-program computer known as the Electronic Discrete Variable Computer , or EDVAC. In 1944, in the middle of ENIAC's development, Mauchley and Eckert proposed the creation of EDVAC to make up for ENIAC's shortcomings. Unlike its predecessor, EDVAC was planned to have a central processor and a memory for both data and programs. During this time, John von Neumann became involved in

17010-476: Was possible from an IBM card reader and an IBM card punch was used for output. These cards could be used to produce printed output offline using an IBM accounting machine, such as the IBM 405 . While ENIAC had no system to store memory in its inception, these punch cards could be used for external memory storage. In 1953, a 100- word magnetic-core memory built by the Burroughs Corporation

17145-410: Was possible to wire the carry of one accumulator into another accumulator to perform arithmetic with double the precision, but the accumulator carry circuit timing prevented the wiring of three or more for even higher precision. ENIAC used four of the accumulators (controlled by a special multiplier unit) to perform up to 385 multiplication operations per second; five of the accumulators were controlled by

17280-403: Was responsible for mathematical and experimental research that advanced the theory of interior ballistics and the investigation of gun design principles. The Exterior Ballistics Section focused on the trajectories and flight characteristics of projectiles and bombs, which influenced the design of new munitions. The Ballistics Measurements Section developed improved ballistic measuring devices, while

17415-431: Was simpler to implement. Three digits of one accumulator (#6) were used as the program counter, another accumulator (#15) was used as the main accumulator, a third accumulator (#8) was used as the address pointer for reading data from the function tables, and most of the other accumulators (1–5, 7, 9–14, 17–19) were used for data memory. In March 1948 the converter unit was installed, which made possible programming through

17550-400: Was the first programmable , electronic , general-purpose digital computer , completed in 1945. Other computers had some of these features, but ENIAC was the first to have them all. It was Turing-complete and able to solve "a large class of numerical problems" through reprogramming. ENIAC was designed by John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert to calculate artillery firing tables for

17685-425: Was to calculate the feasibility of a proposed design for the hydrogen bomb . But while ENIAC could perform ballistic calculations at impressive speeds, it was held back by its lack of internally stored program capability. It took scientists a month to complete the calculation due to the thousands of steps involved as well as ENIAC's inability to store programs or remember more than twenty 10-digit numbers. Nevertheless,

17820-480: Was turned on and was in continuous operation until 11:45 p.m. on October 2, 1955, when it was retired in favor of the more efficient EDVAC and ORDVAC computers. A few months after ENIAC's unveiling in the summer of 1946, as part of "an extraordinary effort to jump-start research in the field", the Pentagon invited "the top people in electronics and mathematics from the United States and Great Britain" to

17955-588: Was undertaken by the female mathematicians who handled the bulk of the ENIAC programming: Jean Jennings , Marlyn Wescoff , Ruth Lichterman , Betty Snyder , Frances Bilas , and Kay McNulty . In 1946, the researchers resigned from the University of Pennsylvania and formed the Eckert–Mauchly Computer Corporation . ENIAC was a large, modular computer, composed of individual panels to perform different functions. Twenty of these modules were accumulators that could not only add and subtract, but hold

18090-402: Was used to calculate thermonuclear reactions using equations . The data was used to support research on building a hydrogen bomb. Related to ENIAC's role in the hydrogen bomb was its role in the Monte Carlo method becoming popular. Scientists involved in the original nuclear bomb development used massive groups of people doing huge numbers of calculations ("computers" in the terminology of

18225-484: Was viewed as a way to free men up for more skilled labor. Essentially, women were seen as meeting a need in a temporary crisis. For example, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics said in 1942, "It is felt that enough greater return is obtained by freeing the engineers from calculating detail to overcome any increased expenses in the computers' salaries. The engineers admit themselves that

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