Another ICL Anthology

Foreword On June 21st 1948 Tom Kilburn ran a program on the first electronically stored program computer in the world. Freddy Williams and Tom had been struggling for some time to make their cathode ray tube store work. Demonstrating the store was the key thing, for without a store the computer as we know it today could never be. This simple machine, always known as the 'BABY', was developed into the Ferranti Mark 1, the first computer to go on commercial sale anywhere in the world. Tom's program was the first program to be written and run. Some of us here in Manchester felt that the fiftieth anniversary of such stupendous achievements should not go unnoticed. So at 11 a.m. on June 21st 1998, fifty years to the dot later, Tom ran that same program again on a reconstructed BABY that had earlier been ceremonially switched on by the widow of Freddy Williams. A team of enthusiasts, almost all members or retired members of ICL, researched the design and built the machine from genuine 1940s components. This would not have been possible without the usual ICL drive and enthusiasm, typified at the personal level by Chris Burton (ex- ICL West Gorton) who led the team, and marked at the corporate level by sponsorship of the project. Anyone interested can now see BABY at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. Tom Kilburn says that it looks exactly like the original - except that it's cleaner. I mention this story because it illustrates vividly what has happened to our industry over fifty years. ICL's latest computer is 25 million times faster, and has 64 million times as much store, as BABY. Many who browse through this book will have been privileged, as I have been, to have been involved in a lifetime's work in what must have been the most spectacular and significant technological development of the twentieth century. One of the fairly unique things about ICL was the fact that it was a company formed by merger and acquisition into a single business. Most large companies formed in this way remained diverse conglomerates, and the problems of culture shock and internal competition were less severe. It was, I believe, the exciting nature of our business, (and of course the wisdom of our bosses), that enabled us to weld together so successfully. While you could still distinguish a round hole man from a slotted hole man, and both of those easily from the new boys who joined in bits and pieces from the early 1960s, in fact origins were never an influence on doing the right thing for the company. Without that loyalty to the company, and the excitement of striving to beat our competitors to the market with the latest technology, we would never have had so much fun. The fact that Hamish has been able to put together another volume of happy recollections is, I believe, a testament to the excitement of it all and the fun we all had. Peter Hall Cheshire Introduction An ICL Anthology came out early in 1996, and seems to have been pretty well received. One thousand and fifty copies were printed, and I got rid of the last one in May of 1998. The following four months have only produced seven requests for additional copies, which I'm afraid is not enough to justify a reprint. The production figure was not reached by nine-level segmentation or any other professional market forecasting technique; rather it was determined by the number of boxes of copies we could store in the spare bedroom, though I like to boast that it was the best bit of forecasting I've ever done. One of the consequential pleasures has been the correspondence that followed its appearamce, and the way that I have been happily kept in touch with many ICL people around the world. A lot of letters included excellent stories that I had omitted - hence this second book - and a few contained corrections. Of these the most important are as follows: The Rime of the Ancient Programmer pp 144-146 This was sent to me without any indication of who the author was, so I attributed it to 'Anonymous'. Then in March 1996, when I was selling copies of the book in the canteen of REA21, two men came past and one said scornfully : 'That poem about the Ancient Programmer wasn't anonymous; he wrote it' and pointed to his friend. But then they left before I could make a note of the author's name. So, I'm sorry, but anonymous it still is, although at least I know that's wrong. Things that gang AWOL in the nicht pp 172-173. Pat and Sylvia Reid point out that the star of the piece was actually Keith Davies, not Ken anybody, and that there was rather more to the final conversation than previously reported. When Jo spoke to John's wife on the phone, what she actually said was something like : 'Tell John not to worry; I have found Keith.' But it was extremely early in the morning, so what John's wife thought she heard was : 'Tell John not to worry; I have found the keys.' And, not recognising the voice, this confirmed suspicions in her mind that John had set up this other woman in a flat. As a consequence when John (entirely innocent) arrived home, he found that he was locked out, with a furious wife utterly convinced that he had a mistress in a flat somewhere. Let's Parler Franglais pp 195-197. This was also marked 'Anonymous' but in fact should be credited to Ron McLaren. As for the omissions, I won't list them here because they fill up the rest of this book. My gratitude again to all contributors, but perhaps especially to Peter Hall, who has not only supplied a Foreword but also virtually a whole chapter's worth of anecdotes, and to Gavin Kirkpatrick, whose happily phrased tribute to Arthur Humphreys expresses the respect and affection which so many of us feel for that great man. Henk van der Vegt has had the happy knack of sending faxes enquiring about progress just at the moments when the process of compilation seemed to be slowing down, and therefore kept the momentum going. Denis Hughes very kindly entrusted me with his collection of ancient brochures, photographs and other relics, including a paper by a senior civil servant comparing and contrasting the BTM and Powers-Samas machine ranges; it dates from 1929, was revised in 1932, and could still have an adverse effect on some blood pressures. Scientific American generously sent me a copy of their article of August 1890 on the United States census of that year, and the Library of the Institution of Electrical Engineers allowed me to copy an article from the American Electrical Engineer from November 1891 with extremely interesting diagrams of the workings of the original Hollerith census machines. Chris Burton leant me a number of fascinating early brochures, mainly of the first Ferranti computers, but also including the P.C.C. and Samastronic, and covering details of the earliest part of the 1900 story. Alan Thomas has once again provided invaluable help in the preparation of the book. I’m glad to think that through him the ICL of today has had a hand in this recording of the ICL of earlier years. I know that the stories repeated here are only another small selection from a wide and deep fund of experience, wisdom and humour. So let me finally say that the in-tray is still open. Hamish Carmichael, Tolworth, October 1998 Chapter 1 – Early History This is taken from a document containing the Historical section of the Hollerith Accounting Machines Handbook, published by The British Tabulating Machine Company Ltd, whose address is given as Victoria House, Southampton Row. It is not dated, but probably dates from shortly after the Second World War; though as it refers to Babbage’s work as being <a hundred years ago’ it might actually date from the 1930s. BTM had moved into Victoria House in 1929. It charmingly starts with the invention of the abacus, and its derivatives, the Chinese swanpahn, the Russian stchloty and the Japanese soroban. (In Powers-Samas training schools, our script on history began with the Sumerian clay tablet, whose embodiment of unit record principles was clearly a predecessor of the punched card.) Then it jumps to Babbage, his Difference Engine and his proposed Analytical Engine, then takes a sideways look at the Swedish Tabulating Machines of G. and E. Scheutz, dated between 1837 and 1853. Finally it gets round to Hollerith, as follows: The art of electric accounting developed from the requirements of the United States Census. The experience of the United States Government in the 10th census of 1880 had pointed to the necessity of the use of mechanical aids to tabulation if the census results were to be published in time to be of any value. In 1880 the census had required more than seven years to complete. So difficult had become the problems of tabulation that one decennial census was hardly completed before preparations were begun for the next. Towards the close of this census work, Dr Herman Hollerith, an engineer who, as a special agent of this census, had won early recognition as an exceptionally able and accomplished statistician, realised the need of mechanical aids in census tabulation. For this purpose Dr Hollerith developed a system of recording the descriptive data for each individual, or each unit of enquiry, by punching holes in strips of paper (and later in cards) which could be adopted to control electrically-actuated mechanisms in the form of counting or adding devices, either singly or in desired combinations.

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