Inventions Information

	"When the European part of the war ended, those "computers" were transferred to the University of Pennsylvania, to calculate ballistic tables with the new Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer. ENIAC had been conceived by Dr. John W. Mauchly and was being built by a staff working under Dr. Mauchly and Dr. J. Presper Eckert." Infoworld. June 14, 1982. Automatic Digital Machines were theoretically defined by the Englishman Alan Turing but the Americans John Mauchly and Presper Eckert obtained the first patent on a practical computer. The Turing Machine was a predecessor of this initial computer. The patent rights for the ENIAC were bought by Sperry Rand and the story goes on... But does it ? Having not registered a patent on a similar computing machine called the ABC or Atanasoff Berry Computer conceived a few years earlier than the ENIAC, Atanasoff may have invented the first computer. The Network Revolution looks into these early computer beginnings.
	But who is inventor John Mauchly ? These notes comes from Memorial Tributes by National Academy of Engineering, Vol. 2 John William Mauchly 1907- 1980 - a pioneer of automatic computing - designer of ENIAC BINAC UNIVAC Mauchly was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, raised in Chevy Chase, Maryland, and graduated as a physics major in 1932 from the John Hopkins University. With a Doctorate degree Mauchly became head of the Physics department at Ursinus College. His interest was weather prediction and he saw the potential for high speed calculations for the improvement of predicting weather while studying in 1941 at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering. Along with Eckert, Mauchly made a proposal to the Army Ordnance Department in 1942 where they outlined the ENIAC. In 1944 the proposal was acted on and in 1946 the ENIAC project was completed. Mauchly and Eckert went on to form the Electronic Computer Company. By 1949 ECC had designed the BINAC, a missile steering computer. By 1951 UNIVAC 1 was created for the Census Bureau and acted as an alphanumerical matrix
	See Page 187 for a more detailed Memorial Tribute to inventor John Mauchly.