Historic Computer Images

This photo collection is one portion of my collection of History of Computing Information documents (seminal reports, 200+ pages online).

Here is a collection of high resolution 400 dpi scans made by Mike Muuss for his Computer History archive. All of them were scanned on a Canon CLC-500 color scanner/printer.

See below for full information on Use and Publication Rights.

See below for details on the five different file types available.

Historical Drawings

Various drawings from the ENIAC manuals and other historical documents. All stored losslessly in GIF format in 4 sizes (full 400dpi size, 1280x1024, 640x480, 96x96).

comp-tree.png 6601x3822 "The Computer Tree", from Electronic Computers Within the Ordnance Corps , by Karl Kempf. "U.S. Army Diagram".

Historical Images

first_four.jpg, 640x480; first_four.png 3793x3009

"U.S. Army Photo", number 163-12-62. Left: Patsy Simmers, holding ENIAC board Next: Mrs. Gail Taylor, holding EDVAC board Next: Mrs. Milly Beck, holding ORDVAC board Right: Mrs. Norma Stec, holding BRLESC-I board

bell-relay1.gif, 640x480; bell-relay1.png 3695x2885

"U.S. Army Photo" A51244, with caption "Bell Relay Computer, showing racks in which the computing, storing and controlling relays are mounted.", from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. An old soldering iron is visible on the desk in the lower left. Building 328, room 27, near the back. Background: ?

eniac1.gif, 640x480; eniac1.png 1340x1024

"U.S. Army Photo", from K. Kempf, "Historical Monograph: Electronic Computers Within the Ordnance Corps" The ENIAC, in BRL building 328. Left: Glen Beck Right: Frances Elizabeth ("Betty") Snyder Holberton

eniac2.gif, 640x480; eniac2.png 3832x3003

"U.S. Army Photo", from 8x10 transparency, courtesy Harold Breaux. The classic shot of the ENIAC while still at the Moore School. Soldier at foreground function table: CPL Irwin Goldstine. Woman far right back: Jean Jennings Bartik. Woman front right: Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum.

eniac3.gif, 640x480; eniac3.png 1239x1024

"U.S. Army Photo", from M. Weik, "The ENIAC Story" A technician changes a tube. Caption reads "Replacing a bad tube meant checking among ENIAC's 19,000 possibilities." Center: Possibly John Holberton

eniac4.gif, 640x480; eniac4.png 3758x2448

Two women posed to show the "direct programming" of ENIAC done by setting hundreds of wires and thousands of switches, in the pre-Converter Code days (an instruction code written by Dr. John von Neumann, Dr. Richard Clippinger, Jean Jennings Bartik and Adele Goldstine and used for ENIAC programming 1947-1955). Standing: Ester Gerston and couching Gloria Gordon Bolotsky, both "Computers" for the Army during WWII and later second-generation ENIAC Programmers. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library.

eniac5.gif, 640x480; eniac5.png 3704x2969

Photo of left side of ENIAC as installed in BRL Bldg 328. The white cabinet in the rear is the core memory, a late addition. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library.

eniac6.gif, 640x480; eniac6.png 3758x2448

Harry Huskey holding a wire of the ENIAC. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library.

eniac7.gif, 640x480; eniac7.png 3735x2460

Two women operating the ENIAC's main control panel while the machine was still located at the Moore School. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. Left: Betty Jennings (Mrs. Bartik) Right: Frances Bilas (Mrs. Spence)

eniac8.gif, 640x480; eniac8.png 3799x3007

Photograph of President Truman standing in front of the ENIAC. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of ARL/SLAD/BVLD, preserved by Mike Danish and Beth Ward.

eniac9.gif, 640x480; eniac9.png 2797x2822

Photograph of right side of the ENIAC as seen from the center of the machine, taken in BRL Bldg 328. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library.

eniac10.gif, 640x480; eniac10.png 3660x2625

Photograph of right side of the ENIAC as seen from the entrance to the machine, taken in BRL Bldg 328. "U.S. Army Photo" from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. The sign on the enclosure in the foreground reads "KEEP OUT: Doors to be opened ONLY by ENIAC engineering personnel".

eniac11.gif, 640x480; eniac11.png 3725x2940

"U.S. Army Photo" entitled "ENIAC OFFICIALS", from the archives of Mrs. Kay Gillon. Left to Right: J. Presper Eckert, Jr., Chief Engineer; Professor J. G. Brainerd, Supervisor; Sam Feltman, Chief Engineer for Ballistics, Ordnance Department; Captain H. H. Goldstine, Liaison Officer; Dr. J. W. Mauchly, Consulting Engineer; Dean Harold Pender, Moore School of Electrical Engineering, University of Pennsylvania; General G. M. Barnes, Chief of the Ordnance Research and Development Service; Colonel Paul N. Gillon, Chief, Research Branch of the Army Ordnance Research and Development Service.

edvac1.gif, 640x480; edvac1.png 1093x1024

"U.S. Army Photo" of the EDVAC, from K. Kempf, "Historical Monograph: Electronic Computers Within the Ordnance Corps"

edvac2.gif, 640x480; edvac2.png 2925x3795

"U.S. Army Photo" of the EDVAC as installed in BRL Bldg 328, from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. Man at the console: ? Man at the paper tape machine: Richard Bianco

ordvac1.gif, 640x480; ordvac1.png 1248x1024.bw

"U.S. Army Photo", from K. Kempf, "Historical Monograph: Electronic Computers Within the Ordnance Corps" Right: ?

ordvac2.gif, 640x480; ordvac2.png 2970x2870

"U.S. Army Photo" A76795 dated 12-March-1952 of ORDVAC installed in BRL Bldg 328, from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. Note ruler block on the floor, for scale. (Also note that the nameplate says "ORDVAC: ? of the University of Illinois, Ballistic Research Laboratory, ???, U. S. Army, 1951")

brlesc1.gif, 640x480; brlesc1.png 1290x1024

"U.S. Army Photo", from K. Kempf, "Historical Monograph: Electronic Computers Within the Ordnance Corps" Console of BRLESC-I computer, front view. Left: Gail Purdham/Beck/Taylor (Mrs. Don Taylor) Right: Loyd Campbell

brlescI2.gif, 640x480; brlescI2.png 3825x3020.png

"U.S. Army Photo" Console of BRLESC-I computer, side view, from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. At the console: Lou Moeller By the door: Horace Burkintere Note the ENIAC photograph hanging on the side of the BRLESC.

brlescI3.gif, 640x480; brlescI3.png 3040x3805

"U.S. Army Photo" Console of BRLESC-I computer, rear view, (during the recording of a television program for OGMS-TV) from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. At the console: ? Man in dark suit: ? Main in light suit: ? Cameraman: ?

brlescII1.gif, 640x480; brlescII1.png 3825x3000

"U.S. Army Photo" Console of BRLESC-II computer, front view, from the archives of the ARL Technical Library. At the console: Alexander V. Kurian Note high-speed card reader in foreground, high-speed line printer behind CPU.

gillon-n-goldstine.gif, 640x480; gillon-n-goldstine.png 1018x1280

"U.S. Army Photo" taken March 1962, from the archives of Mrs. Kay Gillon. Left: COL Paul Gillon, Center: COL Herman H. Goldstine, Right: GEN ?.

barnes-n-gillon.gif, 640x480; barnes-n-gillon.png 1263x1024

"U.S. Army Photo", from the archives of Mrs. Kay Gillon. Left: GEN Barnes, Right: COL Paul Gillon.

More Recent Images

cray2.jpg, 640x480; cray2.png 678x1024

Photo courtesy of Cray Research

fiber.jpg, 640x480; fiber.png 690x1024

The fiber-optic patch-bays in BRL Bldg 328, Rm 27 in 1985. Photo courtesy of Michael John Muuss

gould.jpg, 640x480; gould.png 1156x1024

Photo courtesy of Gould

hep1.gif, 640x480; hep1.png 1036x1024

U.S. Army Photo, courtesy of APG News. Clint Frank holding processor board of Denelcor HEP H-1000 computer.

hep2.gif, 640x480; hep2.png 980x640

Photo of BRL's machine, courtesy of Denelcor

pdp11,70.jpg, 640x480; pdp11,70.png 3821x3025

U.S. Army Photo, courtesy of Michael John Muuss PDP-11/70, Vector General display of XM-1 tank Left: Michael John Muuss, operating Vector General Right: Earl Weaver, inspecting printout of XM-1 design

sun3+3d.jpg, 640x480; sun3+3d.png 1611x1024

Photo courtesy of Michael John Muuss A Sun-2/50 and a SGI 3030 workstation on Mike's desk, ca. 1985.

vax780.gif, 640x480; vax780.png 1592x1024

Photo courtesy of Digital Equipment Corporation

xmp.jpg, 640x480; xmp.png 2347x1578

Photo of BRL's Cray XMP48 courtesy of Michael John Muuss Right: Phil Dykstra

A nice photo of the Cray YMP was taken by Paul Shambroom

Do You Know Who These People Are?

If you know the names of any of the unknown people in these photos, or if you know more about the specifics of when or where these photos were taken, please send mail to < eniac@arl.army.mil >.

The Five File Types

png/

The original 400dpi scans, in PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format. This is probably the easiest way for you to obtain the full-size 400 dpi images.

pix/

The original 400dpi scans, in BRL-CAD® format, either: 8-bit grey scale (.bw) or 24-bit RGB (.pix) formats. (See directions on how to load these into Adobe PhotoShop). Some of these files are quite large. These images have not been gamma corrected.

Directions on how to load .pix and .bw files into Adobe PhotoShop are provided. It's easy to include the high-quality 400dpi digital images from the pix/ directory into your documents!

For details on these formats, see the BRL-CAD® pix(5) documentation. The BRL-CAD® Package is available in source code form at no cost, should you need it.

Local ARL-APG users who wish to make hard copy of these files should use

    pixprint.sh filename -t l -g scan

small/

This directory contains GIF encodings of reduced, icon-sized versions of the images. No image is larger than 96 by 96 pixels. All of them have been gamma corrected for you, to preserve the maximum amount of image detail before encoding.

gif/

This directory contains GIF encodings of 75dpi medium-sized versions of the images. No image is larger than 640 pixels wide by 480 pixels high. All of them have been gamma corrected for you, to preserve the maximum amount of image detail before encoding. (pix-mid-n-smallgif.sh)

jpeg/

This directory contains JPEG encodings of 75dpi medium-sized versions of the images, made using a quality factor of 90% (which is quite good). These files tend to be 1/2 to 1/3 the file of their GIF counterparts. No image is larger than 640 pixels wide by 480 pixels high. All of them have been gamma corrected for you, to preserve the maximum amount of image detail before encoding.

It is recommended that if you want a copy of the image to store on your own system that you download the image into your Web browser and then use the File // Save As.. menus. You should also feel free to include references to these images in your own HTML documents. In that case, use a URL like this:

  http://ftp.arl.army.mil/ftp/historic-computers/small/eniac2.gif

Here is a sample HTML reference for an inline display of the icon-sized image which will retrieve the 640x480 version when selected:

 < a href="http://ftp.arl.army.mil/ftp/historic-computers/jpeg/eniac2.jpg" >
    < img src="http://ftp.arl.army.mil/ftp/historic-computers/small/eniac2.gif" >
    < /a >

It looks like this:

Use and Publication Rights

If you make use of these photos, a brief E-mail note to <eniac@arl.army.mil> to that effect would be appreciated, for our publication/citation records. When you mention where the images came from, please give this URL:

http://ftp.arl.army.mil/~mike/comphist/

Directions on how to load .pix and .bw files into Adobe PhotoShop are provided. It's easy to include the high-quality 400dpi digital images from the pix/ directory into your documents! Even easier is to use the .png format images.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Harold Breaux for the loan of many of the photographs which I scanned.

Thanks to the staff of the ARL Technical Library for opening the vault in Bldg 311 and permitting me access to the BRL archives. I found many valuable documents and photographs there, some of which I believe to be the only surviving copies. Kudos to the past and present librarians for preserving two whole stacks full of historical information from the ravages of military inspectors who rarely seem to appreciate the value of "old books".