FROM TYPEWRITERS TOCOMPUTERS: TECHNOLOGYADVANCEMENTS INCOMMUNICATION

Thursday, July 30, 2009EDUC 550 – Teaching with Primary Sources

Primary sources provide a window into the past—unfiltered access to the record of artistic, social, scientific and political thought and achievement during the specific period under study, produced by people who lived during that period.

Miss Marie Reardon,stenographer, sitting ata typewriter in a room.

Chicago Daily News, Inc.,photographer.

Created/Published1922

DN-0075002Chicago Daily News negatives collection,Courtesy of the ChicagoHistorical Society.

Woman using computerto check design of fabric.

Photographer:Martha Cooper

Created/Published: 1994

AFC 1995/028:WIP-MC-B011-09

Working in Paterson Folklife ProjectLibrary of Congress, Archive of Folk Culture, American Folklife CenterWashington, D.C.

Today, most people have a computer in their home. They are an integral part of our everyday lives and help us accomplish the most simple of tasks, right down to getting a needed phone number. Do we really appreciate and know how the computer was first developed and where it came from?

IT STARTED WITH THE TYPEWRITER…Before the computer and electricity there was the typewriter. There were many contributors to this invention, so there can be no credit given to any single person. The history of the typewriter starts in 1714 with Henry Mill, British Inventor, who obtained a patent for what was a similar invention tothe typewriter.

From 1829 to 1870 many inventors tried to patent a typing device in both Europe and America. However, none of these patents/inventions went into commercial production. Some of these inventors include Henry Mill (a British Inventor) and William Austin Burt (a American inventor, legislator, surveyor, and millwright).

In 1870 a Danish inventor Rasmus Malling-Hansen became the first person to commercially sell the typewriter in 1870 and in that same year Thomas Edison invented the first electric typewriter. Inventors spent years working to perfect this, only to see newer technology make it obsolete. Just like the model T did to the horse and carriage.

Boy typing on atypewriter at ChicagoDaily News sanitarium. Chicago Daily News, Inc.,photographer.

Created/Published1929 DN-0087157Chicago Daily News negatives collection,Courtesy of the ChicagoHistorical Society.

Co-inventor examines newcalculator. Dr. J. PresperEckert, Jr., co-inventor ofthe electronic numericalintegrator and computer atthe University of Pennsylvaniahere, examines the machine'sautomatic control panel.

Created/Published: 1946

LC-USZ62-57100Library of Congress Prints andPhotographs Division

One man looks on asanother man preparesUnivac computer topredict a winning horse.New York WorldTelegram & Sun photoby Herman Hiller.

Created/Published: 1959

LC-USZ62-118471Library of Congress Prints andPhotographs Division

Babbage’s engines were among the first mechanical computers, although they were not actually completed, largely because of funding problems and personality issues.

THE FIRST COMPUTER DEVELOPED…Charles Babbage,also known as “thefather of computing,” originated the idea of aprogrammable computer.

He directed the building of some steam-powered machines that achieved some success, suggesting that calculations could be mechanized. Although Babbage’s machines were mechanical and unwieldy, their basic architecture was very similar to a modern computer. The data and program memory were separated, operation was instruction based, the control unit could make conditional jumps and the machine had a separate in/output unit.”

The Atanasoff BerryComputer (AKA ABC)was the first electronicComputer. It weighedmore than 700 pounds.Work began on this computer in 1937 by John Vincent Atanasaoff and Clifford Berry. This new machine was capable of solving up to 29 simultaneous linear equations. However, the input/output was unreliable and its inventors had to leave Iowa State University for WorldWar II in 1942, leaving the progressof their project untouched.

Because the inventors had left for war they were not widely known until the machine was rediscovered in the 1960’s which caused the controversy of the first computer.

“The ABC first demonstrated in 1939 may not have been much of a computer, just as the Wrights’ model was not much of an airplane, but it opened the way.”

Allan R. Mackintosh, ProfessorUniversity of Copenhagen.

The Apple Macintosh debuts in 1984.It features a simple, graphical interface, uses the 8-MHz, 32-bit Motorola 68000 CPU, and has a built-in 9-inch blackand white screen.

Electrical engineer Ernest Milovinstalling a laptop computer intothe take-up panel to evaluatethe circuits.

Photographer: Robert McCarl

Created/Published: 1994

AFC 1995/028: WIP-RM-C012-07

Working in PatersonFolklife Project

Library of Congress, Archive of FolkCulture, American Folklife Center

THE PORTABLE COMPUTER…Early scientists said “computers will neverbe small enough to be portable”

The Epson HX-20 was considered first portable computer (AKA Laptop, Notebook) was developed in 1981.It was the size of a sewing machine andwas not battery operated.

How has the changing technology from typewriters to computers transform the

way we communicate?