ICYMI: Women’s History: It’s Electric! The History Of Computers

Computers are everywhere today! They are our toasters with WiFi to robotic prosthetics, on our desks, in our pockets, in cars, even in our watches. Computers have gotten cheaper and smaller incredibly rapidly! But did you know that computers are much older than you think? This Digital Visit program will guide you through the history of computers and how we got to where we are through the many contributions from people across generations. 

The lecture will talk about the history of early computers and the people who helped make them possible. Many women contributed to the early mathematical foundations of computers, and even a few Queens residents helped establish early analog computation! And this lecture will highlight a few of them and their peers. 

 

Image description: The image shows Grace Hopper, a Rear Admiral of the US Navy and the early computer pioneer. Grace worked on the Harvard Mark 1, one of the first computers, and invented the compiler, which helped convert typed up English instructions, into machine code for it to run. Due to this innovation, which allowed the same code to run on different kinds of computers, COBOL (Common Business Oriented Language) was created with her participation.

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