The People Behind the ENIAC
John Mauchly grew up around scientists due to his fathers job as the head of Carnegie’s terrestrial electricity department. He earned a Ph.D. in physics at John Hopkins University. After the ENIAC, Mauchly would marry one of the original Programmers of the ENIAC, Kathleen Antonelli.
J Presper Eckert grew up wealthy, and was encouraged to study business in college. He eventually transferred to the University of Pennsylvania Moore’s school of Electrical Engineering. He would have his first patent by 21.
Betty Holberton was one of the original Programmers of the ENIAC. She originally studied journalism in college, as it would allow her to travel. During her time in college, she worked as one of two hundred female ‘computers’ calculating trajectories by hand for the military. She and five others would be chosen to program the ENIAC, where she was the co-lead programmer. She would help develop the UNIVAC along with the BINAC.
Kathleen Antonelli was born in Ireland, though her family immigrated to America after her father was accused of being part of the IRA and imprisoned for two years. She would pursue math throughout her entire schooling, settling on studying business in hopes of working in Insurance records. She would begin work as a ‘computer’ alongside her friend, Frances Bilas, and would marry John Mauchly. She would continue working with programming, designing software for the BINAC and the UNIVAC.
Marlyn Meltzer studied at Temple University and found work calculating ballistic trajectories at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering. In 1945, she would begin working as one of the ‘programmers’ of the ENIAC. She would resign in 1947 to get married.
Ruth Teitelbaum was the only daughter of a math teacher. She worked on the ENIAC from 1945 to 1948, before leaving to get married.
Betty Jean Jennings studied mathematics at University of Pennsylvania, before becoming one of the ENIAC ‘programmers’. She was one of the co-lead programmers. She would go on to work on the BINAC and the UNIVAC.
Frances Bilas majored in mathematics while at college, meeting Kathleen Antonelli while studying. They would both go on to work as ENIAC ‘programmers’
Adele Goldstine studied mathematics at the University of Michigan where she met her later husband, Herman Goldstine, who worked as the military liaison of the ENIAC project. She worked as an instructor for the woman calculators who would calculate ballistic trajectories. She trained many of the ENIAC ‘programmers’ and would write the manual for the ENIAC.
