[SIGCIS-Members] Members Digest, Vol 11, Issue 8

[Dag Spicer]

Brian,

The memo is definitely authentic (see copy of it--attached, courtesy of IBM Archives).

As to Seymour's 'reply,' I fear it is from the book "A Few Good Men From Univac, David Lundstrom, viz. p. 135 on which Lundstrom says:

"One of the funniest documents in my collection of computer
memorabilia is an internal IBM memo, which surfaced during the discovery
phase of the various IBM lawsuits (figure 12). T. J. Watson, Jr., questions
with acerbity just why such a small low-budget operation as the Chippewa
Lab developed the fastest computer in the world, while IBM's vast research
establishment cannot.  I believe that Seymour would say that Mr. Watson
answered his own question."

 
(Thanks to my colleague curator Alex Bochannek for locating this reference)

Mea culpa!  I have attributed this quote to Seymour myself (http://drdobbs.com/184404102).

I stand corrected!

Thanks Brian,

Best

Dag





On May 19, 2011, at 9:00 AM, members-request at sigcis.org wrote:

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> Today's Topics:
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>   1. New CBI Newsletter (Spring 2011, Vol. 33:1)
>      (Charles Babbage Institute)
>   2. Tom Watson and Seymour Cray quotes (Brian Randell)
> 
> 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 10 May 2011 14:47:11 -0500
> From: Charles Babbage Institute <cbi at umn.edu>
> To: katie <cbi at umn.edu>
> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] New CBI Newsletter (Spring 2011, Vol. 33:1)
> Message-ID: <4DC9963F.4020204 at umn.edu>
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> ------------------------------
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> Message: 2
> Date: Thu, 19 May 2011 11:06:54 +0100
> From: Brian Randell <Brian.Randell at ncl.ac.uk>
> To: sigcis <members at sigcis.org>
> Subject: [SIGCIS-Members] Tom Watson and Seymour Cray quotes
> Message-ID: <DC4F042D-3DA8-4AEE-B79D-D0C2188E7519 at ncl.ac.uk>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> 
> Hi:
> 
> I've been trying to trace the origins of the oft-repeated pair of
> quotations:
> 
> "Last week, Control Data ... announced the 6600 system. I understand
> that in the laboratory developing the system there are only 34 people
> including the janitor. Of these, 14 are engineers and 4 are
> programmers... Contrasting this modest effort with our vast development
> activities, I fail to understand why we have lost our industry
> leadership position by letting someone else offer the world's most
> powerful computer."
> - Thomas J Watson Jr
> 
> "It seems like Mr. Watson has answered his own question." -- Seymour
> Cray's response to Thomas Watson.
> 
> which I'd assumed were both apocryphal. In fact I find that Watson gives
> the first quotation himself in his book "Father, Son and Co: My Life at
> IBM and Beyond", saying that it was in a memo that he wrote to his "top
> men" on August 28, 1963.
> 
> However, I've not been able to authenticate alleged Seymour Cray's
> alleged response - which I fear is too good to be true.
> 
> Can anyone in fact validate it?
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Brian Randell
> 
> 
> --
> School of Computing Science, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne,
> NE1 7RU, UK
> EMAIL = Brian.Randell at ncl.ac.uk   PHONE = +44 191 222 7923
> FAX = +44 191 222 8232  URL = http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/people/brian.randell
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
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> End of Members Digest, Vol 11, Issue 8
> **************************************

--
Dag Spicer |  Senior Curator |  Computer History Museum
Editorial Board  |  Annals of the History of Computing
1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. |  Mountain View CA  94043
Tel: +1 650 810 1035    |  Fax: +1 650 810 1055

Revolution:  The First 2000 Years of Computing
Visit in person or online!  http://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/

“We shape our tools and they, in turn, shape us.”  -- Marshall McLuhan 






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