[SIGCIS-Members] Request for biographies

Mon Sep 7 07:14:10 PDT 2020

This has been a most interesting discussion and compilation of ‘great books’      THANKS to all

I would heartily endorse Dave Walden’s naming of Cortada’s History Hunting.       Fabulous insight and reflective piece.

Re the Feynman memoir, which was written just about as he spoke, I’d also recommend Dan Kevles’  The Physicists.   While not strictly a bio of any one person, it is a great character sketch of a collection of physicists

Along the memoir track, I really like James Austin’s Chase, Chance, and Creativity

And for full bio’s, Arnold Thackray and David Brock’s Gordon Moore is comprehensive

And, a self-plug, I appreciate Paul Ceruzzi including my memoir Permission Denied on his short list.

Chuck House 

www.innovascapesinstitute.com 

www.anywhereanytime.io/covid19 

http://innovascapes.blogspot.com

805-570-6706

From: Members <members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org> on behalf of James Cortada <jcortada at umn.edu>
Date: Sunday, September 6, 2020 at 12:09 PM
To: Barbara B Walker <bbwalker at unr.edu>
Cc: "members at lists.sigcis.org" <members at lists.sigcis.org>
Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Request for biographies

I would like to pipe in also to advocate for biography.  I long ago came to the conclusion that the most difficult type  of history to do is probably biography, which is why I never attempted to do it.  So when someone writes a good biography I am in awe, especially since we need these.  Bio story: Dumas Malone the great biographer of Thomas Jefferson told me in the 1960s that it was his objective to write his multi volume bio while going through the same age as Jefferson, i.e., writing about Jefferson in his '60s when Malone was in his '60s.  Both lived into their '80s.  He did it this way, he said, so that he could relate to such issues as their stations in life, attitude toward their prior accomplishments and their responses to the aches and pains of old age.  I did not "get it" when he told this to me at my then age of 21; a half century later, I get it.  But to put a fine point on his experience, he began studying biography in his '20s.  

On Sun, Sep 6, 2020 at 1:53 PM Barbara B Walker <bbwalker at unr.edu> wrote:

Greetings, all,

It’s been wonderful to see this outpouring of excitement about biographies (and memoirs), reflecting their intrinsic fascination. Biographies are sometimes dismissed as subjective, celebratory, irrelevant to the broader structural issues of society, for example gender. But especially in an age of upward mobility through education, expertise, and innovation, good biographies are an extraordinary source of power for individual motivation and self-understanding. Sometimes they are indeed irritatingly celebratory, partly just because it is difficult for a biographer to stick to the research, if not inspired by the subject. 

But biographies and memoirs are life-stories, and at their best uncover a multitude of difficulties and solutions to the grand Tolstoyan question, “kak zhit’,” or “how to live.” Difficulties overcome in intellectual development, love, family, institutions, financial relations – or not overcome – all are grist for readers of a biography to contemplate their own lives, and to strategize for their own success and happiness. As I have seen in reading/watching life-stories with my students, diverse and upwardly mobile as they are at my state university, life-stories are among the most profound tools for self-transformation. More publicly, it is extraordinary how Ron Chernow’s wonderful, complex biography of Alexander Hamilton, reimagined also by Miranda as a musical, has inspired a generation.

Dare I say that if left to men as a genre of scholarship, biographies serve especially to empower men? (and, heh-heh, to preserve the patriarchy!) Women too can learn from the lives of brilliant men, and do. But women – and all in the vast range of human gender and ethnic diversity -- historically face a variety of life-experiences not necessarily experienced by men, and so their lives are a potential source for expanding our understanding of “kak zhit’,” or how to live. And what it means to be human. 

And just to contradict myself, let me add that one of the most inspiring biographies I have read is James Hamilton’s A Life of Discovery, Michael Faraday, Giant of the Scientific Revolution. Hamilton is an art historian, so able to illuminate Faraday’s remarkable ability to visualize the forces of nature, despite a poor education and a distinct weakness in formal mathematics. Those of my students uncomfortable with math love that part!

Hope all are having a safe, refreshing weekend, Barbara

From: Members <members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org> on behalf of "Ceruzzi, Paul" <CeruzziP at si.edu>
Date: Saturday, September 5, 2020 at 4:58 PM
To: "members at lists.sigcis.org" <members at lists.sigcis.org>
Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Request for biographies

Here are some autobiographies / memoirs:

Paul Ceruzzi

_________________________________

Allen Paul Idea Man 2011 Portfolio/Penguin 
Bartik Jean Jennings Pioneer Programmer: Jean Jennings Bartik and the Computer that changed the world 2013 Truman State University Press 
Beranek Leo Riding the Waves: a life in sound, science, and industry 2008 MIT 
Berners-Lee Tim Weaving the Web 1999 Harper 
Getting Ivan A. All in a Lifetime: Science in the defense of democracy 1989 New York 
Grosch Herbert R.J. Computer: Bit slices from a life 1991 Novato, CA 
Hardy G.H. A Mathematician's Apology 1976 London 
House Charles H. Permission Denied: Odyssey of an Intrapreneur  2012 Menlo Park, CA 
Lukoff Herman From Dits to Bits…: A personal history of the electronic computer 1979 Portland, OR 
Mims Forrest M. Siliconnections: Coming of Age in the Electronic Era 1986 New York 
Morse Philip M. In at the Beginnings: A Physicist's Life 1977 Cambridge 
Ornstein Severo M. Computing in the Middle Ages: A View From the Trenches 1955-1983 2002 
Osborne Adam Hypergrowth: The Rise and Fall of Osborne Computer Corporation 1984 Berkeley, CA 
Torvalds Linus Just For Fun: The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary 2001 New York 
Ulam S.M. Adventures of a Mathematician 1976 New York 
Watson Thomas J. Jr. Father, Son & Co.: My Life at IBM and Beyond 1991 New York 
Wiener Norbert Ex-Prodigy: My Childhood and Youth 1966 Cambridge 
Wiener Norbert I Am a Mathematician: The Later Life of a Prodigy 1973 Cambridge 
Wilkes Maurice Memoirs of a Computer Pioneer 1985 Cambridge 
Zuse Konrad Computer - My Life, the 1993 Berlin 
[And two anthologies] 
Lee J.A.N. Computer Pioneers 1995 Los Alamitos, CA 
Northrup Mary Collective Biographies: American Computer Pioneers 1998 Springfield, NJ 

From: Members <members-bounces at lists.sigcis.org> on behalf of Marc Weber <marc at webhistory.org>
Sent: Saturday, September 5, 2020 7:07 PM
To: Brian Berg <brianberg at gmail.com>
Cc: members at sigcis org <members at sigcis.org>
Subject: Re: [SIGCIS-Members] Request for biographies 

External Email - Exercise Caution

It’s a wonderful book, and thank you to Severo for making it publicly accessible! 

Severo also did an oral history with us, as did Dave Walden and several of the other folks being mentioned in this thread.  

Best, Marc

Marc Weber  |   marc at webhistory.org  |   +1 415 282 6868 | Zoom 901 292 1071

Curatorial Director, Internet History Program

Computer History Museum, 1401 N Shoreline Blvd., Mountain View CA 94043

computerhistory.org/nethistory  |  Co-founder, Web History Center and Project

On Sep 5, 2020, at 07:44, Brian Berg <brianberg at gmail.com> wrote:

Thanks - this is some wonderful reading.  For example, the Bob Taylor portion and the birth of the ARPANET and the ALTO computer nicely complements other books such as Leslie Berlin's Troublemakers.

Thanks, Brian Berg

On Sat, Sep 5, 2020 at 3:28 AM David Walden <dave.walden.family at gmail.com> wrote:

Severo Ornstein's memoir "Computing in the Middle Ages -- A view from the trenches, 1955-1983".

Available publicly at the Computer History Museum.
https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102785079

His journey goes from Whirlwind to TX-2 to LINC to ARPANET to Durado to Mockingbird.  At least look at the annotated Table of Contents and read the Preface to see what you'd be missing to not read his well written story.

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This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

Marc Weber  |   marc at webhistory.org  |   +1 415 282 6868 

Internet History Program Curatorial Director, Computer History Museum            

1401 N Shoreline Blvd., Mountain View CA 94043 computerhistory.org/nethistory

Co-founder, Web History Center and Project, webhistory.org 

_______________________________________________
This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

-- 

James W. Cortada

Senior Research Fellow

Charles Babbage Institute

University of Minnesota

jcortada at umn.edu

608-274-6382

_______________________________________________ This email is relayed from members at sigcis.org, the email discussion list of SHOT SIGCIS. Opinions expressed here are those of the member posting and are not reviewed, edited, or endorsed by SIGCIS. The list archives are at http://lists.sigcis.org/pipermail/members-sigcis.org/ and you can change your subscription options at http://lists.sigcis.org/listinfo.cgi/members-sigcis.org

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