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--></style></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='word-wrap:break-word'><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal>The Guardian piece is nicely written, but I sighed a little to see another retelling of the story that adds nothing new. There’s also something ironic in attempting to challenge the long genius myth of Turing by squeezing Flowers himself into the lone genius narrative template as “the real father of computing.”<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>So as a PSA for the work I did a few years ago with Mark Priestley on this topic, those looking to learn more might consult:<o:p></o:p></p><ul type=disc><li class=m-6578521092027700104msolistparagraph style='mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><i>Contextualizing Colossus</i>. That’s the organizational side of the story in <i>Technology & Culture</i>, based in the archival materials, focused on the relationship between Bletchley Park and Dollis Hill. The clearest effort to pull back from individuals to look at this as an institutional relationship. <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/763592">https://muse.jhu.edu/article/763592</a><o:p></o:p></li><li class=m-6578521092027700104msolistparagraph style='mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><i>Colossus and Programmability</i>. From <i>IEEE Annals</i>, this one digs in to the questions of whether Colossus was programmable and whether it was a computer. There’s a British stamp that says it was both, but we conclude it was neither. But we couldn’t find an existing definition of “programmable” so we had to grapple with what that even meant at the time. <a href="https://www.computer.org/csdl/magazine/an/2018/04/08509146/17D45WgziNe">https://www.computer.org/csdl/magazine/an/2018/04/08509146/17D45WgziNe</a><o:p></o:p></li><li class=m-6578521092027700104msolistparagraph style='mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'>Tommy Flowers biography from <i>IEEE Annals</i>. <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8356180">https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8356180</a><o:p></o:p></li><li class=m-6578521092027700104msolistparagraph style='mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'><i>Colossus Genius: Tutte, Flowers, and a Bad Imitation of Turing</i>. One of the my CACM contributions, written in a more general way and also taking aim at the Imitation Game movie. <a href="https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3018994">https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3018994</a><o:p></o:p></li><li class=m-6578521092027700104msolistparagraph style='mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1'>Colossus the Missing Manual. That’s the technical report with the in-depth description of the Colossus architecture, its sequence of operations and what all the controls did. There are also several documented Colossus configurations. <a href="https://mediarep.org/entities/book/f1548ef2-2420-4c93-9b09-4fadcc847bd3">https://mediarep.org/entities/book/f1548ef2-2420-4c93-9b09-4fadcc847bd3</a><o:p></o:p></li></ul><p class=MsoNormal>Perhaps unsurprisingly the world mostly shrugged at these and went on with the ritual retelling of the story of snubbed genius. It was nice, though, making my first visit to Bletchley Park earlier this year to have the chance to introduce myself to the volunteer Colossus operators who turned out to have been making extensive use of the Missing Manual. Rather a specialized audience, but a committed one!<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Best wishes,<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>Tom<o:p></o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='mso-ligatures:standardcontextual'>Thomas Haigh<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='mso-ligatures:standardcontextual'>Professor & Chair, UWM History Department<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='mso-ligatures:standardcontextual'>Chair, IEEE Computer Society History Committee<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='mso-ligatures:standardcontextual'>Director, ACM History Committee Turing Awards Project<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='mso-ligatures:standardcontextual'>See more at <a href="http://www.tomandmaria.com/Tom"><span style='color:#467886'>www.tomandmaria.com/Tom</span></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><div style='border:none;border-top:solid #E1E1E1 1.0pt;padding:3.0pt 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif'> Members <members-bounces@lists.sigcis.org> <b>On Behalf Of </b>Dag Spicer via Members<br><b>Sent:</b> Monday, October 20, 2025 12:49 PM<br><b>To:</b> members@lists.sigcis.org<br><b>Subject:</b> [SIGCIS-Members] Tommy Flowers<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><p class=MsoNormal>A great story… Flowers’ career was full of brilliant inventions. <o:p></o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><div><div><table class=MsoNormalTable border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 width=300 style='width:225.0pt;background:#46443F;border-collapse:collapse'><tr><td style='padding:0in 0in 0in 0in'><p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><span style='font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:black'><img border=0 width=300 height=157 style='width:3.125in;height:1.6319in' id="Picture_x0020_1" src="cid:image001.jpg@01DC41CC.A0CC2720"></span><span style='font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif'><o:p></o:p></span></p></td></tr><tr><td style='padding:0in 0in 0in 0in'><table class=MsoNormalTable border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=0 width=300 style='width:225.0pt;background:#46443F;background-color:rgba(70, 68, 63, 1);-apple-color-filter:initial'><tr><td style='padding:6.0pt 0in 6.0pt 0in;background-color:rgba(70, 68, 63, 1);-apple-color-filter:initial'><div style='margin-left:12.0pt;margin-right:12.0pt;max-width:100%;overflow:hidden'><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:black'><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/12/move-over-alan-turing-meet-the-working-class-hero-of-bletchley-park-you-didnt-see-in-the-movies"><span style='color:white;text-decoration:none'>Move over, Alan Turing: meet the working-class hero of Bletchley Park you didn’t see in the movies</span></a></span><span style='font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:8.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif;color:black'><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/oct/12/move-over-alan-turing-meet-the-working-class-hero-of-bletchley-park-you-didnt-see-in-the-movies"><span style='color:white;text-decoration:none'>theguardian.com</span></a></span><span style='font-size:8.5pt;font-family:"Helvetica",sans-serif'><o:p></o:p></span></p></div></td></tr></table></td></tr></table></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal>Dag<o:p></o:p></p></div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'>-----<br>Dag Spicer<br>Senior Curator<br>Computer History Museum<br>Editorial Board, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing<br>ACM History Committee<br>1401 N. Shoreline Blvd.<br>Mountain View CA 94043<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'>“History is a vast early warning system.” <o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'>— Norman Cousins, American journalist (1915-1990).<o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'><o:p> </o:p></span></p></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:black'>Join our Mailing List here: <a href="https://info.computerhistory.org/subscribe">https://info.computerhistory.org/subscribe</a> <o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p></div></div></body></html>