Consistent with David's Esso correspondent is this sentence by Garret Birkhoff in his article "Computer Developments 1935-1955, as Seen from Cambridge, U.S.A." (/A History of Computing in the Twentieth Century/, edited by Metropolis et al., Academic Press, 1980, p. 29): "I just want to make it clear that, by 1955, with the first commercial machines out, American industries, especially the nuclear industry but also the petroleum industry---which had been egged on by von Neumann: incidentally, he was an early consultant for the Standard Oil Development Company--- were using computers and American industry has relied on them ever since." On 9/14/2010 5:18 AM, David Alan Grier wrote:
I received emails from an Esso engineer, who noted that they took delivery of the first Univac 1103 in '56 and had von Neumann as a consultant.