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Birthplace of the World's First Business Computer - The Norwalk Hour* Remington Rand's First Computer - A Short History by W.B.Wenning Birthplace - Notes Specific to Development in Rowayton Birthplace - A Time Line by W.B.Wenning and Eric Rambusch The Computer Age Began in a Barn - The New York Times, March 29, 1998 Computer Pioneers - The Darien News-Review,* April 9, 1998 Computer Pioneers - The Norwalk Weekly Life & Times, April 2, 1998* Memories of Electronic Dawn - The Norwalk Hour* The History of Computing *Slight editing applied to correct errors of fact

Birthplace: Development
in Rowayton - Notes

These notes are to document what happened at 33 Highland Avenue, the current location of Rowayton’s Community Center and Library. The notes are a "work-in-progress" and we welcome comment.

Contact: Erik Rambusch, rambusch@sprynet.com

From 1943 until 1964 "the Barn" [actually a group of buildings] was used as a site for research by the Remington Rand Corporation.

In the late 1940's Jim Rand pursued his interest in computer development along three avenues simultaneously: large bureaucratic/governmental computers; large scientific computers; and small business computers to replace what were then called tabulators.

Rand pursued the first two through acquisition: Eckert-Mauchley Computer Corporation was acquired for bureaucratic applications and Engineering Research Associates in St. Paul, Minn. was bought to support scientific computer development.

Jim Rand attempted to develop the business computer through his own company research, all of which, at least initially, was carried out in "the Barn" of the Rockledge Estate, Rowayton Ct. It included:

The development of the Remington Rand 409 under the direction of Crossman in the late 1940's which evolved into the Univac 60 and 120.

The Brustman effort which might have produced a more sophisticated computer but was discontinued due to lack of funds and possible overlap with research acquired through Rand’s acquisition of E-M and ERA.

A third effort under the direction of Wenning in the 60's which resulted in the Univac 1004.

Background

Jim Rand hired patent holders in order to accelerate the process of developing a concept that might be commercially successfully. After the war Arthur Draper was put in charge of interviewing inventors for Remington Rand.

According to Porter Draper who now lives in the Wilson Point section of Norwalk, his father Arthur was an inventor and was hired by Jim Rand in 1940. Arthur had discovered wood laminates and a process for epoxy veneers which proved useful for radar covers during W.W. II. As time went on this market became dominated by Corning who pushed the use of fiberglass for similar application. However the technology has come full circle as carbon fibers and epoxies are now used for the Stealth Bomber.

Even though a Naval Reserve officer, Arthur was never called up during the war since his work for Rand contributed directly to the war effort. Like Rand, Draper lived in Darien, one town west of the Rowayton section of Norwalk. Jim lived on Mansfield Avenue, up on a hill overlooking a man-made lake. He kept his two boats in the Five Mile River estuary, across from Rowayton’s Pinkney Park. His captain lived in the house on the Darien side that has just been rebuilt as a mansion.

As Arthur tells it, all Rand’s top executives advised their boss against investing in the development of electronic computers. At IBM the opposite was true, the senior management team saw a future in computers, but Watson was against it. In short, it would be Rand that would force Watson into computers.

Rockledge

In 1943 Jim Rand had bought the Farrell’s Rockledge Estate in Rowayton for his company headquarters. James Augustus Farrell (1863 - 1943) had started to work at the age of 15 in a wire mill and in 1913 became president of U.S. Steel. He also founded the Farrell Steamship Lines which carried the iron ore for U.S. Steel. Like Rand, Farrell’s business associate Andrew Carnegie, the founder of U.S. Steel, lived in Darien. The main house on the east side of Rowayton's Highland Avenue became the headquarters building for Rand’s company. In 1964 the mansion and 15.5 acres were bought by the Thomas School for girls. It is now the eastern headquarters of Hewitt Associates, LLC.

Today's 33 Highland Avenue was "the Barn" directly across the street from the main house of the Farrell estate. It was here that Rand’s secret business computer research was temporarily housed. In 1964, the Sixth Taxing District of Norwalk, or Rowayton, bought this building and the surrounding farm lands for its Community Center and Library.

Originally Jim Rand had wanted to build his company’s R&D facility on this latter site. Joe Kilbourn, a lawyer and long-time Rowayton resident explains that Bill Kent, a major political leader in Norwalk at that time and Chairman of the A.C. Bohack Grocery chain, successfully saw to it that Rand’s R&D facility was built in South Norwalk, across the street form Nash Engineering on Wilson Avenue. Eventually this facility became the site of Norwalk’s Technical College.

Joe Cheh had been the grounds keeper for the Farrells. When Jim Rand bought Rockledge he retained Joe, who would some years later be maintaining 33 Highland as Rowayton’s Community Center. Donald’s Cheh, Joe’s son visited the stables when the Farrells still owned them. He remembers feeding the animals and playing in the root cellar in the back. Though RR’s security during the late 40s was very tight, Don recalls scientists doing vacuum tube research in dark rooms in the stables, now the reading rooms of Rowayton’s library.

Tom Sharp joined Remington Rand in 1946 as Chief Chemist. At that time the Tech Center on Wilson Avenue in South Norwalk was still under construction. The floors were not finished, and because of a telephone strike, there was one telephone line for the entire building.

Tom recalls that the research at 33 Highland involved vacuum tube studies in conjunction with the effort underway at E-M, as well as the building of "card feeders, mechanical printers and keyboards."

Eckert-Mauchly

In 1947 Arthur Draper moved his family to Philadelphia to work with Eckert and Mauchly to learn all he could about their operation.

J. Presper Eckert was an engineering student who understood the business implications of what they were doing. John William Mauchley was a Ph.D., theoretical, professorial and according to Arthur, hard to get along with. They had developed the prototype to the Univac at the University of Pennsylvania in the early 1940s while doing work for the Army’s Ordnance Department. It was known as the Eniac (Electronic Numeric Inergrator and Computer).

In 1946 they formed the Electronic Controls Company, later renamed Eckert-Mauchley Computer Cooperation in 1948, and built the Univac I and II off campus at their 24/25th and Market Streets facility in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This facility grew over time and in the late 1950's was relocated to Blue Bell, Pennsylvania.

Arthur Porter became convinced that the E-M’s computer was biggest idea RR could ever hope to find and recommended the corporation invest in or acquire the Philadelphia computer operation. Draper told E-M that when they needed more money, Rand was ready to make an investment.

E-M was owned in part by American Totalizer, a manufacturer of race track calculating machinery for paramutuals and the like. The venture capital was being supplied by a brilliant engineer who died flying his own airplane in 1949.

Draper immediately arranged for Rand to meet with Mr. Munn, President of American Totalizer. The details of the acquisition of E-M were worked out on the back of an envelope, effective February 1950. The first Univac was delivered to the United States Census Bureau the following year.

The new operation reported to Allan Ross, Executive VP who in turn reported to General Leslie Grove, RR’s President at that time. Grove had headed the Los Alimos activities of the Manhattan Project and like Rand, was a Darien resident. Eckert became a company Vice President and stayed until he retired. Mauchly left to become a consultant.

Draper clearly remembers the day when the senior executives at Rockledge were informed by Grove of the Eckert-Mauchly acquistion, later known as the Univac Division.

First Rowayton Research Effort

Bill Wenning went to work for Remington Rand in December 1948. (He would later married Joe Cheh’s niece.) Bill joined a 7 / 8 man team including two engineers, one mechanical and one electrical -- himself. The team was directed by Mr. Crossman. He was an adding machine expert and had convinced Jim Rand of his ideas for marring this earlier technology with electronics.

For the next three years Bill worked in Rowayton as part of Crossman’s team eventually developing the Remington Rand 409 which in turn evolved into the Univac 60/120. Jake Randmer was also a member of this team. He made the neon diodes for the prototype machines.

According to Bill, 409 was first assembled in today’s Adult Library directly beneath what was to become his uncle’s and aunt’s-in-laws apartment. Don Cheh and his sister Elaine tell how their father built the "foundation for the Univac." More precisely, Joe built or reinforced the foundation under the room where the 409, the progenitor of the Univac business computers was being assembled.

In 1951/2 the 409 group was moved to the completed Tech Center on Wilson Avenue and reorganized into two teams. The team upstairs focused on commercial design and documentation issues.

Bill Wenning was assigned to head the team on the ground floor which continued to solve the applied research and production issues associated with the 409. For example, it used radio vacuum tubes which burned out after three hours. Their original production targets were 100 units, to be manufactured at the rate of one a month, when in fact the demand turned out to be 3 to 4 a week.

This work continued in the South Norwalk Tech Center until the 409 had evolved to the Univac 60 and 120. The Tech Center group took the new Univacs through their early market phases until line responsibility for them could be safely turned over to the operations in Herkimer, NY in 1954/55. The day that transfer officially took place RR’s new President, General Douglas Mac Arthur, was present and many photographs were taken.

The 60 and 120 were called Univac because by then that was the name of RR’s computer division and Univac had an excellent reputation. In 1952, on the night of presidential election, a Univac had been used by the CBS television network to forecast the election's outcome. The computer predicted a landslide for General Eisenhower. This prediction was so startling it is was not announced for fear the computer was wrong.

Later that evening, when it was obvious that Ike had captured the White House, the commentators explained the Univac had predicted the results several hours earlier, but they had waited until it had been confirmed by the more traditional methods.

The Univac 60 and 120 were very successful business computers, not next-step versions of the earlier Univac I and II. The 60 and 120 were punch card calculators designed for applications such as payroll administration. They were named for the number of steps or calculations each could handle. Both input and output were punchcards. Each unit was about the size of a refrigerator and only needed a small fan to cool it, where as the Univac I required 12 tons of refrigeration. The 120 was slightly larger than the 60.

Second Rowayton Research Effort

According to Jacob A. Randmer another research effort was conducted at the barn that did not make it to market.

"When I joined end of ‘49 Brustman had a large group working in parallel with Crosman. Brustman’s group was isolated from the (South) Norwalk lab in the annex (called 'Barn') of the Farrell estate which was then known as Rockledge and was Rand’s local headquarters where Al Ross had his office. As expenses and technical difficulties in Brustman’s group mounted, management had to scrap one of the efforts and it chose to terminate Brustman’s effort, because it was further from completion and probably more expansive than Crossman’s project."

"It is also possible that both efforts were reviewed by people from Philadelphia like Presper Eckert (Univac) and Lukoff and others and it was deemed the Crossman machine would fit better with developments at Univac which was much further advanced in computer technology than the (South) Norwalk (lab)." (Jacob Randmer letter to Colin Burke, April 5, 1992)

Third Rowayton Research Effort

A few years later Bill Wenning and his team regrouped on another computer project – the Univac 1004. But as with the 409, and the Univac 60 and 120, it was too little, too late. By then IBM dominated the computer market, a situation that was to continue until the development of smaller computers in the late 1980s.