SIGN: ENIAC

Unless you happen to work at the , you may have never seen this sign.  It’s located just outside the employee gate on Rte. 22.

Though it may be hard to believe, the first computer dates back to 1946.   ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer) was officially dedicated on Feb. 15 of that year at The Moore School of Electrical Engineering at the University of Pennsylvania.

Work began on ENIAC in 1943 at the request of the Army’s Ballistics Research Laboratory.  It would cost $500,000.

John Mauchley and J. Presper Eckert, Jr. combined their talents to create a technological marvel.  ENIAC was called a “Giant Brain” and  “Super-Calculator.” It could perform mathematical calculations in 30 seconds which took 12 hours by hand.

The computer was also super in size.  Weighing 30 tons, the 40 panels were housed in a 30’x50’ room.  There were 18,000 vacuum tubes in it. 

Working quietly in the background was a team of women. They were called human computers. (For a picture of the first generation computer and the women who helped make it all possible, click here.) They performed all of the mathematical calculations using a ballistics table and fed them into the computer using punch cards. 

These calculations, used for weapons trajectories, were so precise that they took into account whether the enemy was standing up or lying down.

According to information from a documentary, “Top Secret Rosies:  The Female Computers of World War II,” by LeAnn Erickson, these women were given scanty credit for their achievements and shared a single certificate of commendation.  In fact, they later learned that when they demonstrated how ENIAC worked, the military officers in attendance thought they were just models brought in to make the machine look good.  They weren’t even invited to the celebratory dinner.

ENIAC was dismantled at the University of Pennsylvania and arrived at Aberdeen Proving Ground in January, 1947.  It was reassembled and became operational in August 1947.

According to, The ENIAC Story, by Martin Weik, who worked at BRL and wrote the article in 1961, “The first few years at APG were difficult for the operational and maintenance crew.”  That's because it was, “the largest collection of interconnected electronic circuitry then in existence.”  With the exception of the relative handful of people who had created it, no one had ever had to fix and maintain such a thing before.

Problems such as power failures and heat made the machine less than reliable.  There were long down times and the error-free running periods were short, according to Weik.

However, when it was working properly, it was used for weather prediction, atomic-energy calculations, cosmic-ray studies, thermal ignition, random-number studies and wind-tunnel design.

ENIAC would undergo modifications in 1948, and again in 1953 before it was outmoded by new computers.  The plug was pulled on the once-super computer on Oct. 2, 1955.

The creation of ENIAC led to more innovation in the field of computers.  The EDVAC, created in 1951 for BRL functioned with binary code and read/wrote to magnetic tape.  The ORDVAC was also acquired in 1951 and was the twin of a computer, ILIAC, at the University of Illinois, where it was built.  These identical computers were the first to routinely connect remotely via the telephone, and did so for up to 8 hours a night.

It wouldn’t be until 1981 that IBM began manufacturing computers for personal use and MS Windows didn’t show up on the scene until 1985.  With the advent of the internet as we know it in 1991, life hasn’t been the same since.

If you’d be interested in scheduling a screening of, “Top Secret Rosies,” (which is on tour) information can be found here.

This sign was erected by the Maryland Historical Trust and the Maryland State Highway Administration.