New Publication: Proving Ground, by Kathryn Kleiman
A new book by PIJIP Senior Policy Fellow Kathryn Kleiman has been published.聽Proving Ground: The Untold Story of the Six Women Who Programmed the World鈥檚 First Modern Computer聽tells the story of six women hired by the army to program 鈥渢he world鈥檚 first all-electronic, programmable, general-purpose computer,鈥 known as the ENIAC, to calculate missile trajectories during World War II. The women - Frances Elizabeth Snyder Holberton, Betty Jean Jennings, Kathleen McNulty, Marlyn Wescoff, Frances Bilas, and Ruth Lichterman - worked without any manuals, or even existing programming languages, yet their work laid the foundation for the computing revolution.聽
Publisher's Weekly's review of Prof. Kleiman's "fantastic debut" says that "Kleiman has a novelist鈥檚 gift for crafting a page-turning narrative, and the one on offer is both revelatory and inspiring."聽
The book's description on Amazon notes: "While most students of computer history are aware of this innovative machine, the great contributions of the women who programmed it were never told -until now. 聽Over the course of a decade, Kathy Kleiman met with four of the original six ENIAC Programmers and recorded extensive interviews with the women about their work. PROVING GROUND restores these women to their rightful place as technological revolutionaries. As the tech world continues to struggle with gender imbalance and its far-reaching consequences, the story of the ENIAC Programmers' groundbreaking work is more urgently necessary than ever before, and PROVING GROUND is the celebration they deserve."