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And a special mention...
As a sideline to our long-running thread celebrating the UK’s oldest second-generation programmers, we bring you the story of David Ward’s uncle Geoffrey.
“He was a member of the team that built the Colossus computer at Bletchley Park during the war,” says David. “Input to the computer was by punched tape which was made into a long loop and then read at an extremely fast speed.
“Geoff was recruited into the team because of his considerable expertise with teleprinters.”
Uncle Geoff had to keep his secret for 50 years, at maximum cost to his career because he was unable to tell anyone what he had been doing.
“Geoff holds one other ‘first’ in connection with computers,” David tells us. “He was the first person to smash one up.”
Now that’s a world first that is certainly worth celebrating. We anticipate the naming of the “Geoff Ward Electronics Recycling Centre” any day now.
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