Betty Jean Jennings Bartik receives 2008 Computer Pioneer Award

The IEEE Computer Society bestowed its 2008 Computer Pioneer Award on Betty Jean Jennings Bartik for her pioneering work as one of the world's first computer programmers.

Sixty-four years ago, 20-year-old Betty Jean Jennings answered the Army's call for female math majors to calculate ballistics trajectories by hand for the Army's Ballistics Research Lab (now Army Research Labs). A few months later, she volunteered to run the first electronic computer, the Electronic Numeric Integrator and Computer (ENIAC), which proved to be a tremendous success. Bartik eventually led the programming effort to turn the ENIAC into a stored program computer, went on to program the Binary Automatic Computer (BINAC), and did the logical design work on the Universal Automatic Computer (UNIVAC), the first commercial computer.

Along with the other original ENIAC programmers, including Ruth Lichterman, Frances Betty Snyder, Marlyn Westcoff, Kathleen McNulty, and Frances Bilas, Bartik was inducted into the Women in Technology International (WITI) Hall of Fame in 2002. More information about Bartik and the other ENIAC programmers can be found at the ENIAC Programmers Project Web site, www.eniacprogrammers.org.

Bartik's pioneering career continued at Remington Rand, Auerbach Publishers, and Honeywell. She went on to became a Fellow of the Computer History Museum in 2008 and received the Korenman Award from the Multinational Development of Women in Technology (MDWIT) in 2008.

http://awards.computer.org/ana

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[amdluver]

Great to see the recognition finally come this inspiring woman!

[iamthe007]

very inspiring....