History of GIS The Foundations: 1940 to 1965

1. History of GISThe Foundations: 1940 to 1965 Erik Hoel Craig Gillgrass Matt McGrath June 2010 Version 19

2. Background • Why? • Random conversation in Matt McGrath’s officea couple years ago after reading Nick Chrisman’sbook (we all knew very little about this topic) • Focus • Timeline style approach • Nothing truly historical (e.g., before computers) • Caveats • We are not historians, merely curious ESRI development staff • Intended to be low-key and fun – not scholarly • Determining what is historical is quite hard …

3. Overview • Timeline of GIS development • Key academic developments • Significant contributors and personalities • Commercial technologies • Cold War’s influence • Impact of computer technology • ESRI’s role • Lots of amazing trivia

4. Message to Our External Reviewers Your chance to influence history! Shape how young minds perceive the past! Cement your place (and your friends) in the historical record! Expunge your enemies and the wannabees!

5. Law of the Famous “The famous are given most, if not all, of the credit, and a large number of others who also made key contributions to the success are largely ignored.”

6. E 1941 • The Atanasoff–Berry Computer (ABC) was developed at Iowa State by John Atanasoff and Clifford Berry • The first electronic digital computing device • Conceived in 1937, it was capable of solving up to 29 simultaneous linear equations • Pioneered important elements of modern computing, including binary arithmetic and electronic switching John received the 1990 National Medal of Technology

7. E 1941 • First program-controlled computer (the Z3) was completed in Germany, architected by Konrad Zuse • The Z3 pre-dated the Harvard Mark I • Although based on relays, the Z3 was very sophisticated for its time; it utilized the binary number system and could perform floating-point arithmetic • Today, the Z3 is widely acknowledged as being the first fully functional automatic digital computer

8. E 1944 • The G.I. Bill (Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944) provided for college or vocational education for returning World War II veterans • Huge increase in the number of people attending college/university – a boon to academic research

9. E 1944 • The IBM Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator (ASCC), called the Harvard Mark I was the first large-scale automatic digital computer in the United States • The ASCC was electro-mechanical, was devised by Howard Aiken (Harvard), and was built at IBM • The Mark I was fully automatic—it didn't need any human intervention once it started • Considered to be "the beginning of the era of the modern computer" and "the real dawn of the computer age"

10. E 1945 • Secret U.S. Army team led by Geodesist Floyd Hough (HOUGHTEAM) captures vast quantities of German photogrammetric equipment, geodetic, and cartographic data • Geodetic archives of the German Army hidden in secret warehouse in Saalfeld • Data included first-order geodetic surveys of large parts of Soviet Union and Eastern Europe • 90 tons of captured materials • Secured a nucleus of German geodesists • Much remained secret till 1990s

11. E 1945 • Vannevar Bush publishes “As We May Think” in Atlantic Monthly, introducing the Memex • A microfilm-based device that an individual stores all books, records, and communications • Mechanized so that it may be consulted with exceeding speed and flexibility • Bush also predicted that "Wholly new forms of encyclopedias will appear, ready made with a mesh of associative trails running through them, ready to be dropped into the memex and there amplified." • Read by Ted Nelson and Douglas Engelbart, it inspired their independent formulations of the various ideas that became hypertext Vannevar received the 1963 National Medal of Science

12. E 1945 • Gilbert White (Chicago) publishes his dissertation entitled Human Adjustments to Floods • Argued that an over-reliance on structural works had actually increased damages caused by flooding rather than decreasing them • Public confidence in structural works increased building on floodplains, resulting in worse disasters if a flood breaches defenses • Stated that “Floods are acts of God, but flood losses are largely acts of man” • Deemed by several commentators to be the most important contribution made by a geographer in 20th century North America Gilbert awarded the 1992 Prix Vautrin Lud Considered the Nobel Prize for Geography

13. E 1946 • Alan Turing presents first paper with detailed design of a stored-program computer • Considered by many the father of all modern computer science • The single individual most responsible for breaking the Enigma code during World War II while working at Bletchley Park in the UK • In 1950, laid the foundation for artificial intelligence by posing the Turing Test In 1966, the ACM establishes the annualA. M. Turing Award for outstanding contributions to computing; considered the Nobel Prize in computing

14. 1946 • The Tech Model Railroad Club (TMRC) formed at MIT • Student organization and a wellspring of hacker culture • The Signals and Power Subcommittee created the circuits that made the trains run, popularizing terms such as “foo”, “cruft”, and “hack” (an elaborate prank by an MIT student) • They eventually move from telephone relays to computers and programming (e.g., the IBM 704 and the TX-0) • By 1962 the layout was already a marvel of complexity the control system featured about 1,200 relays • Famous members included John McCarthy (AI, Lisp, 1971 Turning Award), Alan Kotok (DEC), and Jack Dennis (time sharing)

15. E 1946 • Léon Theremin invented an espionage tool (“The Thing”) for the Soviet Union which retransmitted incident radio waves with audio info • Sound waves vibrated a diaphragm which slightly altered the shape of the resonator, which modulated the reflected radio frequency • Considered to be a predecessor of RFID technology, because it was passive, being energized by electromagnetic waves from an outside source • In 1973, Mario Cardullo develops the first true ancestor of modern RFID; a passive radio transponder with memory Mario received the 2004 National Medal of Technology

16. E 1946 • Psychologist Stanley Stevens publishes On the Theory of Scales of Measurement • A taxonomy of measurements; all measurements in science are conducted using one of four different types of scales - nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio • Monte Carlo Method for using random inputs to calculate results/properties of complex systems named by Stanislaw Ulamat Los Alamos • Originally developed by physicists at Los Alamos studying radiation shielding and neutron flow through materials • Ulam later proposed the design of the hydrogen bomb and nuclear pulse propulsion

17. E 1946 • Buckminster Fuller invents the Dymaxion Map • A projection of a world map onto a polyhedron • It is intended only for representations of the entire globe • It does not have any "right way up“; Fuller argued frequently that in the universe there is no "up" and “down", or "north" and "south": only "in" and "out“ • Gravitational forces of the stars and planets created "in", meaning 'towards the gravitational center', and "out", meaning "away from the gravitational center”

18. E 1947 • Mapping and Charting Research Laboratory established at Ohio State • Funded by U.S. Air Force • Assembled the world’s largest and most productive corps of geodetic scientists • Particularly strong in gravimetry and photogrammetry • Trained large numbers of analysts and scientists

19. E 1947 • George Dantzig (USAF) creates the Simplex algorithm, an algorithm for solving linear programming (optimization) problems • Considered one of the top 10 algorithms of the 20th century • Regarded as one of the three founders of linear programming, along with John von Neumann and Leonid Kantorovich (USSR) • A mathematics world legend, at Berkeley Dantzig arrived for class late, copied down two problems on the blackboard, and solved them; Jerzy Neyman reported he had solved two of the most famous unsolved problems in statistics • He was the inspiration for the film Good Will Hunting

20. E 1947 • The transistor was developed by a team led by John Bardeen, Walter Brattain, and William Shockley at Bell Labs • Initially primitive and unreliable, it allowed the miniaturization of computers and later development of microprocessors John, Walter, and William received the 1956 Nobel Prize in Physics

21. E 1947 Grace received the 1991 National Medal of Technology • Grace Hopper, developer of the first compiler – A-0 (Arithmatic Language 0), traced an error in the Harvard Mark II to a moth trapped in a relay • Today errors in a program are termed a bug • The first use of the term bug is believed to have been by Thomas Edison in 1878 in a letter to an associate describing minor mechanical faults in his phonograph

22. E 1948 • The Association of American Geographers (AAG) merges with the newer American Society for Professional Geographers (ASPG) • Followed the rapid expansion of the field beginning in WWII

23. E 1948 Claude received the 1966 National Medal of Science • Claude Shannon (Bell Labs) publishesThe Mathematical Theory of Communication showing engineers how to code data so they could check for accuracy after transmission between computers • Identified the bit as the fundamental unit of data and, coincidentally, the basic unit of computation • Considered the founding of information theory • As a master’s student at MIT in 1937, he founded both digital computer and digital circuit design theory by showing that electrical application of Boolean algebra could construct and resolve any logical, or numerical relationship • Considered the most important master's thesis of all time

24. Maurice received the 1967 Turing Award (second recipient ever) 1949 • First practical stored program computer developed under Maurice Wilkes at the Univ. of Manchester – EDSAC • Idea originated with Presper Eckert, John Mauchly, and John von Neumann in 1945 (EDVAC, operational in 1951) Presper received the 1968 National Medal of Science IEEE establishes the von Neumann Medal for outstanding achievements in computer-related science and technology

25. E 1949 • Norman Ramsey develops the Atomic Clock • Based upon Isidor Rabi’s (Columbia – quantum physicist) research between 1938-1940 on measuring the natural resonate frequencies of atoms • Atoms pass twice through an oscillating magnetic field – the oscillating field becomes a metronome to generate time pulses Isidor received the 1944 Nobel Prize Norman received the 1989 Nobel Prize

26. E 1949 • An Wang and Way-Dong Woo (Harvard)create the pulse transfer controlling device • A key step in the development of magnetic core memory • Jay Forrester (MIT) later completed the invention of core memory in Whirlwind • Wang created Wang Laboratories in 1951 Jay received the 1989 National Medal of Technology "Success is more a function of consistent common sense than it is of genius.“ - An Wang

27. E 1950 • Development began on the USAF’s SAGE (Semi Automatic Ground Environment) air defense system • The first graphic system • Outgrowth of MIT's Lincoln Laboratory Whirlwind II • Developed by IBM, Western Electric, RAND, and Burroughs • Used CRT displays to show computer-processed radardata and other information • 22 SAGE command centers • IBM built the AN/FSQ-7 • 250 ton computer • 49,000 vacuum tubes • 3,000,000 watts of power

28. E 1951 • Maurice Wilkes, David Wheeler, and Stanley Gill (Univ. of Cambridge) publish The Preparation of Programs for an Electronic Digital Computer, the first book on computer programming • Based upon experiences developing EDSAC – the first practical stored-program electronic computer • Wilkes also developed the concept of microprogramming while leading the EDSAC project “It was on one of my journeys between the EDSAC room and the punching equipment that "hesitating at the angle of the stairs" the realization came over me with full force that a good part of the remainder of my life was going to be spent finding errors in my own programs.” - Maurice Wilkes Maurice received the 1967 Turing Award (second recipient ever)

29. E 1951 • The UNIVAC I (UNIVersal Automatic Computer I) was the first commercial computer • Design led by Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, the inventors of the ENIAC • Delivered to the US Census Bureau • UNIVAC I used 5,200 vacuum tubes, weighed 29,000 pounds, consumed 125 kW, and could perform about 1,905 operations per second running on a 2.25 MHz clock • Famously known for predicting the outcome of the 1952 US presidential election - it predicted an Eisenhower landslide when traditional pollsters all called it for Adlai Stevenson

30. M 1952 “The work that makes the data intelligible to the reader … is the essential cartographic technique.” - Arthur Robinson, The Look of Maps • Arthur Robinson publishes the revolutionary The Look of Maps • Based upon his doctoral research at Ohio State • Urged cartographers to consider the function of a map as an integral part of the design process as well as to apply psychological research to improving maps • Influenced in part by German cartographer Max Eckert • Set the dominant post-war cartographic research agenda • Considered the origin of modern university cartography • Was Chief of Map Division for the OSS (CIA) during WWII • Developed the Robinson Projection (adopted by National Geographic Society as world projection of choice)

31. M 1952 • International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) proposes the International Geophysical Year (IGY) • Comprehensive series of global geophysical activities to span July 1957-December 1958 • Auroras, cosmic rays, geomagnetism, gravity, ionospheric physics, precision mapping, meteorology, oceanography, seismology, and solar activity • Timed to coincide with the high point of the eleven-year cycle of sunspot activity • Narinder Singh Kapany conducts experiments that led to the invention of optical fiber • Considered the father of fiber optics (also coined the term in 1960)

32. M 1953 • John Backus (IBM) submits a proposal to develop a better alternative to assembly language for programming the IBM 704 • A draft spec for The IBM Mathematical Formula Translating System (FORTRAN) was completed by 1954; the first compiler delivered in 1957 "Much of my work has come from being lazy. I didn't like writing programs, and so, when I was working on the IBM 701, writing programs for computing missile trajectories, I started work on a programming system to make it easier to write programs.“ - John Backus John received the 1977 Turing Award

33. M 1954 • Military and Civil State Topographic Services completes 1:100,000 topographic map of the entire Soviet Union • Decreed as first priority by Stalin following WWII • Very difficult, brutal task in Siberia and Russian Far East • Considered a state secret • Maps for consumers were at 1:2,500,000 • G. A. Ginzburg at the Central Research Institute created a special projection that led to implementing random distortions of coordinates, distances, and directions

34. E 1954 • Nearest neighbor analysis developed by Ecologists Philip Clark and Francis Evans (Michigan) • Used to measure second order (local) distributions of spatial data and identify neighborhood patterns • Nearest neighbor distances compared against random distributions

35. E 1954 • IBM launches the Model 650 • Magnetic drum data-processing machine • $3200/month rental ($23,200/month today) • CPU weighed 1970 lbs. (5’x3’x6’) • Power supply weighed 2970 lbs. (5’x3’x6’) • Card reader (I/O) weighed 1300 lbs. - $550/month rental • Market demand anticipated at 50 (>2000 sold by 1962)

36. M 1955 • DMATS (Detroit Metropolitan Area Traffic Study) completed • First assemblage of all the elements of an urban transportation study • Led by J. Douglas Carroll Jr. • Trip generation rates by land use category • Future trips were estimated from a land use forecast • Produced maps of traffic flow and volume • Much of the work was done by hand with the aid of tabulating machines for some of the calculations • Cost/benefit analysis of expressway network

37. M 1955 • CATS (Chicago Area Transportation Study) initiated • Set the standard for urban transportation studies; in 1962, studies such as this became prerequisite to urban qualification for federal aid for road construction • Lessons learned in Detroit were applied in Chicago with greater sophistication by J. Douglas Carroll Jr. • Transportation networks were developed to serve travel generated by projected land-use patterns • Simple land-use forecasting procedure was employed to forecast land-use and activity patterns • Major advance in use of the computer in travel forecasting

38. M 1955 • System Development Corporation (SDC), based in Santa Monica, California, was created • Arguably the world's first computer software company • Originally the systems engineering group for the SAGE at the RAND Corporation • RAND spun off the group in 1957 as a non-profit that provided expertise for the US military in the design, integration, and testing of large, complex, computer-controlled systems

39. M 1955 • Kelly Johnson and the Lockheed Skunk Works develop the U-2, a high altitude strategic reconnaissance aircraft • Perkin-Elmer developed cameras had a resolution of 2.5 ft (76 cm) from an altitude of 60,000 ft (18km) • Nicknamed the Dragon Lady, flown by CIA and USAF • Still in frontline service more than 50 years after its first flight despite the advent of surveillance satellites

40. M 1956 • GENETRIX initiated by USAF • Camera carrying high altitude balloons launched from Western Europe, recovered in mid-air over the Pacific • 219 balloons launched, 40 recovered • 28 day program before cancellation • Very significant tool to improve maps of the Soviet Union and China (8% coverage, ~13,000 images) • Derivative of camera later used on first reconnaissance satellites

41. M 1956 • IBM invents magnetic disk storage with the IBM 305 RAMAC System • Motivated by the need for real time accounting in business • The 350 RAMAC (Random Access Method of Accounting and Control) stored 5 million 7-bit (6-bits plus 1 odd parity bit) characters (~4.4 MB) • It had fifty 24-inch (610 mm) diameter disks with 100 recording surfaces • Data transfer rate was 8,800 characters per second

42. M 1956 • Robert Colwell (Berkeley) publishes article featuring use of color infrared (or “camouflage detection”) film to detect black stem rust in wheat • Landmark paper in remote sensing • Detecting stress and disease in plants • ASP later published his Manual of Photo Interpritation in 1960 that documented his early work

43. M 1957 • International Geophysical Year (IGY) • 67 nations, 60,000+ scientists worked to understand the earth as a planet • Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1 • United States launched Explorer 1 • Van Allen radiation belts discovered • Mid-ocean ridges discovered (plate tectonics) • Antarctic ice mass estimated James received the 1987 National Medal of Science

44. 1957 4 OKTЯБРЯ, Спутник (Sputnik 1) launched by the Сою́з Сове́тских Социалисти́ческих Респу́блик (CCCP) using their R-7 rocket First satellite to achieve orbit Established precedent of open skies in space Mounting of cameras on orbiting spacecraft became possible M Sergey received the Order of Lenin three times Highest national order of the Soviet Union 44 .

45. C 1957 • GilbertHobrough develops the first successful Stereo Image Correlator – a key event in the development of digital photogrammetry • Hobrough had 47 patents in many areas: • Phonograph turntable and tonearm • High-fidelity speaker design • Radar and barometric altimetry • 3D vision • Laser interferometry

46. C Photogrammetry • Swiss companies Wild Heerbrugg and Kern Aarau led much of the development • Basic theory developed in Germany in the 19th and early 20th century • Main driver: the need for military maps for reconnaissance in a topographically difficult country such as Switzerland, as was required during the period between WWI and WWII

47. C 1957 • Tom Dimond (Bell Labs) demonstrates the Stylator electronic tablet with pen for computer handwriting recognition • To standardize the shapes of the handwritten characters so that a computer could read them, Dimond suggested training operators to construct letters and numbers around pairs of dots, a method he called "dot constraint" • Better known (and often mis-stated as the first digitizer tablet) is the RAND Tablet, introduced in 1963

48. C 1957 • Bob Bemer first describes the concept of time-sharing in Automatic Control Magazine • Time-sharing is sharing a computing resource among many users via multiprogramming and multi-tasking • The prominent model of computing in the 1970s • A major technological shift in the history of computing • Idea originated in 1940 at Bob’s Big Boy in Glendale, CA • Orders were placed by waitresses on a revolving drum with elasticized bands, and the cooks referred to them often (interspersion). Hardly any order ever got produced in its entirety at one time, with the production sequence “shared” by all customers and by all cooks.

49. C 1958 • Univ. of Washington Department of Geography – center of intense advanced research on scientific quantitative geography (William Garrison and his students) – the ‘new geography’ • Developed now classical techniques in spatial analysis, statistical methods, measure of spatial distributions, techniques of spatial comparison, 3D and n-dimensional analysis, network analysis, and geographic modeling techniques

50. C The New Geography • The change involved the greater use and emphasis placed on quantitative techniques • Experimental and statistical methodologies • Resulted in a new generation of geographers trained in contemporary methods of theory construction and data analysis • William Garrison’s Geography 426 class (Statistical Methods) in 1955 was a shock; students trained in statistical methods as well as an introduction to computers and their application (on an IBM 601)