Interviewith grace Murray Hopper interviewers: Beth Luebert, Henny Tropp date of interview: 5 July 1972 place of interview: nm
Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977
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- Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977 8
- Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977 9
Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977 7
Grace Murray Hopper Interview, July 5, 1972, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
Ordered by the Navy. Just because you were a mathematician you could be used …(voice fades out). HOPPER: I presume that the punched card equipment over at the Bureau of Personnel turned me up because I had a course with Courant on mathematical solution of partial differential equations during my leave year from ( ?), I'd gone to NYU and had had Courant's course on solution of partial differential equations and that was a pretty good problem at this time. Was the solution of partial differential equations. TROPP: Because prior to the War, if you look at the development of differential allies, as a result, ordinary differential equations there was no pressure to solve problems that involved partial differential equations as far as… HOPPER: It came up during the War. TROPP: Right.
HOPPER: ( ?) rocketry and missiles, atomic energy put terrific pressure on partial differential equations and I presume it was the fact that the punched cards turned up that I had had that course which was on solution, methods of solution from Courant. TROPP: So then Hollerith had an impact. (LAUGHTER). HOPPER: That's probably how I got ordered home. Because when I went in, I had assumed, I had had the course on cryptography and I had known (Lindstrum?) since the years when he had taught me at Yale and who was then in charge of the Navy Communications Annex which was building all the machines and doing all the crypto analysis and I had assumed I would be shipped there. LUEBBERT:
Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977 8
Grace Murray Hopper Interview, July 5, 1972, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
What was your place in the hierarchy at Harvard after you got there? HOPPER:
I was another programmer to begin with. Eventually I was in charge of the machine room …(voice fades out). TROPP: When you say another programmer, that's really a brand new idea… HOPPER: The program hadn't come over from England yet. We got problems run. TROPP: Who was the person who trained you in terms of coding or programming the machine? HOPPER: Whenever I got in trouble Blocker, I would yell at Blocker Campbell and he would tell me how to get out of it. Nobody trained us. TROPP:
Just learned… HOPPER:
We learned. We had a code book. I left a copy of it over here. TROPP:
Yes. LUEBBERT: Who were the people that were at Harvard who you spent most time with? You all got together and worked on programming… HOPPER: No, we each had different problem that we worked on. Problems were assigned us to solve.
Computer Oral History Collection, 1969-1973, 1977 9
Grace Murray Hopper Interview, July 5, 1972, Archives Center, National Museum of American History
LUEBBERT: Was there any… HOPPER: Blocker worked on his problems. Campbell worked on his, I worked on mine. Then later we got ( ?) and ( ?) to pick him later. You see first of all there were only three of us. TROPP: I guess what maybe Beth is trying to get to is the intercommunication, the casual coffee conversations that you exchanged problems and ideas. HOPPER:
There wasn't any time for that. I find it extremely difficult to explain to anybody today what a wartime environment was like. It seems to be extremely difficult for the young people who are non-allied to realize that this whole nation could be operating on just one idea. That everybody saw it as an idea, the whole drive was on, just one thing, just win that war. That we were all there because of it and we couldn't have been there otherwise. The one thing was to get your job done and make your contribution. It seems to be impossible to recreate that atmosphere unless you were there, to explain it. People ask me, why did you joint the Navy? And I have only one answer, there was a war on.
For instance, one of my cousins is an architect and he has glasses that are about that thick and tried the Army, Navy and Marines, nobody would touch him because he had these very thick glasses. Well he finally got in the Sea Bees in Houston, he got in as a carpenter. He finds he designed some of the finest ( ?) in the Pacific. (LAUGHTER). You fought to get in. My brother couldn't pass the physicals on account of his eyes, so he finally volunteered under the Draft to get in and later he was sent to ( ?) and commissioned. But to young people today, it's totally impossible to explain that.
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