Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Norman Wilson]

Dave Horsfall:

  At one place I worked, every Unix bod sported facial fungus; it must be a
  Unix thing...

====

Not really.  I've seen bare faces and beards and operating systems
over the decades that would scare the bugs out of any of the above
beards and operating systems.  There really isn't a lot of consistency.
I've known plenty of bare-faced UNIX hacks, and plenty of RSX and
VMS and Windows and IBM programmers who hide their embarrassment
behind beards.

The ultimate reference is, of course, the inhabitants of the UNIX
Room.  During my time there in mid-to-late 1980s, some people wore
beards, some didn't.  I have never seen Ken or Dennis or Brian
clean-shaven, but I have never seen Doug or Rob or Tom Duff or
Lorinda with a beard.

And despite a certain remark attributed to the late Vic Vyssotsky
(who I've never seen with a beard either), I am quite sure that
my appearance had nothing to do with my being recruited by the group.

Norman `too lazy to shave' Wilson
Toronto ON

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Adam Thornton]

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For what it's worth, at a certain point in my life I had a SERIOUS beard,
and I appeared in a friend of mine's text-with-static-graphics adventure
game ("Cryptozookeeper") with a comment like "The UNIX beard swallows all
other facial features."

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Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Andrew Hume]

not so fast, there, young pup.

i distinctly remember vic saying something to the effect of
“we have to hire that guy; he will increase our variance”
as you wandered out of an interview with fred grampp.

> On Jan 17, 2021, at 2:33 PM, Norman Wilson <norman@oclsc.org> wrote:
> 
> And despite a certain remark attributed to the late Vic Vyssotsky
> (who I've never seen with a beard either), I am quite sure that
> my appearance had nothing to do with my being recruited by the group.
> 
> Norman `too lazy to shave' Wilson
> Toronto ON

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[John Cowan]

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On Sun, Jan 17, 2021 at 5:35 PM Norman Wilson <norman@oclsc.org> wrote:


> Not really.  I've seen bare faces and beards and operating systems
> over the decades that would scare the bugs out of any of the above
> beards and operating systems.  There really isn't a lot of consistency.
> I've known plenty of bare-faced UNIX hacks, and plenty of RSX and
> VMS and Windows and IBM programmers who hide their embarrassment
> behind beards.
>

I don't think it's so much a matter of wearing a beard, but being allowed
to wear one.  For seven grim decades no American man could get away with a
beard, after the end of the post-Civil War era, in which a beard was the
sign of a veteran (try shaving in the field!)  Mustaches (often handlebars
or toothbrushes until WWII) were the limit of tolerable facial hair among
respectable company employees.

That began to change in the 1960s, when many things did.  Still, hippies
and musicians and poets wore beards but few others did; facial hair didn't
really take off among the gen. pop. until the 70s.

But somehow, programmer beards were tolerated, first at universities, then
at research labs, and then throughout the industry, then throughout every
industry, though I myself was one of only two beards at the Wall Street
brokerage I worked for in the early 80s, the other being my boss.  Even
today, $EMPLOYER, which is an ex-startup, has a mixture of beards and
no-beards among the male engineers, but all the sales and marketing males
are clean-shaven.

(When I met my future wife I was 21, and she wanted me to grow a beard, so
I did.  Since then I have occasionally asked cow orkers who have complained
about shaving why *they* don't grow beards: the most common answer is "My
wife doesn't want me to."  *My* wife doesn't believe this story.)




John Cowan          http://vrici.lojban.org/~cowan        cowan@ccil.org
And through this revolting graveyard of the universe the muffled,
maddening beating of drums, and thin, monotonous whine of blasphemous
flutes from inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond Time; the
detestable pounding and piping whereunto dance slowly, awkwardly, and
absurdly the gigantic tenebrous ultimate gods --the blind, voiceless,
mindless gargoyles whose soul is Nyarlathotep. (Lovecraft)

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Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Steve Nickolas]

On Mon, 18 Jan 2021, John Cowan wrote:

> (When I met my future wife I was 21, and she wanted me to grow a beard, so
> I did.  Since then I have occasionally asked cow orkers who have complained
> about shaving why *they* don't grow beards: the most common answer is "My
> wife doesn't want me to."  *My* wife doesn't believe this story.)

I actually had to shave for a while specifically because of my 
then-girlfriend, so... ;p I can see that.

-uso.

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[arnold]

Steve Nickolas <usotsuki@buric.co> wrote:

> On Mon, 18 Jan 2021, John Cowan wrote:
>
> > (When I met my future wife I was 21, and she wanted me to grow a beard, so
> > I did.  Since then I have occasionally asked cow orkers who have complained
> > about shaving why *they* don't grow beards: the most common answer is "My
> > wife doesn't want me to."  *My* wife doesn't believe this story.)
>
> I actually had to shave for a while specifically because of my 
> then-girlfriend, so... ;p I can see that.
>
> -uso.

Since we've wondered off-topic...

There are two periods of time in the spring and late summer when many
Orthodox Jews don't shave (5 and 3 weeks long, respectively). The deal
I reached with my wife is that I have a beard from the start of the
first one to the end of the second one.  It's worked now for just over
30 years... :-)

Arnold

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Steffen Nurpmeso]

arnold@skeeve.com wrote in
 <202101190807.10J87Gh5009801@freefriends.org>:
 |Steve Nickolas <usotsuki@buric.co> wrote:
 |
 |> On Mon, 18 Jan 2021, John Cowan wrote:
 |>
 |>> (When I met my future wife I was 21, and she wanted me to grow a \
 |>> beard, so
 |>> I did.  Since then I have occasionally asked cow orkers who have \
 |>> complained
 |>> about shaving why *they* don't grow beards: the most common answer \
 |>> is "My
 |>> wife doesn't want me to."  *My* wife doesn't believe this story.)
 |>
 |> I actually had to shave for a while specifically because of my 
 |> then-girlfriend, so... ;p I can see that.
 |>
 |> -uso.
 |
 |Since we've wondered off-topic...
 |
 |There are two periods of time in the spring and late summer when many
 |Orthodox Jews don't shave (5 and 3 weeks long, respectively). The deal
 |I reached with my wife is that I have a beard from the start of the
 |first one to the end of the second one.  It's worked now for just over
 |30 years... :-)

This discussion reminds me of the Jiddish joke (as heard from
Jews, and badly translated from German, not to mention Jiddish)

  Two jewish men meet and greet each other
  Says the elder "ah, you had sardines for lunch"
  says the younger "no, sardines we had three days ago"

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)

Re: [TUHS] Bearded Fellow, Ken Thompson

[Warren Toomey]

Hi all,

	$ mv beards /var/mail/COFF

Many thanks!
	Warren

P.S Yes, I know, >>