> Interesting .. I trust you, but I had thought ( famously) you folks had
> required a LISP and/or Scheme in the required "intro to computers" course
> using the Gerald  Sussman and Hal Abelson "Structure of Computer
> Programs" [Scheme IIRC] until it was finally replaced a few years ago
> with a Python based one [I thought it was tjt that told me that, but I
> could easily have been misled/misunderstood].
>

I think that wasn't until 1981.  I took 6.912, which was an experimental
pre-cursor to the SICP class as a sophomore.  We did LISP programming on
Multics. I might have the years off by one -- it was when "Fear of Music"
came out. :) The mainstream intro classes used Algol on a PDP-11 I think?
To emphasize Noel's point about the distributed nature, the intro to
programming class in the MechE department, 2.10, was Fortran first on punch
cards and then interactive when they got a big-ass DEC 20 running Digital
software. Amusingly MIT AI got one shortly after, and there was some
controversy about leaving TOPS-20 or converting it to ITS; ITS lost.