[TUHS] Interesting comment about /usr/share/calendar.computer

[TUHS] Interesting comment about /usr/share/calendar.computer

[David Ryskalczyk]

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So I was digging around some time back, and noticed these lines in the
*BSD "Computer" calendar file:


06/30   First advanced degree on computer related topic: to H. Karamanian,
        Temple Univ., Phila, 1948, for symbolic differentiation on the ENIAC

Since I'm attending Temple, this caught my attention. However, a
search for "H. Karamanian" didn't turn up anything, so I gave up.

Recently, I tried again and found this:
http://diamond.temple.edu/record=b1850797
In short, the name in calendar.computer is misspelled, and the date is
wrong too! The correct year is 1953, at least according to that
record. (I haven't looked at the actual thesis yet.)
Whether this is indeed the "First advanced degree on computer related
topic" is something I'm not sure about — a cursory search didn't turn
up any others that predate this one, but I didn't search very far.

--David R

[TUHS] Interesting comment about /usr/share/calendar.computer

[David Evans]

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On 10 Oct 2012, at 16:47, David Ryskalczyk <d235j.1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> So I was digging around some time back, and noticed these lines in the
> *BSD "Computer" calendar file:
> 
> 
> 06/30   First advanced degree on computer related topic: to H. Karamanian,
>        Temple Univ., Phila, 1948, for symbolic differentiation on the ENIAC
> 

...

> Recently, I tried again and found this:
> http://diamond.temple.edu/record=b1850797
> In short, the name in calendar.computer is misspelled, and the date is
> wrong too! The correct year is 1953, at least according to that
> record. (I haven't looked at the actual thesis yet.)
> Whether this is indeed the "First advanced degree on computer related
> topic" is something I'm not sure about — a cursory search didn't turn
> up any others that predate this one, but I didn't search very far.
> 

If 1953 is correct then Dave Wheeler's PhD predates it by about two years:

http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/misc/obituaries/wheeler

[TUHS] Interesting comment about /usr/share/calendar.computer

[Jeremy C. Reed]

I emailed rlw who provided the calendar entry in at least 1984 and 
authored the History of Programming Languages book ... He said: ``Grace 
Hopper mentioned it in her keynote address at the first History of 
Programming Languages Conference.  And they got the name wrong (as have 
I at times).  HOPL book, p. 13: "It was finally given to Harry 
Kahrimanian, and in May of 1953, Harry put out hid thesis at Temple 
University,..."''