Copyright © 2015 Truman State University Press, Kirksville, Missouri, 63501
All rights reserved
tsup.truman.edu
Cover art: Betty Jean Jennings, ca. 1941; detail of ENIAC, 1946.
Cover design: Teresa Wheeler
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Todd, Kim D., author.
Jean Jennings Bartik : computer pioneer / Kim Todd.
pages cm—(Notable Missourians)
Summary: “As a young girl in the 1930s, Jean Bartik dreamed of adventures in the
world beyond her family’s farm in northwestern Missouri. After college, she had her
chance when she was hired by the U.S. Army to work on a secret project. At a time
when many people thought women could not work in technical fields like science and
mathematics, Jean became one of the world’s first computer programmers. She helped
program the ENIAC, the first successful stored-program computer, and had a long
career in the field of computer science. Thanks to computer pioneers like Jean, today
we have computers that can do almost anything.”—Provided by publisher.
Audience: Ages 10-12.
Audience: Grades 4 to 6.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-61248-145-6 (library binding : alk. paper)—ISBN
978-1-61248-146-3 (e-book) 1. Bartik, Jean--Juvenile literature. 2. Women computer
scientists—United States—Biography—Juvenile literature. 3. Computer scientists—
United States—Biography—Juvenile literature. 4. Women computer programmers—
United States—Biography—Juvenile literature. 5. Computer programmers—United
States—Biography—Juvenile literature. 6. ENIAC (Computer)—History—Juvenile
literature. 7. Computer industry—United States—History—Juvenile literature. I. Title.
QA76.2.B27T63 2015
004.092--dc23
2015011360
No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any format by any means
without written permission from the publisher.
The paper in this publication meets or exceeds the minimum requirements of the
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for
Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48–1992.
Contents
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Chapter 1: Missouri Farm Life. . . . . 6
Chapter 2: College and War. . . . . . 13
Chapter 3: A Human Computer. . . 21
Chapter 4: The First
Programmers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Chapter 5: A Career with
Computers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Legacy: Computer Pioneer . . . . . . 44
Timeline. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
For Future Reading. . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Image Credits. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
4
Introduction
As a young girl, Jean Jennings dreamed of having
a big adventure. She would lie in the hayloft and
daydream about life beyond the cornfields and
livestock of her family’s small farm in northwestern
Missouri. Jean loved math and science, and
she loved to fantasize about leading scientific
expeditions to far-off places in search of strange,
unknown animals and ancient artifacts that could
change life on the planet.
After college, Jean had her big chance. She
went to Philadelphia and worked for the U.S. Army
on a secret project. She worked first as a human
“computer,” then as a programmer for the ENIAC,
the first successful electronic computer. At that time
most women did not work outside of the home, and
many people thought women could not do highly
technical work like programming. But Jean didn’t
pay attention to what people thought about what
women could not do. Not only did Jean become
one of the world’s first computer programmers, she
had a long career working with some of the earliest
computers.
5
Chapter 1
Missouri Farm Life
Betty Jean Jennings was born on December 27,
1924, outside Stanberry, Missouri, in Gentry County.
When she was in her late twenties, she started going
by “Jean.” Jean’s parents, Bill and Lula Jennings,
had a farm. Her father also taught in a one-room
schoolhouse. With one younger sister and five older
brothers and sisters, Jean was part of a large family.
Stanberry was a small town, but thanks to the
railroad that brought people to town and carried
farmers’ goods to other cities, it was a busy town.
The town had a population of about 1,900 when Jean
6
was born, and had three banks, five grocery stores,
three dry goods stores, three clothing stores, three
drug stores, two hardware stores, three restaurants,
two hotels, one cable manufacturing company, and
one meal and feed mill. Most people in the area had
farms, but some people worked in town or worked for
the railroad.
Stanberry became a town in 1879 when a railroad company
wanted to build a station there. The town was named after
a farmer who had donated land for the railroad’s right-ofway. Having a railroad station made it easier for farmers in
the county to sell their produce and get it to market.
7
Chapter 3
A Human Computer
Now that she had her chance to see the world,
Jean didn’t waste any time. She borrowed some
money from her sister, and, the evening after she
got the telegram, she got on a train and headed for
Philadelphia. She arrived on March 30, 1945, and
reported to the University of Pennsylvania. She
later said, “They were shocked I had gotten there so
quickly.”
Jean started training for her new job as a
“computer.” Before the first computing machines were
21
invented, a “computer” was a person who calculated
mathematical problems using a mechanical calculator.
A couple of weeks later, Jean was on her way to
lunch when she heard the news: President Roosevelt
had died. Everyone was upset by the news, but
the country was still at war. Vice President Harry
S. Truman became
president and
continued efforts to
win the war. Germany
surrendered on May
7, 1945, but the war
in the Pacific was
far from over and
everyone feared that
Japan would not
easily surrender.
Jean’s starting salary
as a “computer” was
$2,000 a year, which
is equal to about
$26,000 a year in
2015.
22
Chapter 4
The First
Programmers
Jean and the other four programmers spent a couple
of months learning how to use the punch card
equipment. By August 1945, they were at the Moore
School of Electrical Engineering at the University
of Pennsylvania learning to program the very first
electronic, programmable, general-purpose computer.
That computer, called the ENIAC, was completely
new, so there were no training manuals. Instead
28
the programmers were given block diagrams of
the ENIAC’s circuits to study. The ENIAC had a lot
of circuits and nearly 18,000 vacuum tubes. The
computer’s 40 panels weighed 30 tons and took up
1,800 square feet. That is as heavy as ten pickup
trucks and the size of a small house. At first that
huge machine had one job—to make a large number
of mathematical
calculations really fast.
The Army had
given John Mauchly
and Presper Eckert
money to design and
build the ENIAC so
they would have
The patent application
for the ENIAC included
a detailed diagram
showing all the units
and how they were
arranged. Different
kinds of units had
different functions
that all worked
together to make
calculations.
29
Legacy
Computer Pioneer
Jean Jennings Bartik grew up on a Missouri farm, but
she dreamed of having adventures and doing things
that would change the world. Many people thought
women could not work in careers like science and
engineering, but Jean proved them wrong. She often
told people that the best advice she’d ever heard
was, “Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t do
something because they think you can’t. You can do
anything, achieve anything, if you think you can and
you educate yourself to succeed.”
Because she was determined to follow her
dreams, Jean helped create the world’s first
successful electronic computer. Thanks to early
computer pioneers like Jean and the other women on
the ENIAC team, today we have computers that can
do almost anything.
Toward the end of her life, Jean commented that,
“If my life has proven anything, it is that women (and
girls) should never be afraid to take risks and try new
things.”
44
Timeline
December 27, 1924: Betty Jean Jennings was born outside Stanberry in Gentry
County, Missouri.
1941: Jean started college in September. The United States entered World War II in
December.
January 1945: Jean graduated from Northwest Missouri State Teacher’s College.
March 1945: Jean was hired by the military to work as a “computer” at the Ballistics
Research Lab at the University of Pennsylvania.
June 1945 to December 1946: Jean worked with the ENIAC on projects for the
military at the Moore School at University of Pennsylvania.
December 1946: Jean married Bill Bartik.
March 1947 to March 1948: Jean worked on converting the ENIAC into the world’s
first stored-program computer.
March 1948 to September 1950: Jean worked at Eckert-Mauchly as programmer
for BINAC and UNIVAC I.
September 1950 to June 1951: Jean worked at Remington Rand as trainer and
programmer for UNIVAC.
June 1951 to March 1953: Jean worked as a programming consultant for John
Mauchly.
1954 to 1967: Jean and Bill had three children, and Jean was a stay-at-home mom.
1967: Jean received master’s of education from the University of Pennsylvania.
October 1967 to November 1986: Jean worked in various technical positions for
Auerbach Publishers, Interdata, Honeywell, Systems Engineering Laboratories,
and Data Decisions.
June 1997: Jean, along with other ENIAC women programmers, was inducted into
the Women in Technology International Hall of Fame.
April 2002: Jean Jennings Bartik Computing Museum opened at Northwest Missouri
State University.
October 2008: Jean was inducted into the Hall of Fellows at the Computer History
Museum in Mountain View, California.
December 2010: Jean completed her autobiography.
March 23, 2011: Jean Bartik died at the age of 86.
November 2013: Jean’s autobiography, Pioneer Programmer, was published.
45
For Further Reading
For Young Readers
Demuth, Patricia, and Ted Hammond. Who Is Bill Gates? New
York: Grosset & Dunlap, 2013.
Ferris, Julie. Ideas that Changed the World. New York: DK Publishing, 2010.
Galas, Judith C. Computers and the Internet. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2002.
Goldsmith, Mike, and Tom Jackson. Computer. New York: DK
Publishing, 2011.
Krull, Kathleen, and Kathryn Hewitt. Lives of the Scientists:
Experiments, Explosions (and What the Neighbors
Thought). Boston: Harcourt, 2013.
Popular Science: Science Year by Year. Discoveries and Inventions from the Last Century that Shape Our Lives. New
York: Scholastic Reference, 2001.
Venezia, Mike. Steve Jobs & Steve Wozniak: Geek Heroes Who
Put the Personal in Computers. New York: Children’s
Press, 2010.
Websites
Computer History Museum. “Jean Bartik: ENIAC’s Programmers.” Video, interview with Jean Jennings Bartik. www.
computerhistory.org/revolution/birth-of-the-computer
/4/78/2258.
Computer History Museum. Birth of the Computer. http://www.
computerhistory.org/revolution/birth-of-the-computer
/4/intro.
The ENIAC Programmers Project. http://eniacprogrammers.org.
46
Gumbrecht, Jamie. “Rediscovering World War II’s Female
‘Computers.’” CNN, February 8, 2011. Online at http://
www.cnn.com/2011/TECH/innovation/02/08/women.
rosies.math/.
Jean Jennings Bartik Computing Museum. www.nwmissouri.
edu/onlinemuseum/computing/index.htm.
PBS. American Experience: Technology Timeline, 1752–1900.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/telephone/timeline
/timeline_text.html.
Timeline of Computer History. Computer History Museum.
www.computerhistory.org/timeline/.
“Walter Isaacson on the women of ENIAC.” Fortune Magazine, September 18, 2014. Online at http://fortune.com
/2014/09/18/walter-isaacson-the-women-of-eniac/.
Sources
Bartik, Jean Jennings. Pioneer Programmer: Jean Jennings Bartik and the Computer that Changed the World. Kirksville,
MO: Truman State University Press, 2013.
Eveleth, Rose. “Computer Programming Used to Be Women’s
Work.” Smithsonian.com, October 7, 2013. Online at
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/computer
-programming-used-to-be-womens-work-718061/.
Fritz, W. Barkley. “The Women of ENIAC.” IEEE Annals of the
History of Computing 18, no. 3 (Fall 1996): 13–28.
Isaacson, Walter. The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers,
Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution. New
York: Simon & Schuster, 2014.
Levy, Steven. “The Brief History of the ENIAC Computer.”
Smithsonian Magazine, November 2013. Online at http://
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-brief-history-ofthe-eniac-computer-3889120/?no-ist.
47
Index
attitudes about women working, 5,
10, 15, 32–34, 37, 40–41
awards, 41–43
ENIAC, 5, 25, 28–34, 41–43
family life, 34, 37
memory size, 38–39
BINAC, 36
childhood and education, 6, 8–9,
11, 12
college life and education, 13, 15,
18–19, 20, 37
computers, size of, 29, 30, 36
education, importance of, 9, 10
electricity, 24, 26
Pearl Harbor, 14–15
rationing in wartime, 23, 25
softball, 8, 10–11
UNIVAC, 35–37
women and technology, 41–43
women and war work, 15, 16, 17, 19
World War II, 14–15, 22, 23–24, 25,
30
Image Credits
Original art by John Hare: pgs. 6, 13, 21, 28, 35.
Courtesy of Jean Jennings Bartik Computing Museum, Northeast Missouri State University: cover and
p. 4, Jean Jennings, ca. 1941; cover (background), detail of photo from 1946 Science Illustrated article; p. 8,
Jean with family, ca. 1932; p. 19, Jean and a friend on campus, ca. 1942–43; p. 22, letter appointing Jean as a
“computer” for Aberdeen Proving Ground, 1945; p. 29, diagram from the ENIAC patent application, showing
the units of the ENIAC; p. 33, Senior engineer Arthur Banks and Jean in front of the ENIAC, February 1946,
photo from Science Illustrated; p. 36, BINAC on the test floor, ca. 1949; p. 40, UNIVAC I with console, printer,
and four UNISERVOS (tape devices), ca. 1950s; p. 42, Jean’s WITI Hall of Fame award.
Courtesy of Northwest Missouri State University Archives Collections: p. 7, Stanberry, Missouri, ca. 1930s.
Photograph by Tage Olsin: p. 10, “A Softball” (retrieved from Wikimedia Commons).
Photograph by Clem Rutter, Rochester, Kent: p. 11, “Childhood Collection, School desks 2737” (retrieved
from Wikimedia Commons).
From National Archives and Records Administration (retrieved from Wikimedia Commons): p. 14, USS
California sinking at Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941 (ID# 295983); p. 17, War work posters, ca. 1941–45 (ID#
513683, 513613); p. 25, “Rationing Means a Fair Share for All of Us” poster, 1941–45 (ID# 515276).
Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division: p. 16: women technicians at Naval Air Base Corpus
Cristi, Texas, 1942 (LC-USW36-77); p. 23, Bonus Bureau, Computing Division, 1924 (LC-F8-33294); p. 24, Rural
Electrification Administration linemen, 1938 (LC-USF34-018577-C).
Photo by U.S. Navy (retrieved from Wikimedia Commons): p. 18, U.S. Navy sailors in a parade.
Courtesy of the U.S. Army (ARL Technical Library): p. 30, the ENIAC, 1946; p. 31, Jean and Fran Bilas working
with the ENIAC.
From Wikimedia Commons: p. 38 (top to bottom): punched card program deck (photo by Arnold Reinhold),
punched paper tape containing a computer program (photo by Orangejon), detail of magnetic storage tapes
from Control Data 160-A (photo by Jitze Couperus), ERA magnetic drum, ca. 1951 (from Computer History
Museum, Mountain View, CA; photo by Gregg Tavares); p. 39 (top to bottom): RAMAC 305 disk (photo by
Mikaël Restoux), Floppy disks in various sizes (photo by George Chernilevsky).
Photo by Lisa Ahrens: p. 39: CD and flash drive.
48