| Title: |
Robert E. Mumma
|
| Local code: |
OH 73
|
| Document type: |
Oral history
|
| Accessibility: |
Free Only
|
| Repository: |
University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Charles Babbage Institute
|
| Collection: |
Charles Babbage Institute Oral History Program
|
| Description: |
Mumma describes National Cash Register's (now NCR) early years in the electronic computing industry. Mumma went to work for NCR in 1939 in their newly formed Electronic Research Department. Before the war he designed gas thyratron tubes for use as decimal counters in an electronic calculator, a working model of which was completed before the war. Mumma discusses the contact NCR had during this period with MIT and Harvard, and reviews some of the early research projects and personnel at NCR. He describes in guarded terms work NCR did before the war for NDRC on a secret communication system and during the war on a high speed counter for measuring muzzle velocity of cannon shells. He recounts how war-time work on cryptanalytic equipment took all the company's effort, and how this shaped company policy resisting government contract work after the war.
|
| Extent: |
36 pages
|
| URL: |
http://www.cbi.umn.edu/oh/pdf.phtml?id=1
|
| Original Language: |
English
|
| Time span: |
Not indicated ... to 1984 (Year of interview)
|
| Speaker: |
Mumma, Robert E.
|
| Speaker gender: |
Male
|
| Speaker occupation: |
Electrical engineer
|
| Document location: |
Dayton, OH
|
| Document date: |
19-Apr-1984
|
| Interviewer: |
Aspray, William
|
| Locations discussed: |
North America; United States
|
| Topics discussed - ASP terms: |
Computer software; Electric engineering; Engineering; Information technology; North America; Oral history; Software engineering; United States; World War, 1939-1945--Cryptography
|
| Topics discussed - Other terms: |
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
|
| ASP release: |
2005-06
|
| Document code: |
OHI0024017-25562
|
