This past year, I've witnessed your pride of successfully designing, developing and bringing to market such a significant system that introduced computing to so many people, businesses, and institutions around the world. Half of all computers in the world by the mid 1960s isn't too bad! ;-)
Quoting from our 1401 two-pager (a precursor to the 14-page booklet to be printed for the upcoming Nov 10th event at the Computer History Museum):
By mid 1959, with a 40-person engineering team working night and day,
trial educational classes underway within IBM, and a running prototype, the 1401
was poised to transform the business world with its low entry cost, outstanding
print quality, powerful magnetic tapes, and the promise of a mass-market
stored-program computer. Only IBM's skeptical forecasting department needed
persuasion to approve the product's launch.
"DAWN OF A NEW AGE": On October 5, 1959, the 1401 was announced via
closed-circuit TV to 50,000 participants in 102 cities. September the following
year the first 1401 was shipped to Time-Life in Chicago and by year end 100
systems had been delivered. By 1965, worldwide installations of 1401s peaked at
9,300 while 1400 family machines-models 1410, 1440, 1460, 7010-comprised half of
all computers (which by 1967 peaked at 15,000 systems).
Regards,
- Robert [B. Garner]
p.s. If you can make it out to California, Nov 9 & 10 at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Fran Underwood, Chuck Branscomb, and Shel Jacobs will be there talking about the 1401 development history:
http://www.computerhistory.org/events/
I'll be hosting a "founders luncheon" on Monday the 9th to share stories and have some fun with the 1401 restoration team and Museum staff. I'll send an invitation to those who, according to Jud McCarthy, are able to make it out west to the Museum.
IBM Almaden Research Center, San Jose, CA
Office: 408-927-1739
Mobile: 408-679-0976
robgarn [a] us.ibm.com
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