steveanderson.digital

Outside the Spacecraft, an interactive museum exhibit at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. High resolution photographs, insight into curation and preservation techniques, even checklists and paperwork.

The exhibit reminded me of this recent tweet by The Onion:

Otherwise Reasonable Man Sincerely Believes U.S. Landed On Moon: The Onion

(@TheOnion)

February 17, 2015

(Revised and republished April 13th, 2025)

ROBOTS.TXT IS A SUICIDE NOTE

ROBOTS.TXT is a stupid, silly idea in the modern era. Archive Team entirely ignores it and with precisely one exception, everyone else should too.

Archive Team interprets ROBOTS.TXT as damage and temporary madness, and works around it. Everyone should. If you don’t want people to have your data, don’t put it online.

The Holmdel Computer Center, Part 2 – AT&T Archives (Wayback Machine link)

This rare look inside a Bell Labs computer center, specifically the one at the Holmdel location, which was referred to internally as the “HOCC” or the “HO CC”. This film was made as orientation for new employees who would need to use the computer center, and this, part 2 of 2 (see part 1), is about the programming center within the HOCC. One thing that’s notable about this film — different from Part 1 — is the preponderance of women working in the Programmer Services area. Around 1966, 7 years before this film was made, there were over 500 women working in “technical work” at Bell Labs, rather than administrative work, and many were in computing. A book and blog by Nathan Ensmenger examines the sociological history of computing, and why during the 1980s the computing field became more and more the province of men. Stories about women in the early decades of computing still reside in the world of the personal anecdote; it’s hard to assess the exact data on how many women worked in the field in the 1960s and 1970s.

The original video isn’t available on the Wayback Machine, but the YouTube version is embedded below.

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

There’s some interesting artwork on the timeshare computer…reminds me of the “nose art” on military aircraft. In my archival research I’ve come across a few instances of pinup-style material, especially ASCII art printouts.

The video below is from 1973, slightly after the timeframe of my research, but certainly interesting.

The Holmdel Computer Center, Part 1 – AT&T Archives (Wayback Machine link)

The year was 1973, and the computer operating system UNIX, invented at Bell Labs by Ken Thompson and Dennis Ritchie, had just morphed into its third iteration or improvement, and had just been rewritten in the C programming language. This film, made as an orientation for the computer center at the Bell Labs Holmdel location, is a rare glimpse into the operations and procedures of an early 1970s research-oriented computing center. And as the 1973 Holmdel Computer Center only had IBM computers, it wasn't running a UNIX installation: the system was only ported to IBM computers in the years to come. In 1973, UNIX as a system was limited to installations on DEC computers, and there were UNIX installations at other locations of Bell Laboratories such as Indian Hill, Whippany, and, of course, Murray Hill (where UNIX and C were developed). Computers in the Bell System weren't just relegated to computer science or the development of computer language. They were employed for all kinds of complex engineering calculations, telecommunications applications, and, very occasionally, for making art and music.

The original video isn’t available on the Wayback Machine, but the YouTube version is embedded below.

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

I happened across an historical US passport for Fred Soper (1893-1977), the American epidemiologist and public health administrator, while doing some research on paperwork. The National Library of Medicine has a page on Fred Soper under their "Profiles in Science" project, but Soper's Wikipedia page is quite lacking (updates have been made since 2015). Updating Wikipedia for this historical figure would make a great project for a History and/or Digital Humanities class. There's also a listing of primary visual sources, with high resolution images.

(Revised and republished April 13th, 2025)

The Case for Hollywood History, Francine Prose at the New York Review of Books, 2015:

It’s so much easier and less threatening to talk about whether (or how much of) a film is “true” than to confront the unpleasant—and indisputable—truth: that racial and sexual prejudice have persisted so long past the historical eras in which these films are set.

This happens quite often with student essays concerning historical films -- too much attention paid to the factual discrepancies and not enough contemplation of the larger themes. I use films in my research and teaching, they're invaluable for understanding how history has been interpreted in various ways.

One of my favorite clips for 20th Century United States history comes from World War Z. It's the moment when people are being removed from the aircraft carrier and The Charters of Freedom are being brought on board in their place. World War Z is fictional of course, however, the human response to catastrophe, whether caused by zombies or some other force, provides a great starting point for historical discussion.

(Revised and republished April 19th, 2025)

Two Control Data Cyber 170 mainframe computers, side by side – one online, and one as a spare. (Photograph via Library of Congress)

SITE BUILDING 002 - SCANNER BUILDING - LOOKING AT DISC STORAGE SYSTEMS A AND B

The year on the photo is listed as 1999, which seems too recent given the feel of the picture. In the high-resolution TIFF, however, the date can be seen on the bulletin board, “21 Oct 99”. The Cyber 170 was produced in the late 1970s, so this unit is at least 20 years old.

The photograph is part of this collection at LOC: Cape Cod Air Station, Technical Facility-Scanner Building & Power Plant, Massachusetts Military Reservation, Sandwich, Barnstable County, MA

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

Campus digital workhorse running final laps after 35 years (Wayback Machine link), by Barbara Palmer, Stanford Report, 2003:

The remarkable thing is not that the mainframe will be retired -- the 35-year-old system is "like a jet slowly losing its engines," said Dick Guertin, a software developer who has worked at Stanford since 1970. What is amazing, say those whose work lives have spanned much of the computer revolution, is that the mainframe system and the ground-breaking applications designed here to run on it have held up so well for so long.

At its peak, there were 30,000 accounts, including noncampus users, on the mainframe. Some of what McWilliam is doing requires real detective work, since many of the people who opened the accounts have long ago left Stanford or retired.

Also – Forsythe Mainframe Retirement (Wayback Machine link):

The mainframe era officially ended on December 15, 2003 when the last of the mainframe accounts was closed down.

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

Hello, Goodbye - CDS Bids Farewell to Mainframe, Ushers in New Beginning

In 1998 the Catalog Distribution Service of the Library of Congress shutoff its mainframe computer and switched to a new system.

During the 1970s, the mainframes were used primarily to print catalog cards, which CDS once produced by the tens of millions. In those early days, as many as 30 staff members were required simply to service the units, performing such tasks as changing tape reels, threading tape and programming. "It was physically demanding labor," said Mr. Billingsley.

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

UCLA’s 1948 Mechanical Computer Was Simply Gorgeous To Watch in Action (Wayback Machine link), by Matt Novak at Paleofuture, 2013.

I’ll need to get more information on the film clip’s provenance – it’s shown here through Gizmodo’s Vimeo channel without a source reference. It’s listed in the Paleofuture article as released by Popular Science via Paramount Pictures, 1948 (possibly through Shields Pictures Inc.).

More information at UCLA, Historical Research Highlights, “The Thinking Machine”

In December of 1977, the last working model of a mechanical differential analyzer in the world is donated by UCLA to the Smithsonian Institution for its pioneering computing display. The differential analyzer introduced much of Southern California industry to automatic computing, but became obsolete beginning in 1960 as it was replaced by computing machines with electronic circuits and vacuum tubes. From 1960 on, it was used mainly as a display piece, clanking away occasionally for student and public demonstrations.

Two more video clips of the UCLA differential analyzers at the Computer History Museum: http://www.computerhistory.org/revolution/analog-computers/3/143

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

Filing Cabinets, a Neglected Piece of Business History, by Linda Gross, the Hagley Library:

Dr. Robertson is an associate professor of media history at Northeastern University. He explained to us that he is currently researching the early history of the filing cabinet (1890s-1930s). Robertson contends that the filing cabinet has been largely neglected in the history of information technologies, with punch card machines (a clearer precursor to computers) taking a leading role in histories of early 20th century information technologies—this despite the importance of “files” and folders” to how we organize information on computers.

“This Big, Urgent Question of Protection for Operating Files and Records,” Remington Rand Inc. brochure, ca. 1948, Hagley Digital Archives.

(Revised and republished April 2nd, 2025)

Kirschenbaum’s Tumblr blog on his book project - http://trackchangesbook.tumblr.com

Matthew Kirschenbaum’s Literary History of Word Processing, Harvard University Press blog post:

It’s interesting to see how Kirschenbaum’s research on the effects of one technological innovation—word processing—is being so shaped by his own embrace of another, social networking. Until recently, it wasn’t often that we got to watch research unfold so publicly, but Kirschenbaum’s style of transparent, internet-based process documentation is becoming more and more common, especially among practitioners of the digital humanities.

Over the years I’ve used WordStar, WordPerfect, Microsoft Word, and many other word processing programs. At the moment I’m moving to Scrivener for larger projects like my dissertation, and Apple Pages for everyday writing. (In 2025, this has changed quite a bit!)

WordStar running in DOS, ca. 1980s (via Wikipedia)

(Revised and republished April 3rd, 2025)

Paper strips shown at faa.gov (Wayback Machine link)

Malcolm Gladwell’s 2002 article on paperwork at The New Yorker.

“The Social Life of Paper” (Wayback Machine link)

Gladwell.com link: http://gladwell.com/the-social-life-of-paper/ (Wayback Machine link)

It is only if paper’s usefulness is in the information written directly on it that it must be stored. If its usefulness lies in the promotion of ongoing creative thinking, then, once that thinking is finished, the paper becomes superfluous. The solution to our paper problem, they write, is not to use less paper but to keep less paper. Why bother filing at all? Everything we know about the workplace suggests that few if any knowledge workers ever refer to documents again once they have filed them away, which should come as no surprise, since paper is a lousy way to archive information. It’s too hard to search and it takes up too much space. Besides, we all have the best filing system ever invented, right there on our desks — the personal computer. That is the irony of the P.C.: the workplace problem that it solves is the nineteenth-century anxiety.

(Revised and republished April 3rd, 2025)

It’s wonderful to see museums considering their digital presence as an extension of their purpose – online exhibitions and other digital projects greatly enhance the collections. This article at the New York Times describes the interconnectivity between museums and visitors that the digital provides, and also the possibility of connection between museums themselves:

Sooner or later, all museum websites will be interconnected, so that any museum might take advantage of scholarship produced by any other. There’s no reason, after all, that the Museum of Modern Art shouldn’t link its Jackson Pollock page to Pollock pages of museums throughout the world.

...Where is all this going? The British Museum has a succinct answer in the concluding sentence of its About Us page: “The website is not merely a source of information about the collection and the museum, but a natural extension of its core purpose to be a laboratory of comparative cultural investigation.”

I visited the “Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World” exhibition at LACMA a few years ago, and thanks to their digital archive of the exhibit I’m able to share videos like this with my students.

(Revised and republished April 19th, 2025)

Craig Robertson, by Christopher Klein at the Boston Globe, 2013.

The assumption behind the system set up after World War I was that you needed an identity document. Of course, this is a time when very few people had driver’s licenses, so the birth certificate was the key document. The US didn’t achieve universal birth registration until 1933, however, and in 1942 the Census Bureau estimated that 40 percent of Americans still lacked birth certificates. So the State Department required those without birth certificates to get sworn statements from one of three people who was deemed to have been able to witness the birth: the mother, a doctor, or a midwife. And if none of those three were available, a friend who was a US citizen had to vouch for your citizenship. So you were no longer seen as a reliable source of your own identity. You needed someone else to verify it.

United States Passport for American epidemiologist, Fred Soper, 1920. National Library of Medicine revised 2025 link, image doesn't seem to load. Wayback Machine link for image.

(Revised and republished April 3rd, 2025)

The Paper Trail Through History (NYTimes gift link), by Jennifer Schuessler, the New York Times, 2012:

Ms. Gitelman’s argument may seem like an odd lens on familiar history. But it’s representative of an emerging body of work that might be called “paperwork studies.” True, there are not yet any dedicated journals or conferences. But in history, anthropology, literature and media studies departments and beyond, a group of loosely connected scholars are taking a fresh look at office memos, government documents and corporate records, not just for what they say but also for how they circulate and the sometimes unpredictable things they do.

(Revised and republished April 3rd, 2025)

Last October I gave a “brown bag” talk (Wayback Machine link) over lunch in the History Department Library at the University of California, Riverside. I spoke for about 40 minutes and gave a wide overview of my project, using images and video clips to help illustrate my research. It was a great turnout of both professors and graduate students, and I received some terrific feedback that I was able to use for future talks.

At the top is the poster I created for the talk at UCR, and the images come from a variety of primary source materials. The inspiration for the color scheme comes the brochure cover just above, which is featured in the online exhibit, “Selling the Computer Revolution,” at the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley.

The brochure is for an IBM 705 EDPM (Electronic Data Processing Machine), a mainframe computer produced in the mid 1950s. Mainframes like the IBM 705 were powerful workhorses in the business world during the postwar era, handling payroll for thousands of employees. The brochure’s cover features a computer processing unit at the center, with punched cards and magnetic tape for data storage.

(Revised and republished April 6th, 2025)

This video, created by Jim Henson in 1967 for IBM, makes a great first post. So much anxiety, so little time, if only there was someone to help…like IBM!

Ben Kafka discusses this video in the Conclusion of his book, The Demon of Writing: Powers and Failures of Paperwork (2012), and also in this online West 86th article (Wayback Machine link):

The “paperwork explosion” expresses both a threat and a wish. The threat, of course, is that we are being overwhelmed by paperwork’s proliferation, its explosion — a threat that historian Ann Blair has recently traced through the early modern period. The wish is to convert all this cumbersome matter into liberating energy, which is exactly what explosions do. From Chaptal’s “electric fluid” to IBM’s “Machines Should Work, People Should Think” to USA.gov’s “Government Made Easy,” we remain attached to the idea that someday, somehow, we can liberate this energy, put it to other uses.

The “liberating energy” that Kafka speaks of also requires containment, it needs direction and control, services which IBM was ready to supply.

Two other aspects of paperwork which I’m researching are: (1) the degree to which IBM was instigating the “paperwork explosion” itself, where was it coming from, who else was worried about it, and (2) how the militaristic response to the demands of paperwork figure into the Cold War environment.

(Revised and republished April 6th, 2025)

A few months ago, I wrote about a Wikipedia Edit-a-thon workshop at the UCR Library on the CDH (Critical Digital Humanities) and HGSA (History Graduate Student Association) websites. From these posts I was approached by Amy Tyson of the National Council on Public History's History@Work blog (Wayback Machine link). Amy covers the "In the Academy" section and she asked if I'd write about my experience at the workshop, which I happily agreed to. As it turned out, I also attended a THATCamp with a Wikipedia component, and I included that in my article as well. My post, "Editing in public: Online identity and the Wikipedia Edit-a-thon," is now live on the Public History Commons website.

The Impact of Wikipedia - Adrianne Wadewitz, 2012:

(Revised and republished April 19th, 2025)