mauchly: the computer and the skateboard

A video biography on John Mauchly, inventor of the computer and the skateboard.

John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert were the inventors of ENIAC, widely considered the first electronic computer. With its grand unveiling in l946, that large, blinking contraption set the public’s imagination reeling like never before —would this machine really be able to take over human tasks? Would there actually be use for such a thing?

Mauchly: The Computer and the Skateboard tells the story of what happens to the inventor as the huge potential of his invention begins to dawn on those around him: from the triumphant unveiling and first successful operations to the crushing blow of being stripped of the patent. co-directors Jim Reed, who is Mauchly’s grandson, and Paul David weave archival footage together with interviews of Mauchly’s colleagues and friends to create an eclectic homage to mauchly and a new perspective on the history of computation.

The backbone of the film is commentary by Mauchly’s widow Kay, who was hired as a young mathematician to do calculations on the brand new eniac and fell in love with its inventor. One of the original “Women of the ENIAC” —the world’s first computer programmers —she shares her lucid understanding of computer history along with intimate biographical anecdotes to provide an insider’s picture of the project’s genesis and progression.

The film’s cast of characters also includes former colleagues and students from the University of Pennsylvania, Ursinus, the Smithsonian Institution, the Eckert-Mauchly company, Sperry Rand, and Iowa State University. The title comes from recollections by Mauchly’s former Ursinus students of a professor who zipped around the classroom on a homemade, jet-propelled skateboard in order to demonstrate Newton’s laws of motion.

Mauchly: The Computer and the Skateboard documents an early chapter of a story which continues into the present: the excitement of creating new technology as well as the inevitable sharks swimming in its wake. Through the reminiscences of those who knew him, Mauchly emerges as a brilliant, driven, sometimes exasperating man who endured a series of personal and professional tragedies with remarkable grace and humor. The kid who stayed up reading into the wee hours with his homemade device warning of his parents’ approach ushered in a whole new era.

Mauchly: The Computer and the Skateboard is a tribute to a man who is certainly one of the undersung heroes of the twentieth century.