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We are saddened to report that Robert Spinrad, father of MAKE Projects Editor Paul Spinrad, has died. From John Markoff's NYTimes obit:
Robert J. Spinrad, a computer designer who carried out pioneering work in scientific automation at Brookhaven National Laboratory and who later was director of Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center while the personal computing technology invented there in the 1970s was commercialized, died on Wednesday in Palo Alto, Calif. He was 77.
Trained in electrical engineering before computer science was a widely taught discipline, Dr. Spinrad built his own computer from discarded telephone switching equipment while he was a student at Columbia.He said that while he was proud of his creation, at the time most people had no interest in the machines. "I may as well have been talking about the study of Kwakiutl Indians, for all my friends knew," he told a reporter for The New York Times in 1983.
[...]
At Brookhaven he would design a room-size, tube-based computer he named Merlin, as part of an early generation of computer systems used to automate scientific experimentation. He referred to the machine, which was built before transistors were widely used in computers, as "the last of the dinosaurs."
Our best and our condolences to Paul and his family.
Robert Spinrad, a Pioneer in Computing, Dies at 77 [annoying login required]
Thanks, Gareth and everyone! We all miss him so much!
Here are some fun things he did growing up, in the 1930s and 40s in the Washington Heights area of Manhattan:
Developed his own photographs in his room, using an enlarger made by opening his camera and strapping it under a hollowed gasoline can, with a light above.
Flew kites with his friends to string telegraph wires between buildings.
Used his bed springs to transmit a brief jolt of static to all the radios within a block or so.
Made gunpowder using ground match heads, charcoal, and potassium nitrate (from the druggist, sold as a laxative back then, I think). Used it in various incendiary devices, for example, pack some into a wide nut between two bolts, screw the bolts down, and throw! My dad and his pals would chain the bolts together so they didn't go too far, but one time a bolt ripped loose and shot between a pedestrian's legs. If it had hit her, who knows what would have happened to my dad, and I might not be here today. But I'm sure he would have been just as clever and resourceful in prison.
Paul
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