OTA Dispatch Issue 3, 2021

20 Oregon Trucking Associations, Inc. Oregon Truck Dispatch TECHNOLOGY How’d We Get Here? By Christa Wendland, OTA Communication Consultant This means that everything from the wheel to the Wii can be considered technology. Although anyone under the age of 30 may believe otherwise, the computer was not created for email, social media, or entertainment. Practical applications previously drove innovation. Without the punch-card based computers that once took up entire rooms, the 1880 census would have taken seven years to tabulate. With a computer, it only took three years. Now, we carry more computing power in our pockets. Of course, some technological advances have been more impactful than others, but here are some of the historical highlights.* 1822 English mathematician Charles Babbage conceives of a steam-driven calculating machine that would be able to compute tables of numbers. The Analytical Engine project, funded by the English government, is a failure. 1890 Herman Hollerith designs a punch card system to calculate the 1880 census, accomplishing the task in just three years and saving the government $5 million. He establishes a company that would ultimately become IBM. 1801 In France, Joseph Marie Jacquard invents a loom that uses punched wooden cards to automatically weave fabric designs. Early computers would use similar punch cards. 1939 Hewlett-Packard is founded by David Packard and Bill Hewlett in a Palo Alto, California, garage. 1943–1946 Two University of Pennsylvania professors, John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, build the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator (ENIAC). Considered the grandfather of digital computers, it fills a 20-foot by 40-foot room and has 18,000 vacuum tubes. A few years later they receive funding from the Census Bureau to build the UNIVAC, the first commercial computer for business and government applications. 1953 Grace Hopper develops the first computer language, which eventually becomes known as COBOL. 1958 The first integrated circuit—the computer chip—is unveiled. 1936 Alan Turing presents the notion of a universal machine. The central concept of the modern computer was based on his ideas.