Name: Herman Hollerith

Occupation/Title:
Birth: February 29, 1860
Death: November 17, 1929 Statistician, Inventor, Businessman, Father of the Modern Automatic Computer

Education/Training:
Herman entered the City College of New York in 1875 and graduated from the Columbia School of Mines with an "Engineer of Mines" degree in 1879. In 1880, he listed himself as a mining engineer while living in Manhattan, and he completed his Ph.D. in 1890 at Columbia University.

Major Invention:
After graduating, Herman went to work for the United States Census Bureau. This appointment was very significant because during this time the bureau was having problems analyzing the large amounts of data generated by the 1880 census, a process that took a total of 7 years. Obviously there was a problem counting so many ballots manually. Working with colleagues and looking at existing methods, (particularly ticket masters punching train tickets), Herman developed a way to use the punch cards combined with mercury, which resulted in an electric current when it made contact with pins going through the holes, to store information, which could then be read with a mechanical counter. His machine was initially one among many counting machines, but in 1890 a competition was held to see whose could count the 1890 US census most quickly. Herman’s won, and the 1890 census was counted within 6 weeks, opposed to the census from 1880, which took seven years. He went on to develop his product more, and a control panel in his 1906 Type I Tabulator allowed it to do different jobs without having to be rebuilt. (The first steps towards programming)

Impact on Gaming:
Herman Hollerith’s inventions are the foundation of the modern information processing industry, including computers, computer programs, video game consoles, and the games themselves. His company, Tabulating Machine Company, was also a large portion of the merger that formed IBM

Quotes: “Herman is said to have been a bright and able child at school, but had an inability to learn spelling easily. His determined teacher made his life miserable to the extent that he used to avoid school whenever possible and run away when his teacher showed renewed effort to improve his spelling.” - F Gareth Ashurst?

References:
http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Hollerith.html
www.columbia.edu/acis/history/hollerith.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Hollerith
http://www-03.ibm.com/press/pressrelease/26734.wss