A
Hollywood biopic about the life of computer pioneer Grace Murray Hopper (1906-1992) would go something like this:
a young professor abandons the ivy-covered walls of academia to serve her country in the Navy after Pearl Harbor and finds
herself on the front lines of the computer revolution. She works hard to succeed in the all-male computer industry,
and is almost overcome by personal challenges but survives them, and ends her career as a celebrated elder stateswoman of
the information age, a heroine to thousands, hailed as the inventor of computer programming. In Grace Hopper
and the Invention of the Information Age, Dr. Kurt Beyer goes beyond the screenplay-ready story to reveal a
more authentic Hopper, a vibrant, complex, and intriguing woman whose career paralleled the meteoric trajectory of the postwar
computer industry.
Michael R. Williams, Professor Emeritus, Department of Computer Science, University of Calgary
"I saw Grace Hopper speak when I was a young software programmer at Bell Labs.
While she spoke of great technology and the power of computing, she also re-enforced the creative power of youthful thinking,
public speaking, and collaborative efforts. Grace Hopper and the Invention of the Information Age brings
all of those themes together in a compelling way, placing Grace Hopper where she belongs, as the creative genesis of the technology
upon which our world depends."
Review in New Scientist Magazine, 12 August by Liz Else
IT WAS a world where women had little future, very much like the
Madison Avenue evoked by the TV series Mad Men. This, however, was post-war computerland, where our heroine, Grace
Hopper, wrote the first specification for COBOL, one of the most successful programming languages.
Beyer has admirably cast Hopper as a serious player in a fledgling industry...
The Silicon Valley Computer History Museum hosted a lunchtime conversation between author Kurt Beyer
and Northern California Public Broadcasting’s Linda O’Bryon. The event was sponsored by SAP and was attended
by 400 attendees, many of whom worked in the computer industry.
Dr. Kurt Beyer Interview on NBCs Press Here
Click To See TV Show
Press: Here’ is a Sunday morning news roundtable discussion
show featuring the top names in Silicon Valley's technology industry and world class technology reporters from The New York
Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, Businessweek, Yahoo Finance, Forbes, NPR, the BBC and Fortune.
Dr. Kurt Beyer Keynote at USAA Speaker Series
USAA Nexus Speaker Series
Kurt Beyer discussed the contributions of Grace Hopper at USAA's Distinguished
Speaker Series in San Antonio. Click Here for a list of talks and lectures near you.
Grace Hopper book by Dr. Kurt Beyer Top 10
Booklist names Grace Hopper and the Invention
of the Information Age a Top Ten Science and Technology book for 2009.
"The obsessions of this stellar group of science writers—including polar
bears, a missing aviator, dawn, computer programming, dogs, and antimatter—inspired a year’s worth of significant
and intriguing books."Click Here
Smithsonian Keynote Dr. Kurt Beyer
Author Kurt Beyer Interviewed by Smithsonian
The Smithsonian's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation interviewed author Kurt Beyer about
the career of Grace Hopper, the history of the computer industry, the process of innovation, and the nature of invention.
