Bringing ENIAC to Life

This chapter explores the construction and initial use of ENIAC during 1944 and 1945. It highlights the challenges of procuring components in the wartime environment, from wire and steel to custom-built power supplies and high precision resistors. ENIAC was built by a forgotten, almost exclusively female, team of “wiremen.” The project was repeatedly delayed, requiring contract renegotiations.

The chapter then introduces machine’s initial cohort of six female operators, putting their work into the broader context of labor in applied mathematics. In concludes with a description of some of the challenges, including a flood, faced by the team as it worked to debug ENIAC as it struggled to run a calculation for Los Alamos intended to determine the viability of Edward Teller’s design for a “Super” fusion weapon.