In 1965, engineers were building a computer to fly men to the moon. It had to survive a rocket launch and the vacuum of space. It could not be erased by a power failure, a hard landing, or anything short of physical destruction. They needed to make the code permanent. They needed to weave it.
In this episode
Episode Music
Additional Reading
CuriousMarc. (2019). Core memory explained and demonstrated [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/AwsInQLmjXc
Nakamura, L. (2014). Indigenous circuits. Computer History Museum. https://computerhistory.org/blog/indigenous-circuits/
Rankin, J. L. (2022, February 18). Core memory weavers and Navajo women made the Apollo missions possible. Science News. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/core-memory-weavers-navajo-apollo-raytheon-computer-nasa
Shirriff, K. (2019). Software woven into wire. Ken Shirriff's Blog. https://www.righto.com/2019/07/software-woven-into-wire-core-rope-and.html
Stark, L. (2018). Hilda wove all those wires [Zine]. https://www.liza-stark.com/projects/zines/hilda.html
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. (2017). "Hear my voice" artist profile: D.Y. Begay [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9wmz5rf1NU
Found in the Machine is a narrative technology podcast about the forgotten history of computing, software, and the internet. Hosted by Daina Bouquin, each episode uncovers the true story behind a piece of computer history. These are the forgotten people, decisions, and accidents that quietly shaped the digital world.
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