The Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer, or ENIAC, was created under the direction of John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert of Penn's Moore School of Electrical Engineering (now the School of Engineering and Applied Science).

Construction of the 27-ton, 680-square-foot computer began in July 1943 and was announced to the public on Feb. 14, 1946. It was built to calculate ballistic trajectories for the Army during World War II, a time- and labor-intensive process that had previously been performed by teams of mathematicians working with mechanical calculators.

ENIAC stored information in the form of electrons trapped in vacuum tubes, making it the first all-electronic, general-purpose digital computer. The long string of adjectives distinguishes it from earlier mechanical computers, which were essentially gear-driven abacuses that could aid in complex math but could only calculate a small subset of equations.

ENIAC Computer History, an educational film:  The First Large Scale, Programmable, General Purpose Electronic Digital Computer ~ ENIAC - original 1946 announcement film, restored & new narration.  ENIAC, "Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer", was designed by J. Presper Eckert and Dr. John Mauchly.  ENIAC used 18,000 vacuum tubes.  This rare film shows the ENIAC in operation in February 1946, when it was first announced to the  public.  Features the designers Dr. John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert,  and the U.S. Army liaison Herman Goldstine.   Film shows   many of the women in the ENIAC computing environment, as programmers, analysts and operators, configuring ENIAC for computational problem solving.  

Co-inventors and designers of ENIAC, J. P. Eckert and Dr. John Mauchly,  founded one of the FIRST companies founded expressly to build electronic business computers:  "Electronic Control Company", which was later incorporated as the Eckert-Mauchly Computer Corporation ("EMCC") in Philadelphia.   EMCC became part of Remington-Rand in 1950.

Eckert and Mauchly also designed and built the BINAC (1949) and the famous UNIVAC I (1951) computers.  Their pioneering work was instrumental in the rise of the early electronic digital computer industry.

In 1997, six of the women most involved in the programming and operating of the ENIAC were inducted into the "Women in Technology International Hall of Fame."   They were Kathleen McNulty Mauchly (Antonelli), Jean Jennings Bartik, Frances Synder Holber, Marlyn Wescoff Meltzer, Frances Bilas Spence and Ruth Lichterman Teitelbaum.

This 9 minute film gives you a unique view into some of the very earliest days of large scale electronic computing.  Modern narration has been added to the film, which was originally silent.   Restoration/editing-- Mark Greenia;  Modern Narration-- Patrick Phillips.  

Uploaded by Computer History Archives Project (CHAP).

* * You are warmly invited to view the video of the BINAC computer, a rare look at the
1949  "Binary Automatic Computer" -  
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udJUWenPK4w&t=262s

* * Also, visit the YouTube video series of interviews with Dr. John W. Mauchly as he recounts
personal memories of his early word in computer technologies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O27BmRe2R48&t=2908s

Visit our many other Computer History videos,
Presented for educational and historical content.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCOyJD0RHtF_77_oAf5tT1nQ/videos

{The Computer History Archives Project is an independent educational research project dedicated to the research and sharing of vintage computing technology.}