60th Celebrations For First Digital Computer

Jun 21 is the 60th anniversary of the birth of the world's initial modern digital computer is being celebrated. It was built at the University of Manchester by the late Tom Kilburn and the late Freddie Williams, it was jokingly dubbed "The Baby" weighing in at one ton and filling an entire lab at the institute. But that Baby changed the world and was the predecessor of modern computers, iPods, mobile phones, the internet, and all the other gadgets we take for settled today. The Small Scale Experimental Machine (SSEM), its proper title, in reality executed its first program at 11am on June 21 1948 - 60 years to the day on Saturday, but Digital 60 Day is being celebrated at Manchester University on Friday.

At that moment number of special events is taking place, including a video link with the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) in Manchester complete with live expression of the Baby replica housed there, plus a Computer Science magic show. And hundreds of school pupils from across the UK will arrive on campus to see the winners of the UK Schools Computer Animation Competition announced. The winning animations will be shown at a special festival at the University. An awards ceremony and drinks reception later will see the surviving pioneers from the Baby design and development team each awarded The University of Manchester's Medal of Honour. The ceremony will be followed by the inaugural Kilburn Lecture, delivered by Professor Steve Furber CBE from The School of Computer Science on the topic of The Relentless March of the Microchip.