JF Ptak Science Books: On the Early Development of ASCII

The History of ASCII. I just wanted to include this short bit on a small archive of material related to the development of ASCII from one of the team members who helped to create it. A more full description appears in the "continue reading" section, below. [Since writing this in 2012 the archive has been donated to special collections at North Carolina State University at Raleigh, where I assume it can be viewed and utilized.]

Manuscript notes (four pieces) and related support publications (fourteen pieces) on the development of ASCII (the backbone of electronic communications) from one of the 70 members of the main (designated "X3.2") development team. Ralph Mullendore¹, the former engineer at the U.S. Census Bureau responsible for (among many other things) the testing, performance, evaluation and installation of the UNIVAC I at the Bureau. It looks to me as though Mullendore was a team member in general (the sub-committee X3.2) and a member of the development task group of for punch card standards and ASCII ("X3.2.3"), for "representations of ASCII in punched form" as well as X3.2.1.

The archive includes

Manuscript items by Mullendore:

--Spiral bound notebook, with about 60 leaves of manuscript notes, making about 100 pages of entries, which I reckon to be about 30,000 words. The entries seem to range from January to February, 1964.

--The American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII)...6pp, manuscript in pencil, loose leaf sheets. Stapled. Ca. 1963/4.

--"Early in 1962 the Efforts of the ASA sub-committee X3.2 produced American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII)...2pp. Ca. 1964

--"The ADP Standardization Council ..." 5pp.

Supporting printed material from Mullendore and other team members:

--Mullendore, Ralph E. Draft Proposal (for X3.2.3 discussion), Representation in Punch Card FForm of Proposed American Standard Codes for Information Interchange (ASCII). 5 June, 1963. 9pp. Offset (?) printed. Stapled.

--______. Punch Card--Standards Work, Bureau of the U.S. Census, Data Processing Systems Division, 5 December 1963. (By Mullendore.) 3pp, offset printed (?)

-- (uncredited) DRAFT, Proposed Revised American Standard Code for Information Interchange. X3.2.4/64 20 October 1964. 48pp. [The "4" part of X3.2.4 is the Code Development Task Group

--Umstead, Henry C. Memorandum to Chairman and Members of X.3.2.3 Subject 6-9 BITREP and TASCII. Dated 10 June 1964, X.3.2.3 5pp, 4pp tables and diagrams.

--______. Memorandum to Militaryt COmmunications System Technical Standards COmmittee, SUbject: Punced Card Standarization Associated with ASCII. X.3.2.3 # August 1964. 7pp, 7pp of tables and diagrams.

--Plomondon, E.E. Recommendation for Punch Card Code for ASCII. 1 November 1963. Includes distribution list of 23 names, including Mullendore. 12+3pp. Stapled. (Decimal ASCII.)

--6 and 7 Bit Coded Character Sets for Information Processing Interchange. International Organization for Standardization, July 1964. 21pp. WIth cover letter for the members of the X3.2 and Task Groups from Eric Clamons.

--Memorandum X3.2.1. Cyclic Redundancy Checking. IBM Corporation Advanced Systems, Poughkeepsie,m New York. 20 November 1964. 8pp.

--Introduction. Tape Labeling Information... X3.2.5/4 21 September 1964. 10pp.

--Auwaerter, John F. "This is a Draft Report on the CCITT Meeting in Geneva...and the X3 Meeting in Los Angeles..." (Numerical code and perforated tape code revisions.)

--______. Report on Meeting of CCITT, Working Group on Alphabets, 2 November 1964. 8pp+9pp, stapled.

--Griffin, L.L. Data Transmission in Integrated Information PRocessing Systems Based on the American Standard Code, (X3.4-1963). 5pp

Notes:

1.From the Miami Herald-Mail, 16 February 1999. Ralph E. Mullendore, 88, of Silver Spring, died Thursday, Feb. 11, 1999. Born Sept. 2, 1910, near Hagerstown, he was the son of the late Harry and Atha Mullendore. He graduated in 1933 from the University of Maryland at College Park with a degree in chemical engineering. He was a charter member of the Maryland Alpha Chapter of Phi Delta Theta fraternity. He worked for the Census Bureau in Suitland, Md., where he was a member of the team working on the nation's first computer, UNIVAC I. He worked for the bureau as a computer diagnostician and troubleshooter, retiring in 1984 after 33 years. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps and then as a Navy officer, attaining the rank of commander. During World War II, he developed and patented an azimuth finder, a navigational aid used aboard Navy vessels.