WHAT:
Electronic Digital Computers, Colossus
WHERE:
Block H, Bletchley Park, UK
LOCATION:
WHEN:
First ran on 1 June 1944
WHO:
Tommy Flowers
DETAILS:
Colossus was a set of computers developed by British codebreakers from 1944 to help in the cryptanalysis of the Lorenz cipher. Colossus used thermionic valves (vacuum tubes) to perform Boolean and counting operations. Colossus is thus regarded as the world’s first programmable, electronic, digital computer, although it was programmed by switches and plugs and not by a stored program.
Colossus was designed by General Post Office research telephone engineer Tommy Flowers based on plans developed by mathematician Max Newman at the Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park.
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