Allen Kent (October 24, 1921 – May 1, 2014) was an information scientist.

Early life

He was born in New York City.
ASIS&T obituary, 2014 At

City College of New York The City College of the City University of New York (also known as the City College of New York, or simply City College or CCNY) is a public university within the City University of New York (CUNY) system in New York City. Founded in 1847, Cit ...

he earned a degree in chemistry.Obituary: Allen Kent / A pioneer in field of information sciences: Oct. 24, 1921 - May 1, 2014
By Molly Born

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette The ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'', also known simply as the PG, is the largest newspaper serving metropolitan Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Descended from the ''Pittsburgh Gazette'', established in 1786 as the first newspaper published west of the All ...

May 3, 2014 During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, he served in the

United States Army Air Forces The United States Army Air Forces (USAAF or AAF) was the major land-based aerial warfare service component of the United States Army and ''de facto'' aerial warfare service branch of the United States during and immediately after World War II ...

. After the war, he worked on a classified project at MIT in mechanized document encoding and search.

Career

In 1955, he helped found the Center for Documentation Communication Research at

Western Reserve University Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

. This was "the first academic program in the field of mechanized information retrieval, first using cards, then utilizing new

reel-to-reel Reel-to-reel audio tape recording, also called open-reel recording, is magnetic tape audio recording in which the recording tape is spooled between reels. To prepare for use, the ''supply reel'' (or ''feed reel'') containing the tape is plac ...

tape technology." In the same year he introduce the measures of precision and recall in . In 1959, he wrote an article for Harper's magazine entitled, "A Machine That Does Research" which provided one of the first insights in mainstream media about how Americans' lives can change due to electronic information technology. He joined the faculty of the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the universit ...

in 1963, where in 1970 he began the Department of Information Science. He retired from the university in 1992. At the time of his death, he was Distinguished Service Professor in the School of Information Sciences at the

Obituary: Allen Kent
The University Times,

, May 15, 2014. The school named a scholarship after him.

Selective bibliography

* *
A Machine That Does Research
" (April 1959), Harper's Magazine * Information Analysis and Retrieval, 1962 * The Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science * The Encyclopedia of Computer Science and Technology * The Encyclopedia of Microcomputers

Awards

* 1968 Eastman Kodak Award for significant contributions to the Science of Information Technology * 1977 Award of Merit from ASIS * 1980 Best Information Science Book from ASISASIS&T Best Information Science Book Award past winners
for ''The Structure and Governance of Library Networks'' by Allen Kent and Thomas Galvin

References

Archival Materials

* Archival materials 1952–1988 are held by the University of Pittsburgh pe
Worldcat holdings record: Allen Kent papers. 1952–1988
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kent, Allen 1921 births 2014 deaths Information scientists City College of New York alumni University of Pittsburgh faculty Case Western Reserve University faculty United States Army Air Forces personnel of World War II