Eldon Hall was the leader of hardware design efforts for the

Apollo Guidance Computer The Apollo Guidance Computer (AGC) was a digital computer produced for the Apollo program that was installed on board each Apollo command module (CM) and Apollo Lunar Module (LM). The AGC provided computation and electronic interfaces for guidan ...

(AGC) at

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the mo ...

, and advocated the use of

integrated circuits An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit (also referred to as an IC, a chip, or a microchip) is a set of electronic circuits on one small flat piece (or "chip") of semiconductor material, usually silicon. Large numbers of tiny ...

for this task. He wrote extensively of the development of the AGC, culminating in his 1996 book, ''Journey to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Guidance Computer'' () He pursued his undergraduate education at the

Eastern Nazarene College The Eastern Nazarene College (ENC) is a private, Christian college in Quincy, Massachusetts. Established as a holiness college in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1900, the college moved to Rhode Island for several years. With its expansion to a four-y ...

Quincy, Massachusetts Quincy ( ) is a coastal U.S. city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the largest city in the county and a part of Greater Boston, Metropolitan Boston as one of Boston's immediate southern suburbs. Its population in 2020 was 1 ...

, his graduate education at

Boston University Boston University (BU) is a private research university in Boston, Massachusetts. The university is nonsectarian, but has a historical affiliation with the United Methodist Church. It was founded in 1839 by Methodists with its original campu ...

, and his doctoral degree at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

(though he did not complete the PhD).

Awards

*1997: Stibitz-Wilson Award from the

American Computer & Robotics Museum The American Computer & Robotics Museum (ACRM), formerly known as the American Computer Museum, is a museum of the history of computing, communications, artificial intelligence and robotics that is located in Bozeman, Montana, United States. The ...

Publications

*Eldon C. Hall (2000). ''From the Farm to Pioneering with Digital Computers: An Autobiography.'' *Eldon C. Hall (1996). ''Journey to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Guidance Computer''

References

1923 births 2022 deaths Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty American computer scientists American technology writers Eastern Nazarene College alumni Harvard University alumni Boston University alumni People from Payette, Idaho {{compu-bio-stub