PCWorld.com - Meet the Movers Behind the First PC

PCWorld.com - Meet the Movers Behind the First PC "Although few outside of the world of computer research might know who they are, Bob Taylor, Alan Kay, Charles "Chuck" Thacker, and Butler Lampson probably should be household names. These four are this year's winners of the prestigious Draper Prize, which recognizes contributions in engineering. As part of the first "class" of researchers at Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center in California in the 1970s, these technologists were key to the invention of the PC.
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Perhaps ironically, Lampson and Thacker both now work at Microsoft, as does laser printer inventor Starkweather. Simonyi, who crafted the Bravo graphical word processor at PARC, created Word after moving to Microsoft in 1981; he retired two years ago."

Must-read history in this context: Dealers of Lightning