Mort Rahimi, Director, 1982 to early 1990s

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) Office of Computing Services and later Information Technology Services

    James Moss, 1973-1984 (added by Garance)
    Bob Gallagher, 1984-1995 (start date added by Garance)
    John Kolb, 1995-present (added by Garance)

Simon Frasier University (SFU)

    SFU Computing Centre, later Computing Services, later still IT Services
    Ross Jewell, ?-1976
    Will Jones, 1976-?
    [?]

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Biographical information 

Robert C. F. Bartels, see the November 1977 Ann Arbor News article about Bob Bartels' retirement in the Documents and files section, a video, photos, and a memory book from the September 2004 reception honoring Bob, and Dr. Bartels' obituary in the November 2006 University Record.

Memoir: Regents' Proceedings, July 1, 1978

Memorial: LSA Minutes

Aaron Finerman (1925-1994) In 1994 Aaron Finerman was made an ACM Fellow "In recognition of his extensive and productive participation in the management of professional society policies and operations. Dr. Finerman has been actively involved in the Space Program and other technical activities worldwide in addition to his years of service to such organizations such as SHARE, AFIPS, and ACM."

In 1981 Aaron Finerman received the ACM Distinguished Servide Award for "his extensive and productive participation in the management of professional society policies and operations. Dr. Finerman has been actively involved in the Space Program and other technical activities worldwide in addition to his years of service to such organizations as SHARE, AFIPS, and ACM."
Aaron Finerrnan, a man of enormous interests and contributions to the computing field, was born April 1, 1925, and died April 6, 1994. Although he suffered some severe personal tragedies in his family, he did not let that deter him from participating in a large range of activities -- both professional and personal. His major professional areas of interest and expertise were in computing center management, professional society publications, education, and professional societies in general. [From http://ip.com/IPCOM/000129835]

Memoir from UM Regents’ Proceedings, March 1990, Page 187.

From http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/f/findaid/findaid-idx?c=bhlead;idno=umich-bhl-9914;view=reslist;didno=umich-bhl-9914;subview=standard;focusrgn=bioghist;cc=bhlead;byte=39352330:

Born on April 1, 1925 in New York City, Aaron Finerman graduated from Townsend Harris High School in New York City in 1948. He received a Bachelor of Civil Engineering degree from the City College of New York. He continued his education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), receiving the S.M. degree in 1951 and the Sc.D. degree in 1956. While at MIT, he used the Whirlwind computer for his research, his first exposure to the emerging computer field. Finerman joined Republic Aviation Corporation in 1956 and headed up the computing and data processing division. Finerman joined the State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook in 1961 as professor of engineering and director of a newly created Computing Center. Finerman also initiated the academic program in computing at SUNY, resulting in the creation of the Department of Computer Science in 1970.

In 1971 Finerman took a two-year leave of absence from Stony Brook and went to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California as manager of the Office of Computing and Information Systems. Finerman returned to Stony Brook in 1973 and stayed until 1978, when he joined the University of Michigan as director of the Computing Center and professor of computer and communication sciences. Finerman was director of the Computing Center until 1986. He retired from Michigan in January 1990, after a one-year sabbatical at Florida Atlantic University. Beginning in August 1990 Finerman was reappointed to active status as professor emeritus of electrical engineering and computer science and director emeritus of the Computing Center for several one-year terms.

Finerman was active professionally throughout his life. He received the 1981 Distinguished Service Award from the Association for Computing Machinery and was the ACM representative to the American Federation of Information Processing Societies in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Finerman was also involved in organizing the Jerusalem Conference on Information Technology, a conference held in Israel beginning in 1971. Sponsored by the Israel Information Processing Association, the conference was devoted to computer technology and developing countries; one of its goals was to help establish Israel as a leader in information technology in the Middle East. Finerman was a member of the program committee for the first conference, chairman of the program committee for the third conference, held in 1978, and U.S. chairman for the fourth conference, held in 1984.

Finerman and his first wife, Gloria Blum, were married December 24, 1949. They had two children, Jay and Ann. Gloria died in 1966 and Finerman was remarried to Carol in 1968. She had two children from an earlier marriage. Finerman's son Jay died in 1979 and his daughter in 1980. Finerman died in 1994.

Elizabeth Barraclough, see the articles in the Documents and files section upon the occasion of Elizabeth becoming an Honorary Fellow of the University of Newcastle in October 2006.

James Macoun Kennedy (1928-2004)

Dr. James M. Kennedy served on the University of British Columbia Senate from 1969 to 1975 as a Representative of Joint Faculties.

After more than a decade working with Atomic Energy of Canada, Dr. Kennedy joined UBC in January 1966 as the Director of the Computing Centre, a position he held until June 1980. In addition, he became a professor in the Department of Computer Science in 1968. From 1980 to 1984, Dr. Kennedy served in the President's Office as Vice-President of University Services. As well as a valuable member of the UBC community, Dr. Kennedy was a founding member of the Canadian Information Processing Society, He served as an officer of the Canadian Mathematical Association, the Canadian Association of Physicists and the Canadian Applied Mathematics Association; and as a board member of Vancouver Community College and the Management Advisory Council of BC Colleges and Provincial Institutes.

Alvin G. Fowler (1935-1999)

Al Fowler, a long standing member of the UILO, passed away February 1999 after a brief battle with cancer. A popular and innovative administrator, Al served as UBC’s Director of Computing Centre from 1981. Under his practical direction the Computing Center rapidly expanded. In 1985 he was seconded from the Computing Centre to successfully organize and implement a new telecommunications system for UBC. In 1986 he joined the Industry Liaison Office as Manager of Intellectual Properties, where his dynamic vision, practical knowledge, and broad interpersonal skills helped make the UILO one of the best in Canada. Al served as a member of the Canadian Information Processing Society from 1965 and was National President in 1981/82. He was a member of the Association of Professional Engineers of BC, a founding member of the Vancouver Enterprise Forum, and UBC Research Enterprises Inc.’s first President. Al also helped to establish many new UBC spin-off companies in the Lower Mainland and on Vancouver Island, and served on the board of directors in several of these companies. Al was a generous colleague and friend whose life contributed to the moral and social life of the University as well as its intellectual community.

Ewan Page

From The Computer Journal, Volume 21, Number 2 (1978), page 104:

First Vice-Chancellor for computer profession

Ewan Page was a research student in the Statistics Laboratory at Cambridge from 1951-54. This was the period when the EDS AC came into service and Page was so much taken by it that he was seen as much in the Mathematics Laboratory as in the Statistics Laboratory. He had a foretaste of later prosperity when he won a prize of £5000 in a football pool, having filled in the coupon, so it was rumoured, with the aid of Tippet's random sampling numbers. Perhaps he felt that this was unprofessional behaviour for a statistician for he decided to make computing rather than statistics his life's work.

He built up the Computing Laboratory at Newcastle and it was
here that he acquired a taste for university administration. He
sharpened his teeth on the Computer Board and in doing so demonstrated his prowess to such an extent that the University made him a pro-Vice Chancellor. When Dr Henry Miller died suddenly in the summer of 1976 Ewan Page stepped into the breach and served with distinction as acting Vice Chancellor.

He now becomes a Vice Chancellor in his own right, at Reading University, and will be the first Fellow of the British Computer Society to do so. All readers of The Computer Journal will give him their best wishes.

   --Maurice Wilkes

Franklin Herbert Westervelt

From http://www.eng.wayne.edu/user_files/180/file/Franklin%20Herbert%20Westervelt.doc:

Frank Westervelt served Wayne state university from 1971-2000 in different capacities. From 1971-1982 he was the Director of Computing Service Center. From 1982-2000 he served as professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He was an Associate Chair and Undergraduate Officer from 1990-1994 and was the Chair of ECE department from 1995-2000. During his tenure at Wayne State University he provided a strong leadership in university’ computing center and in ECE Department as well.  He brought ECE Department on international map by starting interactive distance learning. He organized, designed, and developed Electronics Classroom in Rooms 1500 and 2409 Engineering Building. He wrote special software to ease development of electronic presentations and obtained contract to develop and deliver first ECE Course (ECE 562) to ECCE Master’s Program student at Ford Motor Company by Distance Learning methods.

In honor of his services Ford Motor Company presented him with the 1993 Customer driven Quality Award as Member of Ford/Wayne State University Interactive Distance Education Program Team. (This was the only award given to any University person by Ford in 1993. This team was one of 75 teams, mostly internal to Ford, recognized by NAAO Car Products Development and Truck Operations).

During his tenure at Wayne State he advised a number of Ph.D. and Master’s students, published a number of research papers, developed curriculum for a number of courses, served in a large number of Ph.D. committees, taught a large number of courses, developed teaching laboratories, contributed immensely in ABET process, and participated in several departmental and college committees including Provost’s Task force for Establishment of the Center for Teaching and Learning, University Intelligent Classroom Task Force. He was also a member of Michigan Society of Professional Engineers and Association for Computing Machinery.

In addition, Frank Westervelt has made contributions to the creation of the MERIT network. In the early 1966, Michigan’s three largest schools, the University of Michigan, Wayne State University, and Michigan State University formed the Michigan Inter-university Committee on Information Systems (MICIS) whose overall purpose was to engage the universities in the "broad area of information processing and exchange by computer and other electronic media." Frank Westervelt, then at University of Michigan served as a representative of MICIS which ultimately led to MERIT network. (http://www.merit.edu/about/history/article.php)

And in https://www.eecs.umich.edu/eecs/alumni/Stories/Gibbons.html:

He [Fred Gibbons] credits the [UM] College [of Engineering] for giving a passionate direction to his drive, exposing him to computers in 1967, when they were unknown or a novelty in most classrooms. Fascinated that he could create mechanical drawings on a Calcomp plotter, Gibbons remains grateful that the College allowed him to create both bachelor’s and master’s degrees around computer science, when it didn’t even offer a formal computer major.

“The school was at the forefront of technology that turned out to be very important to me personally, and I got early exposure to it from a couple of great guys–professors Frank Westervelt and Bernard Galler,” he said.

And from Planning the ARPANET: 1967-1968:

To explore the questions of packet size and contents, [Larry] Roberts requested Frank Westervelt of the University of Michigan write a position paper on the intercomputer communication protocol including  “conventions for character and block transmission, error checking and re transmission, and computer and user identification."

Publications

Dale Bent

From www.viu.ca/ccs/images/EC_ENews_1010.pdf:

October 2010, Chair of The Elder College Board of Management. Dale is a semi-retired Professor of Business, currently teaching online for Athabasca University. Prior to retiring, he was with the University of Alberta, University of Western Ontario, and Victoria University of Wellington. His personal interests include environmental affairs, sailing, and music. He lives in Departure Bay with his wife Penny, a retired lawyer. Dale is co-chair of the Program Committee.

From http://www.ask.com/wiki/Norman_Nie:

Together with two young computer scientists, C. Hadlai (“Tex”) Hull and Dale Bent, [Norman H.] Nie invented a computer software package called the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS)^[1].

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