Excerpt

Apart from the lack of available sources, one of the difficulties in describing the events that led to the creation of The Sumerian Game is the inability to pinpoint a precise date of its completion. In the absence of a commercial release date and due to conflicting dates in surviving documents regarding different versions of the game, it is currently impossible to definitively state when the developers considered it complete or in a satisfactory state. Contrary to popular belief, the development of The Sumerian Game continued for at least five years beyond the significant date of 1967, often regarded as the final year.

It is easier, however, to give an approximate start date for the project, often cited as the summer of 1962. During this time, representatives from the Westchester County school district, IBM delegates, and researchers from the Boards of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) of New York met for a workshop with the intent of exploring the use of computers to teach young students in the area. However, even in this case, the chain of events that led to the creation of The Sumerian Game had already been set in motion at least two years earlier, by two men who, since 1960, had been contemplating, with high expectations, the possibility of introducing computers into schools to teach in a more effective and personalized way.

These two individuals were Bruce Moncreiff and Noble Gividen.

Born in Nashville, Tennessee, on May 26, 1919, Moncreiff was the son of William Franklin Moncreiff and Edna Lovina Bruse, both teachers. This is a curious detail given the interest their descendant would later show in education and the role he would play in the story of The Sumerian Game.

Moncreiff: "Both parents were teachers and school administrators. My father was a University of Chicago trained mathematician and one time head of the Mathematics Department of the Nashville Public schools. My mother, thirty years his junior, was trained at the Dekalb Normal School. They were separated soon after I was born; mother returning to her parents home, where I was raised. She taught the rest of her life, serving as principal of a large elementary school in Melrose Park, Illinois in the 20s and 30s. Teachers sample textbooks and the N.E.A. Journal were all commonplace in our home. My grandfather, a surrogate father, was a church leader, a unionist and a political liberal."

The absence of his father and undiagnosed vision problems until the age of 11 marked Moncreiff's childhood, hindering his performance in primary school and leading teachers to label him as unruly and problematic. His mother resolved the situation by transferring him to the school under her supervision, citing his high IQ and her teaching skills as justification. In this new environment, despite attending advanced courses, Moncreiff excelled. He later attended Proviso Township High School in Maywood (1931-1936), where he pursued a college preparatory course. However, as he later wrote in his autobiography, Moncreiff "'took' a college preparatory course, but really majored in 'Band' and 'Orchestra,' playing the French Horn."

Picture 1: The Proviso Township High School band, as pictured in the 1936 yearbook. Bruce Moncreiff is standing, second from the right.

Too young to enroll directly in university, he attended Oak Park Jr. College for a year, benefiting from small classes and inspiring teachers, a rarity in his previous experience. After this brief period, in September 1937, Moncreiff entered the University of Illinois, majoring in philosophy. It was at this institution that he made a significant and formative discovery that would lead his life in an unpredictable direction.

Moncreiff: "My Three years at Illinois were distinguished only by discovery of formal philosophy, to which I immediately became addicted."

After earning a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1940, Moncreiff, encouraged by his tutors at the University of Illinois, accepted an offer from the University of Chicago, where he transferred to complete his studies with a scholarship. Unfortunately, his mother Edna became seriously ill and died six months later, on January 16, 1942, at only 51 years old. Moncreiff had no choice but to return to the University of Illinois to continue his studies part-time, finding employment at General Electric in Fort Wayne. There, in addition to learning the basics of industrial engineering, he had the fortune of meeting his future first wife, Virginia Elizabeth Sanders. In 1943, he was enlisted in the US Navy and assigned to the Inductee Special Assignment; he remained in the service until 1946, when he was discharged with the final rank of Pharmacy Mate, 2nd Class, and returned to his studies, completing them at Harvard.

Picture 2: Profile of Brise Moncreiff, from the yearbook of Proviso Township High School, year 1936.

Moncreiff noted in his autobiography: "After the Second World War, he pursued a graduate program in Philosophy and the History of Science at Harvard University, where he was discovered by Edmund Berkeley who recruited him for the Prudential Insurance Company."

Berkeley had also graduated in mathematics and logic from Harvard, after which he began working for an insurance company, Prudential Insurance, eventually becoming head of research. He also served in the US Navy during the war years, working in research laboratories on the development of the Harvard Mark II, a large computer that used relay technology to help the Navy perform complex ballistic calculations.

After the war, Berkeley returned to Prudential but stayed only long enough to recruit Moncreiff into a management training program. Upon completing the one-year course, Berkeley had already left Prudential due to serious disagreements with the company's management, who were reluctant to support the researcher's interests, particularly his strong advocacy of the nuclear threat. Nevertheless, Moncreiff decided to follow in the footsteps of his mentor.

Moncreiff: "My request for assignment to the Methods Department was approved, where I worked on a variety of preparatory planning for the advent of large scale computers, in particular the Univac. I did systems planning, functional specifications, and programming designed to test machine codes. In the six years at the Prudential I was promoted several times, ultimately to Senior Methods Analyst in charge of a department of approximately 65 people engaged in systems research and development."

Despite the brief stint at GE in the early 1950s, Moncreiff began to desire a return to research and considered seeking employment at IBM. The opportunity didn't arise immediately. First, Moncreiff decided to leave Prudential to spend a year at the Battelle Memorial Institute, where he worked on a logistics research project for the Air Force. The project moved to the RAND Corporation in 1953, prompting Moncreiff to relocate to Santa Monica.

Moncreiff: "Two months after moving to Santa Monica, I contracted polio; returning to work part time after six months. RAND was kind through all these troubles, but it was my feeling that they would be slow to give me any managerial responsibility. So, after almost two years, I accepted a position as Data Processing Manager with AiResearch Manufacturing Company in Los Angeles. The project was to help them get a computer system installed to do manufacturing control."

Though unfortunate, his time at RAND gave Moncreiff valuable opportunities to gain experience and grow professionally. RAND Corporation did not have the machines familiar to Moncreiff, like the UNIVAC, but instead had a new mainframe from a competitor: the IBM 702. The project, which began at Battelle Memorial Institute and concluded at RAND Corporation, was particularly fruitful for Moncreiff because it allowed him to familiarize himself with IBM's new computer—something that would later help him realize his desire to work for the Armonk-based company. On the other hand, working with the IBM 702 led him to certain realizations that would unexpectedly shape his future.

While technologically advanced, the IBM computer was still quite rudimentary. Due to its high cost, it was essential to keep the machine running continuously. Yet, to operate nonstop, it required constant monitoring and intervention by highly specialized technicians, who had to swap magnetic tapes, oversee task execution, and ensure the computer's functionality. This was a complex task, now automated by operating systems in modern computers. Back then, it was often repetitive, with long periods of downtime followed by bursts of frantic activity, creating an environment prone to human error. Moncreiff noticed this and began contemplating the possibility of automating these operations, allowing the machine to manage itself. He called it "automatic supervisor" and presented the concept in a paper at the Western Joint Computer Conference from February 7 to 9, 1956.

Moncreiff: "Very little experience has been accumulated in the operation of a large commercial data-processing center. However, reflection on the subject has led to the conclusion that, in the large-scale operation of such a system, there will be a different emphasis from the one usually present in the operation of a large-scale computing installation. The general administrative problem in both cases is, of course, to keep both staff and equipment operating efficiently. In the latter case, however, the emphasis is on new problem preparation, while in the case of the business application the emphasis must be on the efficient day-after-day operation of the same routines. The automatic supervisory routine described here is an attempt to solve those operating and programming problems peculiar to this routine-dominated situation. The excuse for solving these problems with a machine program, rather than by instructions to the operator, is two fold: 1. The human operator cannot compete in speed with the machine in making routine decisions and in controlling the processing operations. 2. The human operator is more likely to make mistakes in carrying out routine instructions. The purpose of a supervisory routine is, therefore, to keep the machine running efficiently in spite of the slowness and fallibility of the human operator. The various aspects of the proposed supervisory routine will be approached by looking at these problems of both operator and programmer which the routine helps solve. A summary description of the way the routine works will follow."

His theories proved useful when he led a team of programmers to develop an automatic production control system for jet engines at AiResearch Manufacturing Company, a division of Garrett Corporation. After completing this task, in the fall of 1957, he joined IBM, working on the IBM 7030, known as Stretch. This was IBM's first attempt at building a fully transistorized machine, more compact, lightweight, cost-effective, and powerful than bulky vacuum-tube mainframes. However, the project faltered to the point that IBM's management decided to cancel it, delivering only the pre-ordered machines and scrapping the commercial launch.

With the closure of the Stretch project, Moncreiff was transferred to the Advanced Systems Development Division (ASDD) and assigned to work on "a new integrated programming language and operating system," which later became known as PL/I. Shortly thereafter, at his specific request, he was moved to research in the field of educational technology. In this role, whenever a school or research institute expressed interest in exploring, alongside IBM, the possibility of using computers for education, Moncreiff became the point of reference for various projects. In the following years, until his early retirement from IBM—due to dissatisfaction over the lack of recognition for his contributions and philosophical differences regarding the goals of ASDD research—Moncreiff was extremely prolific in initiating research projects across the United States.

Picture 3: Bruce Moncreiff, as portrayed in the biweekly magazine The Reporter of New York. IBM purchased a two-page spread in the December 14, 1967 edition to showcase the company's dedication to student education, selecting Moncreiff as the public face of the initiative. The headline read: "This philosopher wants tomorrow's students to get the best teaching possible—with or without computers. What's he doing at IBM?"

In California, at UCLA, he collaborated with music professor Wolfgang Kuhn and IBM colleague Jerome D. Harr to create an interface for the IBM 1620, installed at the Advanced Systems Development Division in Los Gatos, to recognize students' solfeggio, indicate their voice type ("low" or "high" for male or female), and calculate the deviation from the perfect note with a margin of error between 1% and 4%. The system functioned by playing a taped recording, instructing the student to sing the notes into a computer-connected microphone. The program analyzed the students' singing, asking them to repeat the exercise if necessary or moving on to the next task, eventually providing a detailed report on the results of the entire exercise. According to Professor Kuhn, the system worked reliably, producing only one erroneous output out of 10,000 tests.

Kuhn was an advocate of the Suzuki method of music teaching, based on listening, imitation, and repetition. In the final report, it was noted that "Professor Kuhn, who used a small Music Department allocation for his study, foresees the day when a complete curriculum in melodic, rhythmic, and harmonic sight-singing and dictation could be computerized and adapted for any level of musical development. He also envisions instructional systems for learning to play instruments."

And so it was, a few years later, when the system developed by Kuhn, Moncreiff, and Harr, completed by 1967 and quickly dubbed by the press as the "singing computer," became the foundation for MusicMaster, a software for the Apple II. Thanks to an accessory card produced by Mountain Computer, MusicMaster could interface with an alphaSyntauri keyboard to teach music to users.

In Texas, Moncreiff spearheaded the development of software designed to simulate a chemistry lab, described as follows: "The University of Texas has done some very interesting work in CAI in various areas. They have a simulated chemistry laboratory for freshman students in which a CAI terminal is used in place of laboratory experience. The student goes to the terminal just as he would go to the laboratory. He may be shown a slide or told by the typewriter that he has a test tube of colorless liquid. The computer simulates the laboratory experiment. In another program, Math preskill CAI courses are made available to students to teach the mathematical skills necessary to pass freshman chemistry."