Gordon Bell
Gordon Bell was born on August 19, 1934 at Kirksville, Missouri. He joined Digital Equipment Corporation in 1960 and spent 23 years (1960-1983) there as Vice President of Research and Development. When he started at DEC, he immediately began promoting the PDP-1 as an example of a 'VW Beetle' of computing -- a mass market, inexpensive, moderately-fast computer and then architected various mini- and time-sharing computers, including the PDP-6. In addition to his work at DEC, Bell’s accomplishments include the architecting of machines at Encore, Ardent and Stardent; teaching computer engineering at Carnegie Mellon University (1966-78); writing books on computer design and entrepreneurship; and founding the National Science Foundation’s computing directorate.
