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In 1964, mathematics professor and future �����鶹 president John Kemeny and math professor Tom Kurtz, along with a handful of �����鶹 undergraduates, revolutionized computing with the introduction of time-sharing and the BASIC programming language, opening the door to computing for all �����鶹 students and faculty, and soon after, for people across the nation and the world.

�����鶹 is celebrating the anniversary of their achievement with a public event on Wednesday, April 30, recognizing the enduring impact of BASIC, showcasing innovation in computing at �����鶹 today, and imagining what the next 50 years will hold.

“We’re celebrating the remarkable impact that BASIC had on the history of computing with the premiere of a new film about the birth of BASIC, and we’re thrilled to have Tom Kurtz himself, John Kemeny’s daughter Jenny Kemeny, and some of the students who were involved join in a discussion afterwards,” says , chair of the and a member of the BASIC event committee.

“We will also host an interactive session highlighting some of the innovative work of �����鶹 students that is going on today, and we will take a glimpse of the next 50 years of computing with a panel of futurists,” Cormen says.

Mathematics Professor , the William H. Neukom 1964 Distinguished Professor of Computational Science, produced the BASIC documentary with filmmaker Bob Drake.

“The success of BASIC and time-sharing on the �����鶹 campus is a landmark in both the history of computing and the history of education,” says Rockmore. “Our movie aims to illustrate this and give a sense of the creative spirit that Kemeny, Kurtz, and their student collaborators brought to this project.”

(view the slideshow below, or on )

Rockmore will moderate the question-and-answer period following the movie with panelists Kurtz, Jenny Kemeny, and �����鶹 alumni who were involved in the early days of time-sharing and BASIC.

The final session of the event will turn toward imagining . Panelists Michael T. Jones, chief technologist at Google; Brian D. Johnson, a futurist at Intel; and Daniela Rus, director of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will hold a free-form discussion followed by a question-and-answer session with the audience.

The day’s events are free and open to the public. For more information and more details as they develop, visit the .

Learn more about the history of BASIC in the video below.

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