Question: What Texas-born computer engineer co-invented the magnetic disk hard drive system?
Answer: Louis Stevens. Born in Post in 1925, he attended Radar Technician School after joining the Marines during World War II and later studied at Texas Tech University and the University of California, Berkeley. He began working for IBM in 1949. A few years later, he was appointed manager of a team tasked with developing an improved method of storing and retrieving electronic information.
In 1956, the company launched the first computer with a random-access disk drive—the IBM 305 RAMAC—which featured an aluminum disk magnetized with iron oxide paint. The computer could retrieve information within seconds, whereas the previous method of shuffling through hole-punched cards took hours or even days. The development paved the way for the widespread use of computers in business and government.
