Frederick P. Brooks, Jr.

About

Frederick P. Brooks Jr. was born in 1931 of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, parents. He received the A.B in Physics from Duke University in 1953, and the Ph.D. in Computer Science from Harvard University in 1956, under Howard Aiken. Dr. Brooks joined IBM Corporation, working in Poughkeepsie and Yorktown, New York, from 1956 to 1965. He was an architect of the Stretch and Harvest computers and then was Project Manager for the development of IBM’s System/360 family of computers and OS/360 software. For this work, he received a National Medal of Technology. In 1957, Dr. Brooks and Dura Sweeney invented a Stretch interrupt system that introduced most features of today’s interrupt systems. Dr. Brooks coined the term computer architecture. His system/360 team first achieved strict compatibility, up