John Salzer

Biography

John M. Salzer arrived from Budapest, Hungry in the United States in 1940 and began a career as an upholsterer. He later took courses at Case Institute of Technology and learned about radar communications and pulse communications systems in the Army. The Army provided enough training and credits to allow Salzer to return to school and obtain his B.A., M.A., and ultimately his Ph.D. at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Salzer started his Ph.D. work in 1948 and held a research assistant position at the Digital Computer Lab under the direction of Gordon Brown, Jay Forrester, and Bob Everett. Salzer worked with the Whirlwind Project, specifically the block diagrams. From the Whirlwind Project came Salzer’s dissertation topic, control problems of digital computers. Because of this work, Salzer received a job offer in 1951 from Hughes. After leaving Hughes in 1954, Salzer joined the Magnovox Laboratory.