History of Computers: Atanasoff was an early pioneer of automatic computing, he formulated the idea of using the binary number system to simplify the construction of an electronic calculator.

In 1939, when Iowa State physics professor John Vincent Atanasoff was looking for someone to help him design and build a computing machine, a colleague recommended a graduating electrical engineering student, Clifford Berry.

"Berry is a brilliant student, has a tremendous grasp of mechanical construction, and is well-grounded in electronics," the electrical engineering professor said of the young man who planned to begin graduate school that fall. After a few meetings with the new graduate student, Atanasoff concluded "he had vision and inventive skills as well."

In the fall of 1939 Atanasoff and Berry began building the prototype of the first computing machine to use electricity and vacuum tubes, binary numbers, capacitors in a rotating drum for memory elements, and logic systems for computing. A working model by the end of the year demonstrated the validity of their concepts and won them a grant of $850 to build a full-scale computer.

Berry and Atanasoff worked together in their basement laboratory over the next two years, with both professor and student suggesting improvements and innovations. The result was the Atanasoff Berry Computer, the world's first electronic digital computer