Summer Time Reading

[Gerry Mckiernan]

     I would like to nominate _Dealers of Lightening: Xerox Parc and the Dawn of the Computer Age_
by Michael Hiltzik as a Top Ten choice for Summer Time reading. It's a most engaging and intriguing story
of the men _and_ women who invented or refined our current computer and communications Present and Future. For anyone interested in the people, personalities and politics of innovation, this is a 'Must Read'.

    I'd appreciate learning of other favorites for Summer Time reading!

/Gerry McKiernan
Theoretical Librarian
Iowa State University 
Ames IA 50011

          "The Best Way to Predict the Future is to Invent It!"
                                           Alan Kay
[Kay was among the original members of PARC and is considered to be the 'inventor' of the laptop computer and object-oriented programming]

       Here's a blurb from the book jacket:

"_Dealers of Lightning_ is the riveting story of the legendary Xerox PARC - a collection of eccentric young inventors brought together by Xerox Corporation at a facility in Palo Alto, California, during the intellectual ferment of the seventies and eighties. Here for the first time Michael Hiltzik, a correspondent for the Los Angeles Times, reveals in detail the true story of the extraordinary group that aimed to bring about a technological dawn that would change the world - and succeeded. _Dealers of Lightning_ is an unprecedented look at the ideas, the inventions, and the individuals that propelled Xerox PARC to the frontier of technohistory - and the corporate machinations that almost prevented it from achieving greatness." 

    For more details see the Amazon.com page at 

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ts/book-reviews/0887308910/002-7222014-4029845#08873089106499

    Also available in paperback

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0887309895/qid=957981269/sr=1-2/002-7222014-4029845