Walter Sprick

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Walter Sprick (born December 20, 1909 in Breslau ; † September 11, 1989 in Sindelfingen ) was a physicist and computer pioneer.

Life

His parents were the bookseller ( Goerlich & Coch ) Rudolf Sprick and Hedwig, geb. Wolff.

After four years of elementary school in Paderborn , he attended the humanistic grammar school in Werl until Easter 1929 . He studied mathematics and physics for two semesters at the University of Bonn and until 1934 at the University of Göttingen.

For lack of money he had to interrupt his studies, initially worked for six months in a steel works and from autumn 1934 to 1938 in the television laboratory of the TeKaDe in Nuremberg . Then he was a patent engineer in Berlin.

When the Second World War broke out , he joined the Askania company in Berlin-Friedenau, where he worked again as a laboratory engineer with television technology and met Werner Rambauske . In 1944 he became head of the television laboratory at the Institute for Physical Research in Bayreuth . This institute was founded by Bodo Lafferentz around 1942 and has been considered a satellite camp of the Flossenbürg concentration camp since June 13, 1944, when technically experienced prisoners were taken over from the Neuengamme concentration camp . After the war he initially worked as a high-frequency technical consultant for companies in Paderborn and Bielefeld .

In autumn 1947 he took on the position of second assistant at the Institute for Applied Physics at the University of Kiel for three semesters. During this time he was also a guest student. To finance his thesis, he took on the development of an electronic calculating machine for the Schleswig-Holsteinische Landesbrandkasse in Kiel. In 1950 he wrote his dissertation, Examination of the hearing ability with a view to use as a visual aid .

In 1951 the calculator for the state fire fund was completed. He coupled simply a by tubes electronically decimal rapidly multiplying / divide- auxiliary engine with a tabulating the so by Electromechanics (gears, relays) in speed could not afford, in 1952 he moved to Böblingen and worked at IBM , where he Heinz Nixdorf had as an assistant. Heinz Nixdorf later developed similar arithmetic units for Bull see tabulating machine and Wanderer (multitronic) on the Wanderer Exakta Continental (see in the entrance area of ​​the Heinz Nixdorf Museum).

By 1952 he developed a method for the photoelectric scanning of characters . This procedure was later taken up by Evon C. Greanias . In 1966, IBM brought out the multifunction reader IBM 1287. In 1974 Sprick retired.

Publications

  • A method of character recognition
  • with Karl Ganzhorn : An analogous method for pattern recognition by following the boundary (to the IFIP Congress 1959, Paris)
  • Process for the photoelectric reading of characters ; DBP 953 474 (June 29, 1952) / Character Reader ; U.S. Patent 2,838,602 issued June 10, 1958
  • Arrangement for generating a voltage curve representing the contour of a scanned character ; DBP 1076418
  • Method for identifying polylines
  • Examination of hearing ability with a view to use as a visual aid ; 1950
  • Exchange tube lexicon: with detailed exchange instructions on all exchange options, taking into account approx. 2500 German, English and American radio and Wehrmacht tubes

literature

  • Hans Schmidt: Electronic calculating machines for the insurance industry . In: Insurance Industry . tape 7 , no. 8 , April 15, 1952, p. 162 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ 60 years ago: An “artificial brain” works in Kiel, article at heise.de, January 31, 2011 , accessed on February 1, 2011
  2. ↑ Hans Hiebel: Large media chronicle ; 1999, p. 249
  3. ↑ United States Patent 2838602: Character reader - IBM , June 10, 1958.
personal data
SURNAME Sprick, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German physicist and computer pioneer
DATE OF BIRTH December 20, 1909
PLACE OF BIRTH Wroclaw
DATE OF DEATH September 11, 1989
Place of death Sindelfingen