LEO editor

Kit Grindley – born in Clapham< London, April1929, died October 26^th 2018 in Sydney Australia.  Kit Grindley after graduation from LSE in 1956, started as a Management Trainee in Lyons in 1956 and was a part of the LEO team of LEO I and LEO II programmers.  Kit developed ideas about a language for expressing requirements he called Systematics as a result of his LEO experience. He studied for a PhD at the London School of Economics and was awarded with a PhD for his research into Systematics in 1972, supervised by Frank Land. He enjoyed a successful and varied career as a computer professional,  This included compiling an annual review of the chief issues faced by CIOs when working as a Director for Urwick Diebold, a subsidiary of Urwick-Orr and Partners, acting as a consultant for Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC), publishing a number of books on computer management including Systematics, editing the Journal IT Reviews working for and being awarded a PhD (1972) by the London School of Economics, followed by being appointed to, first a Professorial Fellowship at the LSE sponsored by F International, whose founder Dame Stephanie Shirley writes about his role in the company in her autobiography Let IT Go, and encouraged his research into Systematics setting up research unit for that purpose.  and later by a part-time chair in Systems Automation sponsored by PWC also at the LSE. His academic career included a stint as Adjunct Professor at the University of Technology, Sydney. His wife Liz notes of his LEO years: “(those who) knew him during those crazy, exciting and trail blazing years.  He was such an exceptional person and we are all lucky to have loved him.  Such a great brain and so many talents.” These crazy activities included running with the bulls in the annual Pamplona bull running festival, and getting injured in the process.  His books on IT Strategy and Systems methods were acclaimed  by his readers.  His death is noted in the Sydney Morning Herald – see

Link to SMH obituary:  http://tributes.smh.com.au/obituaries/smh-au/obituary.aspx?n=christopher-grindley&pid=190608434

John Grover – Born December 1924, died 2000. After National Service in the RAF where he gained his pilot’s wings, joined Lyons as a Management Trainee in 1947 working on Bakery Accounts.  Recruited to the new LEO team as a programmer in 1950, took responsibility for a number of the early LEO applications Including the world’s first business application, the valuation of bakery output. David Caminer paid this tribute to John Grover. “John played an invaluable part in out very very small team. He followed the methodology that we laid down unswervingly and made it possible to get it firmly established as newcomers were drawn in. He was a fine trainer and many of the young men and women who were recruited learned the new discipline working under him.” He left LEO in 1956 to join Derek Hemi at EMI working on the EMIDEC.  A short biographical sketch can be found on page 204 in Peter Bird’s LEO: the World’s First Business Computer.  http://www.computerconservationsociety.org/resurrection/res24.htm#d

 

Peter Guest  b.1934, died 1995 aged 61, LEO Maintenance Engineer

Margaret Guest, his widow writes: Peter’s education badly disrupted during Wartime, leaving Wm. Penn School, Peckham, London aged 16 in 1951. Attended Woolwich Polytechnic 1951-55 for part time day release, obtained ONC in civil engineering while working for Sir Murdock MacDonald & Partners as a trainee draughtsman.  Further HND studies but National Service  in RAF intervened including training in communication hardware preparing to be a wireless operator and then posted to Aden where he worked for the Commonwealth Air Forces Communications Network with the rank of Corporal. Came back and worked for Vickers Armstrong at a factory in Crayford, Kent. At the time he joined they were building a valve computer for Powers Samas, the PCC, which had an immense  number of problems and not many people capable of solving them!  He left when the PCC was going to be superseded by a future design done by ICT.

 Early 1960 (the year we were planning to marry) Peter was employed by LEO in London (for a very small wage for the first 6 months) while getting a good grounding in all aspects of this new invention; engineering, testing, commissioning, etc. He was sent out to maintain computers at Ford Dagenham (LEOII/4) and Ilford Films (LEO II/9)

while we lived in a caravan on the outskirts of Romford. He was also training on LEO 111. At the time the head office of LEO Computers was in Bayswater.

Then, about 1964, after LEO amalgamated with English Electric, we moved to the South Coast where he was sent to commission a new English Electric computer for Lloyds Bank at Durrington, Worthing, while also troubleshooting other installations in London and the South Coast.

After the merger with English Electric he spent a lot of time up in Kidsgrove on the KDF9 commissioning and troubleshooting.

Our next move was to Long Ashton, on the outskirts of Bristol where he was Assistant Service Manager.  Later becoming Area Manager working on computers for Wills Tobacco and an important (I think Government) installation in Dorset. Later appointed Area Manager for West London and the Western Home Counties.

In 1967, when Marconi split its computer interests from English Electric, another move to Widford, Chelmsford, to work for Marconi who were embarking on a programme to produce the Myriad 1 and design the Myriad 11.

He was also involved in the System 430 for English Electric-LEO (the first integrated circuit design) which caused many problems because of the high reliability requirements necessary for the Military and Traffic Control for which it was intended. He was then Manager overseeing design, production, quality control, budgets, planning and responsible for 45 employees. It was a very stressful time for him.

Then there was a period of uncertainty, with a merger of Marconi with GEC looming..

This made up his mind to move again, to MDS Data  Processing, Teeside, Durham.

Peter first joined MDS as Quality Control Manager. MDS was an international company, main Plant being in Utica, north of New York State and another in Germany and he made regular visits to both locations.  After all this travelling he decided to stay more local, so worked for local companies; Redifon, Comark and MBM near Brighton, before finally freelancing as a Business Consultant working from home.

He sadly died of Cancer aged 61. Memoir

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/at2ctlnx0ti3cmf4xmaok/Peter-Guest-memoir.doc?dl=0&rlkey=yxc8p1mg2n859v5xtzw3ybm93

Hugo Gunning 1933 – 2017, died of septicaemia. John Daines writes “I remember seeing him first in Hartree House, in a lift in 1962 or 63.  Immaculately dressed, he worked on Lector but not an engineer, probably testing.  He subsequently worked with and for me as part of the Commissioning Operators team in Minerva Road.  In early 1968 he came to Winsford for a few weeks to help with testing 4/50’s.

Sometime in autumn 1964 he said one day, “if you want to make some money, Jay Trump will win the Grand National”; and it did.  Hugo was a keen follower of the Turf.  There is an article about Hugo on page 13 of https://issuu.com/tthclondon/docs/london_mission_sep_-_oct_2007 and some super videos at  http://www.red5599.com/Dancehall%202010/hugo.htm “  Hugo was, as his wife writes, a man of many parts, a musician of note, and TV personality.  The above text and two obituaries from family members can be found at https://www.dropbox.com/s/2rwldw0cldec2pr/Hugo%20Gunning%20obituary.doc?dl=0

and the LEO Computers Website

Peter Gyngell – born 23 February 1930, died 6thJune 2018 at his home in Wollongong, Australia.  Peter was born in Wales, graduated from RADA in 1948, but did not follow an acting career.  He became involved with LEO in 1958 working for the Ford Motor Company on their LEO II computer at Aveley on the huge Ford spare part application.  He played a critical part in the success of that work. He subsequently joined LEO Computers Limited and was appointed manager of the LEO operations Australia  in 1961.  Neill Lamming writes: “As General Manager of LEO Australia when it was formed in 1961, Peter had a massive presence in the early business computing market in Australia. He personally led the sales campaigns which resulted in spectacular wins against established competitors like IBM with such major organisations as Shell Australia, Colonial Mutual Life, H C Sleigh and Tubemakers of Australia. He was a legend who will always be remembered warmly by those who worked with him.”  A more extended obituary is held on the LEO Computers Website

Douglas Hartree – 27.03.1897-12.02.1958, eminent Cambridge Scientist noted for his contribution to a number of fields of study including early computing – as an example he was the first civilian to programme ENIAC – played a crucial role in the collaboration between Cambridge University and Lyons in the development of LEO.   “Hartree’s fourth and final major contribution to British computing started in early 1947 when the catering firm of J. Lyons & Co. in London heard of the ENIAC and sent a small team in the summer of that year to study what was happening in the USA, because they felt that these new computers might be of assistance in the huge amount of administrative and accounting work which the firm had to do. The team met with Col. Herman Goldstine at the Institute for Advanced  Study in Princeton who wrote to Hartree telling him of their search. As soon as he received this letter, Hartree wrote and invited representatives of Lyons to come to Cambridge for a meeting with him and Wilkes. This led to the development of a commercial version of EDSAC developed by Lyons, called LEO, the first computer used for commercial business applications. After Hartree’s death, the headquarters of LEO Computers was renamed Hartree House. This illustrates the extent to which Lyons felt that Hartree had contributed to their new venture.”  From Wikipedia at https:/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Hartree   His profile was published in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB), online and in print September 2004, written by C.G. Darwin and revised by Jon Agar.

George A. Hayter– Died April 2015 in Northern Cyprus. Joined LEO about 1964/5, on systems and sales, at Allied Suppliers, started at Hartree House, then Computer House and Stag Place. Subsequently worked at BOAC under Peter Hermon, then headed the Stock Exchange computer transformation, before setting up his own consultancy for the financial sector.

Derek Hemy – !920 –2000, Joined Lyons as Management Trainee 1939.  Did war service in Royal Corps of Signals.  Returned to Lyons in 1946 in Systems Analysis Office under David Caminer.  Selected as first LEO programmer, a role in which his performance was outstanding.  Left LEO in 1955 to senior role in EMI’s venture into computing with the EMIDEC.   Transferred to ICL when they took over EMI computing and later became computer consultant for Unilever.  More biographical details in Bird, P. J.  LEO: The First Business Computer, pp. 204- 205.

Ray Hennessy –Programmer, consultant, LEO Computers Society stalwart and Committee Member, spent 32 years at LEO before retirement.  Born 1934 died 15^th November 2016.  Oral History edited transcript and recording and Obituary by John Daines

Peter Hermon – Trailblazer in Computer Management. One of the very first computer specialists to make it all the way to the board of a major corporation, Peter Hermon blazed a trail and set standards for successful computer management that were years ahead of their time, most notably for Dunlop Rubber Company from 1959-65 and then for British Airways and its predecessor companies, BEA and BOAC, from 1965 through to the early 1980s.

For BOAC, he developed, virtually from scratch, a computer communications system that covered every aspect of the airline’s business activity, including reservations, departure control, message switching, flight planning, crew rostering, engineering and financial control.  

This developed into the celebrated Boadicea project, a network of computers linking cities around the globe from the USA to New Zealand, from Finland to South Africa, to a central computer complex in London.  The system, implemented on time, within budget and without problems, set standards for the airline industry that have survived to this day.  It also had airlines all over the world clamouring to buy the company’s know-how and software, leading to sales to over 50 airlines. By 1983, these sales amounted to some £40m a year at 2008 values, enough to cover the airline’s investment in computers many times over, a success acknowledged by two Queen’s Awards for both technological innovation and export achievement.

When BOAC merged with BEA in 1972, Hermon became Group Management Services Director with the immediate task of integrating two separate computer installations based on IBM and Univac equipment.  The role then broadened to embrace organisation and productivity and it was Hermon who produced a report for the Secretary of State for Trade & Industry that led to the full integration of both airlines to produce British Airways in 1976.  He also led the team that, in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s, developed a strategy for cutting staff numbers from 57,000 to 38,000, achieving savings in excess of £100m a year.

His last appointment at British Airways was as Managing Director of the airline’s European Division.

As well as serving on the boards of both BOAC and British Airways, Hermon was also Chairman  of SITA, a worldwide communications operation specialising in  the needs of the travel industry, and of International Aeradio Ltd (IAL), a BA subsidiary later sold to STC.

He left BA in 1983 to join Tandem Computers as UK Managing Director from where, shortly after, he was headhunted into Lloyds of London, the world’s premier insurance market, with a brief to effect a root and branch modernisation of its computer systems.  When it came to the crunch, this proved a bridge too far, as Hermon once described it, for such a traditional organisation and he moved on to Harris Queensway and then, as a freelance management consultant, to handle assignments for, among others, Saatchi and Saatchi, Argos and Credit Lyonnais. In 1970 he was appointed a part-time adviser  to the Civil Service on computer strategy and later served on the Government’s Central Computer Agency

Peter Hermon was born in 1928, His parents were Arthur and Beatrice (nee Poulter). His mother was a dressmaker and his father worked for Morris Motors in Oxford as a technical manager.

He was educated at Nottingham High School where he held two scholarships.  He went from there to Oxford University on no fewer than three further scholarships – a state scholarship, a major open scholarship to St John’s College and a Henry Mellish scholarship, a single award open to anyone living in Nottinghamshire.  He then took a double first in Pure and Applied Mathematics and a prize for the best result across the university. He was then elected to a Harmsworth Senior Scholarship at Merton College for research in Pure Mathematics.

Grounding in LEO credited for later successes 

Hermon left Oxford in 1954 to join J. Lyons & Co of teashops and catering fame.  It was here that he cut his computer teeth as one of a remarkable group of British computer pioneers who developed the world’s first business computer and the applications to run on it. These were stirring days, Hermon recalled, when the computer buff had to turn his hand to everything – business analysis, programming, operating and sweeping the floor before VIP visitors toured the LEO (Lyons Electronic Office) site in Cadby Hall to pay homage to the groundbreaking work that was going on there.

Hermon’s particular role within Lyons involved the installation of the first of the second generation LEO 2 computers for the Imperial Tobacco Company in Bristol.  The complexity of the tobacco company’s pricing and credit terms led to the largest and most complex suite of programs yet attempted at the time.  This was followed, in 1959, with the installation of an integrated sales accounting system, a concept years ahead of its time, running on the first of a third generation LEO 3 computers for Dunlop Rubber at Fort Dunlop.  Hermon at this time had joined Dunlop and went on to coordinate the company’s computer strategy worldwide.

Much of the later computer successes at British Airways were credited by Hermon to his time with LEO.  The team he built up at BA contained no fewer than nine managers from LEO Computers with many other ex-LEO people further down the line.

In retirement, Peter Hermon, devoted much of his time to writing.  He was a contributor to a book on the development of the LEO computer, entitled in the UK ‘User-driven Innovation’ and in the US and Hong Kong “LEO: the incredible story of the world’s first business computer,” published by McGraw Hill. Peter became increasingly involved in the activities of the LEO Computers Society, attending reunions and contributing to keep the LEO flame burning, repeating his conviction that the standards set by the LEO ethos underlay his own success.

He also authored a two-volume “Hill-walking in Wales,” the definitive guide to climbing the 170 or so 2000ft mountains in the principality, as well as “Lifting the Veil,” a plain language guide to the Bible.  He had also preached widely for the Association for the Propagation of the Faith, the official missionary society of the Catholic church.

Peter Hermon was married in January 1954 for 57 years to Norma Stuart Brealey who died in 2011. He had four children with Norma, David, who predeceased him in 1976, Juliet, Robert and Caroline.  Six grandchildren and five great grandchildren also survive him.  He was married for a second time in December 2016 to Patricia Cheek.

Peter Michael Robert Hermon, b. 13 November 1928, d. 1 November 2022

Published in Computer Weekly 18 Nov 2022