David John Wheeler FRS (9 February 1927 – 13 December 2004)
David Wheeler, a member of the team at Cambridge University which built EDSAC under Maurice Wilkes, had the distinction of being the first person to be awarded a PhD in compute science in the UK in 1951. He played an important role in the collaboration between Cambridge University and J. Lyons in the period starting in 1949 when the Lyons Board made the decision to go ahead with the design and construction of the first LEO computer. In particular much of the systems software including the initial orders, the use of subroutines and relative addressing owe much to his invention and tuition. But he also experimented with Derek Hemy in drafting a payroll program to be tried on EDSAC. He went on to have a distinguished career in Computing, became an FRS and held in international esteem. He is included in the Dictionary of National Biography (ONNB), his profile written by Martin Campbell-Kelly published online 3rd January 2008 and in print 5th March 2009. He is remembered in many obituaries and tributes including a biographical sketch on page 211 of ‘LEO: The World’s First Business Computer’ by Peter J. Bird. His Oral History is held in the Babbage institute. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wheeler_(computer_scientist)