The first machines

An institute for calculation

In 1948 the mathematics professor Eduard Stiefel founded the Institute for Applied Mathematics at ETH Zurich. His assistants were Ambros Speiser and Heinz Rutishauser, who would both play a large part in what followed.

A rented computer: the Zuse Z4

In 1950 Stiefel rented the Zuse Z4, a relay computer, for five years. It gave the institute a working machine while it designed its own.

ERMETH: a computer made at ETH

Work on ETH’s own computer, ERMETH, began at the same time as the Z4 rental. ERMETH went into operation in 1956 and served until 1963, when ETH replaced it with a CDC 1604 mainframe bought from industry.

Building a computer in-house was a statement: the institute wanted to understand machines from the inside, not only use them.

From a group to a department

In 1968 the institute split, and Rutishauser’s group became the Group for Computer Science. After Rutishauser’s death it was renamed the Institute for Computer Science in 1970. In 1981 ETH founded a Division of Computer Science and began a degree course for computer science engineers, and in 1988 the institute became the Department of Computer Science.

The people behind this story, including Niklaus Wirth, are on the People page.