I was sorting some old textbooks recently, and found my Pascal book from way back when at Calvin. Yes, children, that was before Java and C++ were the standard languages kids learned. The photo is of Swiss-born Niklaus Wirth who created Pascal.
I decided I could recycle the COBOL book from Grand Valley, but the Pascal book has some good history in the first chapter with cool old photos of things like the ENIAC, and quotes from the past and present spread throughout. This one gave me pause:
"It became increasingly apparent to me that, over the years, Federal agencies have amassed vast amounts of information about virtually every American citizen. This fact, coupled with technological advances in data-collecting and dissemination, raised the possibility that information about individuals conceivably could be used for other than legitimate purposes and without the prior knowledge or consent of the individuals involved."
- President Gerald R. Ford,
quoted in Pascal Programming and Problem Solving by Sanford Leestma & Larry Nyhoff
Photo of Niklaus Wirth from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niklaus_Wirth
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