The Hewitt D. Crane papers contain materials collected and primarily authored by Crane during his time as an engineer at Stanford Research Institute (later renamed SRI International). Included in the collection are technical papers written by Crane, correspondence, grant applications, personal narratives, and SRI International records relating to client contracts and project proposals. The records span 1959 through 2007 with the bulk of the collection being from the early 1960s to the late 1980s. Highlights in the collection include notes, articles, and contract agreements regarding Crane’s handwriting recognition system and eye tracking technology. Also of interest are research and articles on all-magnetic computing systems, including one co-written by Crane and Douglas Engelbart, and a wide variety of explorations of human-computer interaction and sensory augmentation via computing systems. The collection contains very little documentation regarding Crane’s work on ERMA (Electronic Recording Machine, Accounting) – SRI’s project for Bank of America to automate its check-processing operations. Mentions of ERMA are limited to Crane’s biographical narratives.
Biographical/Historical Note
Hewitt D. Crane was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, in 1927. After serving in the United States Navy as a radar technician during World War II, Crane studied electrical engineering at Columbia University, earning his BS in 1947, and Stanford University, earning his doctorate in 1960. Crane’s first jobs in the computer industry were debugging an early facsimile system at Western Union Research Laboratory (1948 to 1949), maintaining one of IBM’s earliest computers (the SSEC) (1949 to 1952), working on the IAS computer project led by John von Neumann at the Institute for Advanced Study (1952 to 1955), and working on magnetic-core memories at Sarnoff Research Laboratory (1955 to 1956).
In 1956, Crane moved to SRI International in Menlo Park, California, where he spent the rest of his career. His first project at SRI was helping with the creation of ERMA (Electronic Recording Machine, Accounting), a pioneering automated check processing system for Bank of America. Later projects included the study and development of all-magnetic computing and logic systems (a prototype of a very early all-magnetic computer is in the collection of CHM), automatic focus optical systems, the Purkinje Image Eye-Tracker, handwriting verification systems, optical character recognition, and auditory neuroscience. Crane was one of SRI’s most prolific inventors with more than 70 patents and 70 published papers to his name. “A Cubic Mile of Oil: Realities and Options for Averting the Looming Global Energy Crisis,” a book he authored with fellow SRI scientists Edwin Kinderman and Ripudaman Malhotra, was published posthumously in 2010. In addition to his computer engineering career, Crane co-founded Ridge Vineyards in Cupertino, California, in 1959. He died June 17, 2008, in Portola Valley, California.
These folders include multiple versions of a paper on mechanical interactions among the human ear's inner hair cells (IHCs), tectorial membranes (TMs), and outer hair cells (OHCs).
These folders consist of correspondence and clippings sent between Crane and numerous individuals with last names starting J through Z ( A through I were not included in the donated collection). They are grouped in alphabetical order by last name name: David Jen, Bela Julesz, George Keller, Ted Krueger, Eileen Kowler, Harry Klopf, Ed Kinderman, Don Kennedy, Sally Longyear, Ann Landers, Bill Lane, Tom Lantos, Doux Le, Paul Lee, Jerome Lemelson, William Langston, Amory Lovins, Dick Lyon, Paul MacLean, Robert MacNeil, Tom Mandel, John Markoff, Carver Mean, Barbara Means, Terry Middleton, Bill Miller, Barry Minkin, Gordon Moore, Richard Muller, Ron Nater, Don Nielson, Larry Nyman, Aston O'Donnell, Jay Ogilvy, Barney Oliver, Eddie Oshins, David Packard, Roy Pea, Ross Perot, Bill Perry, Oz Piper, Steven Pinker, Joe Pompei, Karl Pribram, Jan Rajchman, Warren Robinett, Andy Rooney, Charles Rosen, Louis Rosenblum, Oliver Sacks, William Safire, Taichi Sakaiya, Bob Samuels, James Schlesinger, Earl Schubert, Peter Schwartz, Bob Scott, Neil Scott, Teddy Shalon, Tom Sheridan, Christine Sherry, Eva Silverstein, Soloman Snyder, Roger Sperry, Chauncey Starr, Chuck Steele, Paul Steinhardt, Harry Stevens, Bob Stewart, David Stork, David Strauss, John Sunderland, Bob Sutherland, C. B. Sung, Ingo Swann, Jay Swartz, Joe Sweeney, John Tangney, George Timberlake, Jim Townsend, Warren Tsuneishi, Tom Van Sant, Bert Vorchheimer, Steve Waldhorn, W. S-Y. Wang, W. Ward, Tom Ware, Caspar Weinberger, Chris White, Bruce Wilcox, Aaron Wildavsky, Lawrence Wilkinson, Edward O. Wilson, John Wilson, Kent Wittenburg, Lotfi Zadeh.
These folders contain several manuscript iterations of a “A Cubic Mile of Oil: Realities and Options for Averting the Looming Global Energy Crisis” (2010), a book Crane wrote with fellow SRI scientists Edwin Kinderman and Ripudaman Malhotra. Also included are related notes, articles, diagrams, and presentations.
These folders include papers written by Crane and others regarding the design of all-magnetic computing systems and the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE)
This folder includes part 1 of a manuscript on the history of Ridge Vineyard, a vineyard in Cupertino co-owned by Crane. The rest of the manuscript was not included in the collection donation.
These folders relate to a paper by Crane titled "Beyond the Seventh Synapse: The Neural Marketplace of the Mind." Included are multiple versions of the paper (along with the original manuscript), correspondence, notes, and reviews.
These folders contain papers and articles about human-computer interaction -- including electronic speech recognition, optical character recognition, signature verification, and tactile perception.