The leaders of the team developing the ENIAC were Penn's John Mauchly and
J. Presper Eckert. Jean Bartik was one of those who helped develop the first programs.
Other advances ensued until 1944 when the first large computer came into being in a basement at the University of Pennsylvania, the work of
J. Presper Eckert. It was designed to calculate artillery trajectories.
Mauchly and
J. Presper Eckert, Jr., and the first such computer built for commercial purposes, was dedicated and demonstrated in Philadelphia, Pa.
The Eckert-Mauchly Award is named in honor of
J. Presper Eckert and John Mauchly, co-inventors of ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic computer.