. . written quite long ago (well, not so long ago for me, but for you young 'uns).

It purported to explain for the ordinary guy how computers work - actually pretty well, as I recall (though it was long before I had anything to do with computers).

He remarked that he spent much of WWII calculating artillery trajectories on a bank of card reading calculating machines.

Around that time he attended a lecture by a guy who described a machine that would read two stacks of punch cards, not just one. One stack would be the data, the other instructions on what to do with the data.

He left the lecture inspired by the idea - but realizing the horrifying complexity of such a thing. he thought, "It's too bad I will never see such a machine in my lifetime".

He had not yet realized that an obscure logician named George Boole (1815 to 1864) had come up with an algebra where you sort of plug what you want into one end and turn a crank with the design coming out the other end.

Well, until about 1937 nobody else had realized that either - until some guy realized you could use it to design a telephone switching system.