IT 'dinosaurs' on show

October 2005

A new museum at Monash University's Caulfield campus provides an insight into the fast-moving world of information technology.

Report: Diane Squires
Photography: Greg Ford

Antique IT: a chunky keyboard on display

As today's computers get ever smaller and more compact, it is difficult to imagine that a single computer once weighed as much as a small car. Yet that's the way it was with Monash's first computer -- the Ferranti Sirius, which weighed about a tonne and had to be moved into its first home by crane.

When it arrived from England in 1962, the machine was a marvel of modern technology. Today, the 43-year-old computer forms the centrepiece of the Monash Museum of Computing History, which opened at the university's Caulfield campus in May.

As one of only four models brought into Australia, the Ferranti cost the university £25,000. First used in the Mathematics department at the Clayton campus, it was the university's only computer until the mid-1960s. It was also used by local industry groups that had no other access to computers.

The Ferranti was last used in the mid-1970s and was moved to Caulfield after the 1990 merger between Monash and the Chisholm Institute of Technology.

Its presence in the museum provides a glimpse of the rapidly changing world of technology.

Other featured items include a mini-computer, PDP9, the same model used at the Parkes Observatory during the moon landing in 1969 and the actual machine used in the Australian film The Dish.

There is also a 'millionaire calculator' -- an early-model mechanical calculator from the early 1900s that was one of the first calculators to perform multiplication rapidly.

As well as viewing original computer equipment, visitors to the museum can follow computing history through a photographic chronology of computer usage that explores how technology has developed from the 1950s.

The museum will also offer programs designed to educate primary and secondary school students from Years 5 to 10 in the history of computers as well as professional development programs for IT teachers.

Senior lecturer in IT and museum director Ms Judithe Sheard says the education programs will give younger children an understanding of how today's computers developed and their impact on society, while older students will learn how computers have been used throughout their brief history.

"The museum gives young students the chance to have a look at early computer devices and see how computers were used in the 1960s and beyond. This is technology that they don't get to see now," she says.

"Older students will learn about how the devices worked and the implications of IT in society since they were introduced to Australia in the 1950s."

History project manager and museum curator Ms Sarah Wolf says the new training program for teachers will help prepare them for teaching IT in the classroom. The professional development series includes input from Monash IT academics and the Victorian Information Technology Teachers' Association.

The museum is on level two, B block, Caulfield campus, and is open Mondays to Fridays between 9 am and 5 pm.

For information, contact Ms Sarah Wolf on +61 3 9903 2698 or email sarah.wolf@infotech.monash.edu.au.