Computer Hobby Movement in Canada

The fist issue of the ACS Newsletter published in New York by Stephen Gray in August 1966.

In 1966, the first such organization—the Amateur Computer Society (ACS)—was launched in the U.S. The ACS Newsletter was a forum for the exchange of information on computing among the growing number of computer enthusiasts. Although the computers of the 1960s were to big, to complex, and to expensive to be replicated by a hobbyist, ACS reported that some of its members constructed and experimented with their own rudimentary computers as early as 1966.

The introduction of the microprocessor ("a computer on a chip" as the device was informally referred to) onto the market in the early 1970s triggered the outbreak of homebrew computer activities that spawned the North American computer hobby movement. From 1974, electronics enthusiasts were buying, building, and experimenting with rudimentary low-cost microprocessor-powered computers (or microcomputers) frequently offered to them in a kit, do-it-yourself form. All of a sudden, the movement found itself in the front line of personal computer revolution.

The computer hobby movement in the U.S. had a strong influence on the early developments of personal computing worldwide. However, the computer hobby activities of the 1970s and early 1980s were neither restricted to the U.S. nor were they homogeneous. Hobbyists in Asia, Australia, and Europe were frequently building and experimenting with locally designed and manufactured computers. Their hobby activities were influenced by local conditions and had a considerable impact on domestic home and personal computer markets which were developing in unique ways and at a unique pace, providing further evidence that technological developments are not always globally uniform and that technology is culturally dependent.

Howard Franklin re-assembling his 1974 computer at his home in 2003. Photograph by Z. Stachniak. Franklin’s microcomputer resides at York University Computer Museum.

By contrast, the early members of TRACE were mostly computer professionals. However other enthusiasts of computing, of little or no expert computer knowledge, soon joined the club to build their first personal computers.
[T]hey all shared that invisible bond which ties together members of any hobby, wrote Garry Wheeler in the January 1978 issue of TRACE Newsletter.
This bond is strengthened by the unique language they use. Words such as byte, bit, nibble, Kansas, ram, rom, floppy, and five volts were heard [during meetings] at regular intervals.

Similarly to HCC, some people joined TRACE having already working microcomputers to their credit. A young computer enthusiast and a TRACE member, Howard Franklin, built his microcomputer in 1974. His home computer was possibly the earliest hobby computer constructed in Canada and one of the elite few microcomputers designed in the early 1970s.

An announcement of COMPUTERFEST'79 — the M.A.C.C 4th Convention, Luisville, Kentucky, June 1979.

TRACE hobbyists regarded their club as part of the global North American computer hobby movement rather than a distinct Canadian organization. Since June 1977, TRACE had been a member of the Midwest Affiliation of Computer Clubs; it exchanged newsletters with several American computer clubs, and its members regularly attended microcomputer events in the U.S. However, specific local factors defined some of TRACE's characteristics and in the process distinguished it from other North American computer hobby organizations. One such characteristic was TRACE's early focus on the Canadian-made MIL MOD-8 and MOD-80 microcomputers and on the APL programming language.

The MIL MOD-8 and MOD-80—were popular microcomputer ‘starters’ for hobbyists across North America. They were easy to build, expand, and experiment with. Their components were available from various sources. In April 1976, TRACE formed the MOD-8/80 special interest group. Two months later there were thirteen fully functional MOD-8/80 systems. Although TRACE hobbyists did build other computers as well such as the Mark-8s and Altair 8800s, the construction of the MOD-8 and MOD-80 computers would remain one of the main hardware activities of TRACE in its first year of operation.

Another unique characteristic of TRACE was its involvement with the APL programming language. The language's fundamentals were conceived by a Canadian, Kenneth Iverson in the mid-1960s. By the early 1970s, the language was already well-established in North America and its fast growing popularity turned into a worldwide APL software movement. APL conferences and meetings, interest groups and publications, as well as "I Like APL" stickers and buttons, T-shirts and songs, transformed the initial curiosity about APL into an unprecedented cultural phenomenon.

York APL reference card,  1972.

In Canada, the popularity of APL resulted in the first implementation of this language on a personal computer (the MCM/70 PC mentioned above was equipped with the MCM/APL dialect of the language) and early introduction of APL to universities. In 1968, York University offered its own variant of the language called York APL.

Several TRACE members had considerable APL expertise. In April 1976, they formed the APL special interest group. The following month, TRACE provided its members with an opportunity to glance at the MCM/70 computer and its APL language during a special MCM presentation.

By contrast, members of the Homebrew Computer Club were almost exclusively interested in the BASIC programming language developed by John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz at Dartmouth College in the early 1960s. The language was further popularized by the enthusiasts of the Altair 8800 hobby computer who used a dialect of the language implemented by Microsoft's founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen. However, because APL required much more memory than BASIC and because computer memory was expensive, the cost of a microcomputer running APL—such as the MCM/70—was prohibitively high for most hobbyist and, realistically, BASIC was the only language that they could afford. The connection between TRACE and the APL community continued into the early 1980s.

Regional computing landscapes directly affected the activities of other early Canadian microcomputer clubs as well. The Ottawa Computer Group  was a hardware-oriented club formed in late 1976. In 1977, Jocelyn and Frank Tait—the co-owners of the Ottawa-based Tarot Electronics—offered their MIMIC microcomputer to the club.
We belonged to a hobby group in Ottawa, recollected Jocelyn Tait, and some of the members expressed an interest in the new microcomputers, so I worked up a kit and instructions so they could build their own (which is what they liked to do) if they cared to. Eventually we were taking a display case to every meeting and selling parts to them as well as delivering quantities of the kits.

For those who did not want to solder the MIMIC’s components together, Taits offered fully assembled computers enclosed in a slope-front metal case in blue and black. Over 200 MIMICs were sold to the hobbyists.

The cover of TRACE Newsletter, August 1982, depicting a photograph of Ontario and the Great Lakes taken by Tiros-N satellite in September 1980. This image was produced using a high-resolution display generator designed by TRACE hacker Fulko Hew.

To many, however, TRACE was not an organization of hobbyists but of computer hacking — a type of activity that required working hard on laborious hardware or software projects.
I think [the term] ‘hobbyist’ connotes someone who’s just passing time doing ‘the thing’ without a real goal and without intense motivation, commented Fulko Hew, TRACE's last president, whereas a hacker is out there to improve either something or themselves — the ‘works hard’ part [of the definition of a hacker]. According to Hew, TRACE members were hackers in the proper definition of the term. We were hackers... we built the future of personal computing. We were doing things that (relatively) few other people in the world were doing.

Hew’s depiction of TRACE as an organization of hackers echoes Bob Kamins’ views that he expressed in his June 1982 “Real Hackers don't use IC’s” editorial for TRACE Newsletter:
If there is one thing distinguishing TRACE from many other computer clubs, it is the disproportionately large number of hackers among the members. Hackers will continue to make contributions ... to the art of computing.

JLS Computers Inc. Promotional brochure, c. 1983.

Finding evidence of significant hacking activities at TRACE to support Hew and Kamins’ point of view is not difficult. Hew himself ‘hacked’ a high-resolution graphics display. Using his system he was able to display high-resolution images produced, for instance, by the Tiros-N weather satellite (one of such images was reproduced on the cover of the August 1982 issue of TRACE Newsletter).

Hew did not commercialize his display. On the other hand, Kamins did convert his hardware hacking experience into business when he started his HAL Computer firm in Toronto to manufacture IBM PC and XT compatible computers. And so did Joe Sutherland, whose Toronto-based company —J.L.S. Computers Inc. —manufactured IBM PC, XT, and AT compatible computers, and another TRACE hacker Walter Banks who founded an electronics company Byte Craft in Waterloo in 1976.

Jim Butterfield shows his The First Book of Kim during his 2005 lecture at York University. Photograph by Z. Stachniak.

Peter Jennings demonstrating his Microchess program during the 5th Vintage Computer Festival, Mountain View, CA, 2003. Photograph by Z. Stachniak.

The result of his work was a popular book The First Book of KIM published in 1977. Later, Butterfield became a legendary promoter of Commodore products and prolific writer on the subject of microcomputing. His enthusiasm for the KIM-1 brought him and Peter Jennings together. In 1976 Jennings wrote Microchess — a chess playing program for the KIM-1 and, later, offered for other computers. The game became one of the most successful entertainment programs written for early home computers and launched Jennings’ successful entrepreneurial career.

Interestingly, some of the early profits from Microchess were used by the company Personal Software (which had purchased Microchess from Jennings), to help finance the marketing of one of the first spreadsheet programs—VisiCalc—arguably the first “killer application” and one of the best selling software products in the early personal computer industry. VisiCalc was initially offered for the Apple ][ computer exclusively helping the young Apple Computer Inc., rooted in another hobby computer club, HCC, to establish itself as an early industry leader.

Years later, Peter Jennings commented that there were those at TRACE with considerable hacking drive and those who, like him, wanted to turn their passion for microcomputing into an entrepreneurial venture. But he also noted that there were those who never considered their hobby a business opportunity.

Hew, Kamins, and Jennings painted a complex picture of TRACE that reflected their expectations of what the club could have accomplished. In their recollections, they recalled hackers and consumers of microprocessor products. They mentioned those who, like Jim Butterfield, were very curious about the new microcomputer technologies and applications. They finally talked about future entrepreneurs, like Peter Jennings and Walter Banks, like Jocelyn and Frank Tait, who transformed their enthusiasm for microcomputers into successful business ventures.

The official guide and program of the 1980 Canadian Computer Show and Conference, Toronto, November 11-13, 1980. Published by Canadian Datasystems.

The attendance at the 1977 Canadian Computer Show and Conference was estimated at 13,000. By the early 1980s, that number grew to over 30,000. TRACE participation in the Canadian Computer Show and Conference events as well as its involvement in organizing microcomputer exhibits and shows provide evidence of information transfer from Canadian computer hobbyists to the general public that was occurring in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The first public event organized by TRACE was not, in fact, the club’s initiative at all. It was a microcomputer exhibit mounted in Toronto's Ontario Science Center during the International Federation of Information Processing meeting hosted by the center on August 8-12, 1977.

For TRACE, the  Ontario Science Center's invitation was a unique opportunity to showcase microcomputing in front of a large audience of computer professionals and general public visiting the center. It was also an opportunity to test the organization's readiness and maturity to create and deliver outreach programs.

TRACE exhibit at the Ontario Science Center was followed by another presentation during the 1977 Canadian Computer Show and Conference that took place in Mississauga, Ontario, in early November. The organizers offered exhibit booths to several Canadian computer clubs including TRACE, the Kitchener-Waterloo Microcomputer Club, and the Ottawa Computer Group. Under the The First Canadian Personal Computing Showplace banner the clubs as well as local suppliers of microcomputer products showcased the age of microcomputer by exhibiting hobby and commercial personal computers.

The success of the 1977 microcomputer exhibit at the Ontario Science Center, allowed TRACE to exhibit there again in the following two years. Reporting on the overnight preparations for the 1978 exhibit, Ross Cooling wrote in the July 1978 issue of TRACE Newsletter about the public's high anticipation of the event:
You could tell the public knew what was happening - we had hard time holding them back that night.

Lining up for tickets at Computerfest'83. Photographer unknown.

A demonstration of Canadian TELIDON videotex system during Computerfest'83. Photographer unknown.

Crowd gothers for a software presentation at Computerfest'83. Photographer unknown.

TRACE Computerfest'83 took place under the slogan “computers are fun!” It aimed at attracting both the hobbyists as well as the general public. The registration fees were set low to encourage high participation. The three-day event was well attended and its program included microcomputer seminars, workshops for children, films, demonstrations, and exhibits on a wide variety of software- and hardware-related topics prepared by computer clubs as well as vendors of computer equipment. A flea-market and public domain software swaps completed the program.

TRACE Computerfest event demonstrated that by the early 1980s, the effective promotion and delivery of large scale computer literacy programs by computer hobby organizations such as TRACE required expertise and resources that the clubs did not and would not have. The opening of the Harbourfront Computer Center just two months later (and in approximately the same location as Computerfest'83) was clear evidence that many aspects of microcomputing were now out of the hobbyists’ hands. The Center was opened on September 19, 1983, at Queen’s Quay Terminal as "A place where you, your grandmother, your three-year-old child or your brother can come and learn on and learn about computers." It was co-founded by the federal and Ontario governments, had 30 full time positions, and supported its programs with 60 computers. It was well-positioned to deliver high-quality computer literacy programs.

Although TRACE was neither an organization of educators nor the club's focus was on outreach programs, it did contribute its fair share to the process of the social acceptance of personal computing. It had also found its voice to represent the hobby movement in Ontario and speak on its behalf. The much improved newsletter published by the club between 1982 and 1984 provided comprehensive information on computer stores, shows, meetings, and other events. It offered its pages to promote activities of other computer clubs in the region.

Winding the operations up

For most of the 1970s, these were the hobbyists, and not the commercial microcomputer or consumer electronics industries, who found themselves on the front line of promoting and imparting computer literacy at the community level.

The Commodore VIC-20 home computer (introduced in 1980) was possibly the first computer to sell over one million units.

By the end of the decade, this situation had began to change rapidly due, in large part, to the introduction of a new consumer electronics gadget—the home computer—driven by the success of hobby computing and home gaming consoles. By the early 1980s, the consumer electronics market was full of inexpensive computers for home and schools manufactured by companies such as Apple Computer, Atari, Commodore, Texas Instruments, and Tandy. Home computers were being sold fully assembled and supported with manufacturers' warranties and ever growing libraries of software. They were readily available from large departmental stores or, as in the case of Tandy, from dedicated retail centers. For the first time in the computer industry's history, some manufacturers sold over a million computers. With these new offerings came dedicated commercial magazines and other publications. In parallel to home computing, the desktop computer market had started to attract considerable attention since the introduction of the IBM Personal Computer in August 1981.

The 25th anniversary of TPUG celebrations during the  World of Commodore 2004 event. In the top picture, some of the TPUG's earliest members (including Jim Butterfield, 3rd from the left) are presented with an anniversary cake. The bottom image depicts a flee market during the event. Photographs by Z. Stachniak.

Another challenge to social relevance of the early general-purpose computer clubs was the impact of the rapidly changing personal computing landscape on the formation of a new type of computer clubs dedicated to specific manufacturers. These new organizations that were mushrooming all over the North America were eroding membership from older general-purpose clubs at an alarming rate. For TRACE, this diminishing membership, in addition to other factors, almost resulted in its closure in early 1982. When only a few members showed up for the January meeting and none of them was willing to assume responsibilities for the club’s operations, a motion was put forward to discontinue TRACE as a formal organization. At the same time, the Toronto PET Users Group (TPUG) formed in 1978 and dedicated to Commodore microcomputer products was about 15,000 member strong and was the largest Commodore-oriented user group in the world. Fortunately for TRACE, the motion to discontinue its activities was defeated. A new and energetic executive took over and, in a short period, the club staged a spectacular comeback.

To stop the membership erosion, TRACE needed knowledgeable volunteers who would reorganize the club and keep their members active and informed.
Volunteers are the life blood of an organization like TRACE. If you don't work, TRACE won’t work, wrote Kamins in the February 1982 issue of TRACE Newsletter, in his rather desperate attempt to enlarge TRACE's volunteer base. His plea seemed to work. The attendance at the meetings picked up again through 1982. The renewed TRACE offered high-profile presentations to its members (in 1982, TRACE meetings featured, among other presentations, talks on LOGO programming language, on the development of SPAR Aerospace Shuttle Craft Manipulator Arm, and on Canada's Telidon videotex system). The club improved the quality of its newsletter which, for a brief period, was commercially sold in Toronto. New clubs and computer stores found TRACE Newsletter a convenient place to advertise their services.

The Defender — an Apple ][ clone assembled in Canada (c. 1982).

The success of the IBM personal computer in the marketplace, followed by its informal acceptance as the industry standard for a business desktop computer, shifted the attention of many hackers to the IBM microcomputer hardware and software products and to new business opportunities created by a vast IBM PC and Apple ][ clone market. Furthermore, many computer literacy programs and large-scale computer events such as exhibits, shows, festivals and conferences, were being organized across Canada by educational institutions, dedicated organizations and companies with substantial financial backing and expert knowledge. For all these reasons, in the mid-1980s, people just stopped coming to TRACE meetings, to meetings of the Homebrew Computer Club, and of the Ottawa Computer Group.