The Very First Computer Bug

Ever wondered where the term ‘bug’ came from?

On September 9th, 1947 at 3:45 p.m., Grace Murray Hopper records ‘the first computer bug’ in the Harvard Mark II computer’s logbook.

Grace Hopper in her working environment

A US Navy rear admiral and computer genius, Grace Hopper, was in the team of the programmers developing computers around the WW2. She coined the term “debugging” after removing the actual bug (a moth) from the circuitry of Harvard Mark II computer. She also made a record in the log journal adding a bug as an explanation of the cause of computer malfunction.

Though the term “computer bug” had been sometimes used before, it was Grace Hopper who made it really popular by writing in her diary about the “first actual case of bug being found”.

Photo of the log entry describing “first computer bug”