{"id":6740,"date":"2023-11-20T18:23:46","date_gmt":"2023-11-20T18:23:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.leo-computers.org.uk\/leopedia.org\/?p=6740"},"modified":"2023-11-20T18:23:48","modified_gmt":"2023-11-20T18:23:48","slug":"bbc-witness-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.leo-computers.org.uk\/leopedia.org\/bbc-witness-history\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC Witness History"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>BBC Witness History<br>Coombs, M. and Lanchin, M., (2019), From cakes to computers, BBC Witness<br>History Coombs recalls her work as an early computer programmer on LEO, the first<br>electronic office system, pioneered by the Lyons catering company. In the early 1950s, the<br>leading British catering firm, J Lyons &amp; Co, pioneered the world&#8217;s first automated office<br>system. It was baptised LEO &#8211; the Lyons Electronic Office &#8211; and was used in stock-taking,<br>food ordering and payrolls for the company. Soon it was being hired out to UK government<br>ministries and other British businesses. Mary Coombs worked on the first LEO and was the<br>first woman to become a commercial computer programmer. She tells Mike Lanchin about<br>her memories of those heady days when computers were still in their infancy<br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/programmes\/w3csyx55\">https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/programmes\/w3csyx55<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BBC Witness HistoryCoombs, M. and Lanchin, M., (2019), From cakes to computers, BBC WitnessHistory Coombs recalls her work as an early computer programmer on LEO, the firstelectronic office system, pioneered by the Lyons catering company. In the early 1950s, theleading British catering firm, J Lyons &amp; Co, pioneered the world&#8217;s first automated officesystem. It was [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"set","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>BBC Witness History - LEOPEDIA EDITORIAL SYSTEM<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.leo-computers.org.uk\/leopedia.org\/bbc-witness-history\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"BBC Witness History - LEOPEDIA EDITORIAL SYSTEM\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"BBC Witness HistoryCoombs, M. and Lanchin, M., (2019), From cakes to computers, BBC WitnessHistory Coombs recalls her work as an early computer programmer on LEO, the firstelectronic office system, pioneered by the Lyons catering company. 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