In memoriam: A llen K ent (1921–2014)

I had the privilege of knowing Allen Kent as a teacher, researcher, and advisor when I was a master’s and PhD student, and later as a colleague for 19 years in the Department of Information Science at the University of Pittsburgh. One of Allen’s most outstanding characteristics was his ability to have a vision of what the future should be for information science and technology and how it could benefit society in a positive manner. He was one of the foremost pioneers of information science and was known worldwide for his tireless efforts in the fields of information science and information processing technology. Born in Harlem, New York, in 1921, Allen was the son of a tailor. He received a bachelor of science in chemistry from the City College of New York, a certificate in metallurgical testing at New York University, and also served in the United States Air Force and the Air Documents Research Office in London, where he worked on analyzing, indexing, and classifying captured German documents during World War II. This WW II document analysis and indexing experience, followed by his experience as an editor of technical manuscripts after WW II, led to a legendary career in information science, since he saw the need for better methods to index and retrieve documents including the use of mechanical and later computerized retrieval technologies. After WW II, Allen became involved with a couple of lawyers who wanted to produce the artificial sweetener saccharin, which was in short supply. He was asked to find all the ingredients to produce saccharin. He spent months searching through chemical engineering indexes and journals to find one ingredient for which he only knew the characteristics but not its name. This helped inspire within him the concept that information should be better indexed and that faster retrieval methods should be available. Shortly thereafter, he was asked to participate in a classified project at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he helped develop a system for mechanically encoding key words to help find specific pieces of information within large documents, the precursor of today’s Internet search engines. He became interested in free-field searching and realized the need for vocabulary control, especially when dealing with automated processing. In 1955, Allen took a job at Case Western Reserve’s (now Western Reserve University) Center for Documentation and Communication Research. There he worked on an elaborate coding system that involved “telegraphic abstracts”; this system included rules to aid in the retrieval of information from documents. He helped establish the Mark I Information Retrieval Service based on the Western Reserve University System in 1960 and became involved in a pilot program to study the feasibility of a mechanized information service for educational research materials, which led to the development of ERIC. When Allen was at Western Reserve University, he played a major role in creating the first academic program of mechanized information retrieval, initially based on using 80 column punched cards and later utilizing the newer reelto-reel magnetic tape technology. In 1959, he wrote an article for Harper’s Magazine titled “A Machine That Does Research,” which was among the very first articles in the national popular press that described to Americans how their lives would soon be changed by electronic information technology. Allen joined the University of Pittsburgh in 1963 to teach courses and perform research in information science at the School of Library Science (now the School of Information Sciences). Soon after coming to the University of Pittsburgh, he developed and became director of the Knowledge Availability Systems Center (KASC). KASC became one of six NASA technology transfer centers in the United States with the goal of transferring NASA-developed technology to the private sector using computer-based storage and retrieval methods. KASC also offered technical solutions to private industry by searching electronic databases offered by organizations other than NASA such as Chemical Abstracts. His first book, Textbook on Mechanized Information Retrieval, was published in 1962 and used in his course “Mechanized Information Retrieval” at the University of Pittsburgh. In 1968, he created and became chairman of the Interdisciplinary Department of Information Science at Pitt, and in 1970 he was named director of the Office of Communication Programs. During his career at Pitt, he served as an advisor to the Kennedy White House regarding the creation of a national information storage and retrieval network. Allen was a prolific writer and editor. In addition to publishing many journal articles, he created and co-edited the Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science, the © 2014 ASIS&T