Alan Turing

1912 – 1954 · died at about 42^[1][2]

Science & Invention

Fun Facts About Alan Turing

• Alan Turing buried two silver bars near Bletchley Park during World War II, then could not break his own code describing where he had hidden them. He never recovered the silver.^[1]
• Turing was a marathoner of world-class standard who sometimes ran 40 miles to London for meetings. His 1948 Olympic trial time was only 11 minutes slower than the Olympic silver medalist's.^[1]
• To fight hay fever, Turing cycled to work in a gas mask. Rather than fix his bike's slipping chain, he counted pedal turns and reset the chain by hand in time.^[1]
• Turing chained his mug to the radiator pipes at Bletchley Park so that nobody would steal it.^[1]
• When Turing and fellow codebreakers wrote directly to Winston Churchill asking for resources, Churchill ordered "ACTION THIS DAY" and top priority for their needs.^[1][3][4]
• Turing wrote a chess program before a computer could run it, so he played it by hand, following the algorithm on paper at about half an hour per move.^[1]
• Frida Kahlo and Alan Turing died five weeks apart in 1954.^[1][2][5][6]
• Alan Turing was alive at the same time as Theodore Roosevelt — their lives overlapped for 7 years (1912–1919).^[1][2][7][8]

Alan Mathison Turing was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher and theoretical biologist. He was highly influential in the development of theoretical computer science, providing a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with the Turing machine, which can be considered a model of a general-purpose computer. Turing is widely considered to be the father of theoretical computer science.^[1]

Contemporaries

Winston Churchill

42 yr overlap

Carl Jung

42 yr overlap

Albert Einstein

42 yr overlap

Pablo Picasso

42 yr overlap

Alexander Fleming

42 yr overlap

Igor Stravinsky

42 yr overlap

Coco Chanel

42 yr overlap

Diego Rivera

42 yr overlap

Niels Bohr

42 yr overlap

Erwin Schrödinger

42 yr overlap

Georgia O'Keeffe

42 yr overlap

Charlie Chaplin

42 yr overlap

Their World

Questions About Alan Turing

When was Alan Turing born?

Alan Turing was born on June 23, 1912, and died on June 7, 1954.

How old was Alan Turing at death?

Alan Turing was born on June 23, 1912, and died on June 7, 1954, at age 41.

What was Alan Turing known for?

Alan Turing was known for: Father of computer science, codebreaker. Alan Mathison Turing was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher and theoretical biologist. He was highly influential in the development of theoretical computer science, providing a formalisation of the concepts of algorithm and computation with the Turing machine, which can be considered a model of a general-purpose computer. Turing is widely considered to be the father of theoretical computer science.

Who was alive at the same time as Alan Turing?

Alan Turing's closest contemporary was Winston Churchill. Their lives overlapped for 42 years.