{"id":755,"date":"2011-04-11T14:53:39","date_gmt":"2011-04-11T19:53:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/?p=755"},"modified":"2013-02-04T17:16:51","modified_gmt":"2013-02-04T22:16:51","slug":"jerry-lawson-1940-2011","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/archives\/755\/jerry-lawson-1940-2011","title":{"rendered":"Jerry Lawson (1940-2011)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jerry Lawson creator of Fairchild Channel F and Black Video Game Pioneer<\/a>In Memoriam: Gerald A. Lawson (1940-2011)<\/a>, black video game pioneer.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

I am very saddened to announce the passing of a truly important figure in the history of video games. Jerry Lawson<\/a> died Saturday morning, April 9th, 2011, at the age of 70.<\/p>\n

Lawson was notable not only for being a rare African American electronic engineer in Silicon Valley, but also for leading the team<\/a> that created the world’s first ROM cartridge-based video game console. I speak, of course, of the Fairchild Channel F, which hit the market in August 1976.<\/p>\n

Lawson did an interview<\/a> for this site in 2009, and I am proud to say that the feature brought this amazing man some long overdue recognition. The IGDA honored Lawson’s contributions to the industry<\/a> during an informal session at this year’s Game Developer’s Conference on March 4th, 2011.<\/p>\n

I heard the news of Lawson’s death only this afternoon from David Erhart, a personal friend of Lawson. Erhart tells me that he and Lawson were planning to go to a ham radio swap meet Saturday morning, but he received a call from Jerry’s wife on Friday night telling him that Lawson was in the ICU. The next morning, his wife phoned Erhart again to say that Lawson had died.<\/p>\n

The cause of death is unknown to me at the moment, but I do know that Lawson struggled with severe diabetes for years. An obituary for Jerry is in the works, and I will post an update whenever I receive it (or a link to it).<\/p>\n

Rest in peace, Jerry. Thank you for all you’ve done for us. History will not forget your name.<\/p>\n

[Update (04\/14\/2011)<\/strong> – David Erhart was told by Lawson’s family that Lawson died of a heart attack. “He was feeling bad Wednesday afternoon\/night as was taken to the hospital,” Erhart wrote in an email. “He then died at 6:15am Saturday morning.” This New York Times obituary<\/a> quotes Lawson’s wife as saying that Lawson died from “complications of diabetes.”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Memoriam: Gerald A. Lawson (1940-2011), black video game pioneer. I am very saddened to announce the passing of a truly important figure in the history of video games. Jerry Lawson died Saturday morning, April 9th, 2011, at the age of 70. Lawson was notable not only for being a rare African American electronic engineer […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,42,21,27,9],"tags":[370,375,374,373,340],"class_list":["post-755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-video-game-info-and-history","category-memorials","category-news-current-events","category-regular_features","category-retrogaming","tag-black-history","tag-channel-f","tag-fairchild","tag-jerry-lawson","tag-memorials"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vintagecomputing.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}