Norman Woodland, the inventor of bar code died at 91

Norman Woodland, the inventor of bar code, which revolutionalised retail in 70s, died at 91 on 8 December 2012 at New Jersey. He died because of complications resulting due to Alzheimer’s disease. He is survived by his wife (61), two daughters, one brother and granddaughters.

Woodland was the co-inventor of bar code; the zebra pattern which stores information about the products.  He as well as his partner Bernard Silver (who died in 1963) patented this idea of bar code back in 1952 and also sold that to Philco, the electronics company for 15000 US dollar.

About Norman Woodland

•Woodland was mechanical engineer.
•He worked at IBM for around 35 years.
•He worked with the team that had developed laser scanner which could read bar codes during the 70’s.
•For his invention, Woodland was also awarded National Medal of Technology in 1992.

How did the bar code come up?

Woodland along with his partner Silver started working on a project which eventually led to bar code. At that time, they taught at Drexel University in Philadelphia. They developed bar code after the head of one supermarket asked for a way of keeping a better record of the inventory. Woodland thought if Morse Code was useful in tracking inventory and then he started drawing lines of varied thickness on sand. That is how the code came up and is today known as Universal Product Code (UPC). First bar code scan occurred on 26 June 1974 in Troy, Ohio.

Today, there are 5 billion products which are scanned optically with the help of bar code or UPC. The laser scanner which is handheld is today used in industrial, transportation as well as shipping industries across the world. Today, the bar code saves countless hours of shoppers in the supermarkets.