Niagara Falls and the Origins of Computer Algebra

Abstract

The present note intends to show some connections arising from an investigation around the origins of Computer Algebra, which starts from the first explicit appearances of this field in the decade of the 80’s of the past century, takes us back to previous work done by Charles Babbage and the Spanish engineer Torres–Quevedo in relation to their analytic and algebraic machines, runs briefly through Kempe’s work on universal linkages, and ends up in the Canadian shore of the Niagara Falls, relatively close to Waterloo (ON), birthplace of some relevant decisions  concerning the development of the Computer Algebra research community and home of the mathematical software Maple.