Jerry Lawson

Gerald Anderson Lawson (December 1, 1940 – April 9, 2011) was an American electronic engineer. Besides being one of the first African-American computer engineers in Silicon Valley, Lawson was also known for his work in designing the Fairchild Channel F video game console, leading the team that refined ROM cartridges for durable use as commercial video game cartridges. His innovations in this area led to him being considered the father of the game cartridge. He eventually left Fairchild and founded the game company Video-Soft.

Early life Lawson was born in Brooklyn, New York City, on December 1, 1940. His parents ensured he received a good education and encouraged his interests in scientific hobbies, including ham radio and chemistry. In addition, Lawson said that his first-grade teacher encouraged him on his path to be someone influential, similar to George Washington Carver. Completed in early 1975 using Fairchild's new F8 microprocessors, Demolition Derby was among the earliest microprocessor-driven games.

In the mid-1970s, Lawson was made Chief Hardware Engineer and Director of Engineering and Marketing for Fairchild's video game division. The Channel F console featured a variety of controls, including a new 8-way joystick designed by Lawson and a "pause" button, which was a first for a home video game console. The Channel F was not successful commercially but the cartridge approach was popularized with the Atari 2600 released in 1977.

While he was with Fairchild, Lawson was a member of the Homebrew Computer Club, a group of early computer hobbyists that included several who became well-known including Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Videosoft did not release any games, although their incomplete titles were saved and distributed to collectors in 2010. Videosoft closed about five years later, and Lawson started to take on consulting work. At one point, he worked with Stevie Wonder to produce a "Wonder Clock" that would wake a child with the sound of a parent's voice, though it never made it to production. On April 9, 2011, about one month after being honored by the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), he died of complications from diabetes. In March 2011, Lawson was honored as an industry pioneer for his work on the game cartridge concept by the International Game Developers Association (IGDA).

There is a permanent display of Lawson's contribution to the gaming industry at the World Video Game Hall of Fame at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York.

The Los Angeles Unified School District named Elementary School #11 Gerald A. Lawson Academy of the Arts, Mathematics and Science.

A short documentary on Lawson and his development of the Fairchild Channel F was produced by The Czar of Black Hollywood director Bayer Mack and released by Block Starz Music Television as part of its Profiles of African-American Success video series. He was also featured in the first episode of the Netflix limited-series documentary High Score, released August 19, 2020, with his story told by his children Karen and Anderson.

The first episode of Season 6 of Command Line Heroes, "Jerry Lawson: The Engineer Who Changed the Game", covers his work on the Channel F. Lawson is also prominently featured in the second episode of the second season of History's The Toys That Built America, "The Birth of Video Games" along with other pioneers of the early video game industry Nolan Bushnell and Ralph Baer.

University of Southern California's Games Program and Take-Two Interactive established the Gerald A. Lawson Fund in May 2021 to support black and indigenous students enrolled in the university's programming seeking careers in the video game industry. Microsoft also began contributing to the fund in August 2021.

The interactive Google Doodle game on December 1, 2022, was dedicated to Lawson to celebrate what would have been his 82nd birthday, allowing the user to make games, edit existing built-in games, and share games. On June 9, 2023, Norman Caruso's YouTube series The Gaming Historian profiled Lawson and the birth of the Fairchild Channel F video game system in its episode, "The Story of the First Video Game Cartridge."