Samuel Simon Snyder

Samuel Simon Snyder (August 18, 1911 – December 28, 2007 ) was a cryptographer for the United States Government. and other computing systems such as Harvest, one of the earliest general-purpose computers made with IBM. After spending 30 years at the National Security Agency, he worked at the Library of Congress, and he held a Defense Department Meritorious Civilian Service Award and The Washington Post's "Ideal Father of the Year" award for 1949.

Personal life Samuel Snyder married Patricia Yakerson Snyder in 1935; Patricia died in 1996.

He left behind 4 children, 9 grandchildren, and 5 great-grandchildren. Snyder's eldest son, named Sol and a professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine as of 2008, remembered Samuel Snyder's "knack for math and science" and that he spent his last years "basking in his passion for music". Sol's elder sister Elaine Hodges (d. 2006) , then 12 years old, described Samuel Snyder as a "mathematician, artist, scientist, house cleaner, sewer, dog harness maker, dog bather, can play the clarinet, saxophone, piccolo, story writer, [and the] best father in the world" in a letter to the Washington Post asking that Snyder be named the Post’s “Ideal Father”; he was awarded that designation in 1949.

Books

History of NSA General-Purpose Electronic Digital Computers, Samuel S. Snyder, National Security Agency, 1964.