William Wallace McDowell

William Wallace McDowell, also known as W. Wallace McDowell, (1906–1985) was American Engineer, who worked for IBM and became vice president and spent his entire 38-year career at IBM. He was a pivotal IBM engineering executive who successfully steered the company's transition from electromechanical punch-card machines to the era of electronic computing, and he managed the development of the company's first commercial electronic computers.

The W. Wallace McDowell Award of the IEEE is named in his honor.

Career McDowell studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) where he received his bachelor's degree in Engineering Management in 1930. That same year he joined IBM, where he first worked in the sales department, but by 1931 as a developer he had switched to the engineering laboratory in Endicott, New York. In 1936 he became assistant to the Vice President of IBM, and in 1939, Assistant Manager of Engineering. In 1942 he became Manager of the engineering laboratory in Endicott, and in 1950, IBM Director of Engineering. In 1954 he became Vice President of IBM. He retired in 1968 as Resident Vice President (a position he had held since 1960).