"I just wondered how things were put together." ~~ Claude E Shannon:

Claude Shannon Claude Elwood Shannon, a mathematician born in Gaylord, Michigan (U.S.) in 1916, is credited with two important contributions to information technology: the application of Boolean theory to electronic switching, thus laying the groundwork for the digital computer, and developing the new field called information theory. It is difficult to overstate the impact which Claude Shannon has had on the 20th century and the way we live and work in it, yet he remains practically unknown to the general public. Shannon spent the bulk of his career, a span of over 30 years from 1941 to 1972, at Bell Labs where he worked as a mathematician dedicated to research.