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Until Canada's centennial in 1967, Ottawa did double duty as national capitol of Canada and territorial capitol of the Northwest Territories (NWT). In that year, Yellowknife was named the new NWT capitol and all legal and administrative functions were moved from Ottawa to Yellowknife. The Government of the Northwest Territories (GNWT) provided more local autonomy and swelled Yellowknife's population with government employees. To house those employees, the GNWT leased privately-managed apartments and detached housing, offering them to employees for a fixed monthly rate: $115 for a furnished one bedroom apartment in 1974, $100 without furniture.
By 1974, the GNWT was already on its second computer by the time I arrived. An IBM mainframe, System 370 Model 125, had replaced the smallest System 360 (Model 20). The 370/125 had 192 KB of memory, some 3330 DASD, a card reader and 1403 line printer. The operator console had the only monitor, and the only interactive application was the IBM program that told their service staff how to clean the printer.
The operating system was DOS/VS Release 33, with a non-paging (VS = Virtual Storage) version of POWER, the job and print spooling package. PL/I was the Installation Standard programming language and TOTAL the database, but most of the programs were still in RPG II, having recently been converted from the 360/20. There were also COBOL and FORTRAN compilers available. DYL-250 was replaced with DYL-260 while I was there: a non-IBM combination Sort package and report writer. Because all IBM software and hardware were rented, two 3410 tape drives were replaced with four half-speed models for about the same price.
The brain strains to remember everyone, but here is a start:
| Name | Position | Came From | Went to |
| Ed Oldridge | Systems Analyst | Alberta Gas Trunk Line in Calgary | Saskatchewan Technical Institute in Moose Jaw |
| Peter Hart | Applications Manager | Ontario Hydro | |
| Jim Frances | CIO | ||
| Al (championship curler) | Operations Manager | ||
| Sheila Hart | Systems Analyst | ||
| Ken Kawasaki | Programmer | University of Manitoba (student) | Workers' Compensation Board - Alberta in Edmonton |
| Jon Pearkins | Programmer, 7 levels underfill | University of British Columbia (student) | University of Alberta, Edmonton |
| Brian Hoyt | Programmer | University of Victoria (student) | Nova, Calgary |
| Bob Johnson | Systems Programmer | BC Tel, Vancouver | a private computer company in Yellowknife |
| Charles West | Systems Analyst | Sears, Toronto | Nova, Calgary |
| Dave | Programmer | Ottawa (school) | |
| John | Operator | UBC in Vancouver as a student | |
| Elaine (?) | Operator | Edmonton Catholic School Board |
Jon Pearkins
January 11, 2007