The Imagineers of War: The Untold Story of DARPA, the Pentagon Agency That Changed the World

by Sharon Weinberger

Back in the 1970s, Donchin might drop in at DARPA to see Lawrence about brain-driven computers, but he would also poke his head in Licklider’s office or chat with other program managers with similar interests. DARPA back then was an open office building, at least for its unclassified projects, and visiting one research manager was an invitation to chat and meet with other officials and swap ideas. “When I came to see Dylan [Schmorrow], there were security people in the lobby,” Donchin said. “I couldn’t speak to anybody about anything except Dylan Schmorrow. It was an amazing transformation.” More shocking for Donchin was that DARPA officials had no idea that the agency had been involved in similar work in the past. “They had zero information about the biocybernetics program,” he said. “DARPA had no capacity for institutional memory. It was very strange.”