Meet Jerry Lawson: The Father of the Console

Story by Iremide Stephen. Photos courtesy of Famous People.

Gerald "Jerry" Lawson was the first African American to create video games. According to CNET, Jerry Lawson was a pioneer of modern gaming who, while one of the few Black men in the industry at the time, led the team that developed the first home video gaming system with interchangeable game cartridges.

Jerry Lawson had a portrait of a scientist George Washington Carver hung next to his desk, which inspired him to become an inventor. Lawson first encountered computers while working at Federal Electric ITT and PDR Electronics in New York. Lawson, a black Silicon Valley engineer, changed the path of the video game industry by helping create game cartridges. A cartridge is a removable case containing a magnetic tape of one or more disks and used as a computer storage medium.

Lawson brought interchangeable video games into people’s homes with the invention of the Fairchild Channel. He joined Silicon Valley’s Homebrew Computer Club in the 1970’s and during his tenure with the club, was its only Black member.

Iremide Stephen is an 8th grade scholar at Friendship Armstrong Middle School.