Gerald Lawson a.k.a "Jerry" passed away April 9th, 2011. Jerry was the creator of the world's first cartridge-based video game system, the Fairchild Channel F. Gerald was born & raised in Queens, NY & attended Queens college. In the early 1970's, he was the Chief Hardware Engineer and director of engineering and marketing for Fairchild's video game division. Jerry was in charge of all the new cartridges, how they were made, and what the games were. Lawson created one of the original arcade games, Demolition Derby, in his garage 1972. This game was later placed in a pizzeria in California. He founded Videosoft, a video game development company which made software for the Atari 2600 in the early 1980s, as the 2600 had displaced the Channel F as the top system in the market.
Lawson was the sole black member of the Homebrew Computer Club, a group of early computer hobbyists which would produce a number of industry legends, including Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Lawson later worked with the Stanford mentor program and was preparing to write a book on his career. At the time of his death, he resided in Santa Clara, CA.
