New York: Today’s Google doodle is dedicated to Gerald “Jerry” Lawson, one of the fathers of modern gaming who led the team that developed the first home video gaming system with interchangeable game cartridges.

Google’s December 1 doodle features games that were designed by three American guest artists and designers Davionne Gooden, Lauren Brown, and Momo Pixel.

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. For his contribution during video games’ early days, Lawson has been dubbed “father of the video game cartridge.”

Lawson was born in Brooklyn, New York on December 1, 1940. He tinkered with electronics from an early age, repairing televisions around his neighborhood and creating his own radio station using recycled parts. He attended Queens College and City College of New York before departing early to start his career in Palo Alto, California. At the time, the city and its surrounding region had become known as “Silicon Valley” due to the explosion of new, innovative tech companies starting up in the area.

After attending Queens College and City College of New York, Lawson moved to California and joined Silicon Valley pioneer Fairchild Semiconductor in 1970 as an applications engineering consultant.

While at Fairchild, Lawson created Demolition Derby, a coin-operated arcade game that was one of the first games to be powered by a microprocessor.

After Lawson left Fairchild, he started his own company, VideoSoft in 1980. It was one of the first Black-owned video game development companies. The company created software for the Atari 2600 that popularised the cartridge created by Lawson and his team.