[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 4 (Tuesday, January 15, 2013)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E27]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               HONORING THE LIFE OF JOHN C. HAMMERSLOUGH

                                 ______
                                 

                          HON. JAMES A. HIMES

                             of connecticut

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, January 15, 2013

  Mr. HIMES. Mr. Speaker, it is with heavy heart that I rise today to 
pay tribute to a good friend and outstanding community leader, John 
Hammerslough.
  His passing marks the end of an era in Weston, Connecticut and the 
loss of a dear friend to many across Connecticut.
  John was a fixture in Weston's civic community for half a century, 
died on January 2 after a brief illness. He was 84 years old and had 
lived in Weston with his wife Nancy since 1959.
  John understood the importance of serving the public and at one point 
or another he was a member of Weston's Board of Selectmen, the Board of 
Finance, the Police Commission, among other roles, and was active in 
local, state and national political campaigns. Along with his wife, he 
was named ``Democrat of the Year'' in 2009 by the Democratic Town 
Committee, and the town of Weston proclaimed May 11, 2009, as ``John 
and Nancy Hammerslough Day.''
  John Hammerslough was a pioneer in the emerging field of computer-
driven analysis of financial securities. His role as director of 
computer research at Shields & Co. was unusual enough at the time that 
The New York Times profiled him and ``his electronic computer'' in June 
1967. The computer, the article noted, ``is no bigger than an office 
desk.''
  John Hammerslough was born in New York City in 1928, the son of 
Charles R. Hammerslough, a clothier and sometime theatrical producer, 
and the former Sylvia Rittenberg. He attended the Bronx School of 
Science and the Taft School, and graduated from Brown University.
  After college, he entered the army and served in the Korean War, 
first as an infantryman and later as a public information officer. The 
experience spurred him in later years to speak out against American 
involvement in Vietnam and, more recently, against the invasion of 
Iraq.
  Although Mr. Hammerslough was involved in the financial securities 
business for nearly half a century, he did not immediately go to work 
on Wall Street as a young man. Rather, his experience as a writer and 
audio producer for the army during the Korean War led him to join CBS 
as part of its fledgling television news operation.
  After a stint in the news business, he returned to school to do post-
graduate work in mathematics at New York University, which led him to 
Wall Street, where his specialty was the use of computer analysis for 
valuing securities. His group at Shields & Co. operated the first 
computer at a Wall Street firm dedicated solely to investment research. 
He continued to focus on computer-assisted financial research through 
the 1970s.
  Of his work, Mr. Hammerslough told the New York Times in 1967: ``The 
computer is suggestive rather than dictatorial. It's loaded with 
technique, but it has no judgment. The machine, therefore, represents 
an extension of our intelligence.''
  Since the early 1980s, Mr. Hammerslough worked as a financial expert 
in litigation support, providing advice and testimony in more than 
1,000 matters involving securities and alleged violations of securities 
law.
  A devoted Westonite, he was a familiar figure not only at Town Hall 
but also at the town center, where he could be seen most mornings 
drinking coffee with friends and talking politics and sports, at 
holiday parades and celebrations, where he sold ice cream and handed 
out buttons for the Democratic Party, and along the roads near his 
home, where he enjoyed walking his beloved dog.
  I join all of his friends and colleagues in extending my deepest 
sympathies to John's wife Nancy, his son, Charles, daughter, Jane, and 
four grandchildren Phin, Alex, Zach and Shira.

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