Jacob Rabinow was born in the Russian Ukraine as Yakov Aaronovich Rabinovich in 1910. The Russian Revolution forced his family out of Russia and into China, where his father died. In 1921 Rabinow, with his mother and brother, settled in Brooklyn, New York.

Rabinow received a B.S. in electrical engineering from the City College of New York in 1933, and in 1938 he began work as a mechanical engineer at the U.S. government Bureau of Standards. He left the Bureau of Standards in 1954 and started the to develop his reading machines. He sold the company to Control Data Corporation in 1964, staying on as the company's vice president from 1964 to 1972. In 1972 he returned to the government Bureau of Standards, where he is still employed.

Rabinow has received numerous awards and honors, including a Certificate of Merit from President Truman in 1948 for his war-time efforts. In 1980 he was named Scientist of the...