John E. Karlin, a researcher at Bell Labs, studied ways to make the telephone easier to use. (Image from the NY Times, courtesy of Alcatel-Lucent USA)
John Karlin, an early researcher in behavioral science at Bell Labs, was considered the father of human factors engineering. The NY Times obituary (John E. Karlin, Who Led the Way to All-Digit Dialing, Dies at 94) is a fascinating history of usability research.
