Noah Webster

Hartford, CT was a reluctant assignment except for the tour of Webster House. Noah Webster began work on the modern dictionary at the age of fifty, almost coincident with a religious conversion, and continued for thirty-five years until his death.

was there a connection between the conversion and the work?

Webster understood the concept of memes and believed that language could control the "unruly nature of man". Standardized language reduced miscommunication and transaction costs across the entire economy, and probably led to more homogeneous American culture.

In a sense, Webster created a major aspect of today's software industry (programming languages, search engines, semantic analysis) over 150 years ago.