In my first year FORTRAN or cards as you say then the University department bought a mini and used BASIC.
Looking back, the EECS department was actually a pretty active center for computer-related research. But computers weren't widely-used elsewhere at the time.
Then years later as a college freshman during the dot com boom I got my first job writing VB. Literally changed my life and put me on a path where I was able to be better off than my parents.
This leads to the statement : F0R X=1 T0 1OO.
Was it really that way back(wards) in 1964?
Additional citation hunting from 2020 when the BASIC manual was shared & discussed here:
The expression you're looking for is “the legacy of BASIC on our industry can hardly be overstated.” You're trying to say its legacy is huge; whatever anyone says, it won't be an overstatement. If it “couldn't be understated”, however insignificant one said it is, that would still be true. That wasn't what you meant, was it?
(And yes, that means user emptiestplace’s comment didn't deserve to be downvoted into oblivion.)
The legacy of BASIC on our industry can hardly be understated. The language and its mission at Dartmouth was innovative.
BASIC had immeasurable secondary effects simply by being the first programming language so many new computer users were exposed to (particularly near the dawn of personal computers).
Edit: I got sucked into some nostalgia.
Here's the 1964 edition of the Dartmouth BASIC reference: http://web.archive.org/web/20120716185629/http://www.bitsave...
It's really charming, and I think it gives you a bit of the feel for the time.
(I also particularly like, on page 21, the statement "TYPING IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR THINKING".)