The early history of metacompilers is closely tied with the history of SIG/PLAN Working group 1 on Syntax Driven Compilers. The group was started primarily through the effort of Howard Metcalfe in the Los Angeles area. In the fall of 1962 Howard Metcalfe designed two compiler-writing interpreters. One used a bottom-to-top analysis technique based on a method described by Ledley and Wilson. The other used a top-to-bottom approach based on a work by Glennie to generate random English sentences from a context-free grammar.