Rabinow Scanned Comparison Reading Machine
date: label: date made
content: 1954
name: label: maker
content: Rabinow, Jacob
notes: label: Description
content: The Ukrainian-born inventor Jacob Rabinow (1910-1999) came to the United States with his parents as a child – the family settled in New York City. Rabinow was educated in the New York City public schools and studied engineering at the City University of New York. He spent much of his career at the National Bureau of Standards, working with a variety of other government agencies. For a few years, he served as a technical advisor to the Diamond Ordnance Fuze Laboratories, working on a device that might transform printed characters and other visual patterns into electronic signals. By 1954, he was ready to prepare a report on this device, what was called a reading scanning machine. This is a small part of the device. The typewriter is at the center, with the reader behind it. Above these is a display panel, below are three memory circuits. A metal frame with a wooden stand provides support.
label: Description
content: Rabinow would go on to take out over 200 U.S. patents and to take a continuing interest in optical character recognition.
label: Description
content: References:
label: Description
content: J. Rabinow, <I>Report on DOFL First Reader</I>, DOFL Report TR-128, Washington, D.C.: Diamond Ordnance Fuze Laboratories, 1954.
label: Description
content: Jacob Rabinow Interview, November 23,1970, Computer History Collection, Archives Center, National Museum of American History.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: District of Columbia, Washington
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Computers
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Jacob Rabinow
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1982.0393.01
label: catalog number
content: 1982.0393.01
label: accession number
content: 1982.0393
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Scanner
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 196 cm x 55 cm x 77 cm; 77 5/32 in x 21 21/32 in x 30 5/16 in