Findex Punch Cards
date: label: date made
content: 1970s
notes: label: Description
content: These two identical paper cards are blanks intended for use with the Findex filing system. Each has a 10x10 array of round holes corresponding to teacher skills and characteristics. When a job candidate could teach a certain topic (e.g. art, piano, voice), had a certain level of education, was interested in teaching at a certain level or in a particular state, was of a certain religion, or was married, holes were punched sto create an elongated punch where there had been two round ones. This meant that if Southern Teachers' Agency staff sought someone with specific characteristices, they could be located by the system. In addition to holes, the cards have blank lines on which users wrote in the teaching positions obtained by teachers and such information as a candidate"s age, height, weight, marital status, and certification.
label: Description
content: Both cards are marked: Walthers (/) Patented. They also are both marked: FINDEX Milwaukee (/) Form 78-0710. The Walthers mentioned is probably the Wisconsin engineer William K. Walthers who acquired Findex in the 1920s but found the manufacture of model trains more lucrative. By 1958, Walthers was selling the Findex from William K. Wathers, Inc., of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
label: Description
content: Reference:
label: Description
content: Robert S. Casey, James W. Perry, Madeline M. Berry, and Allen Kent (editors), <I>Punched Cards Their Applications to Science and Industry </I>, New York: Reinhold Publishing, 1958, pp. 47-49.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Wisconsin, Milwaukee
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Carey Goodman, Southern Teachers Agency
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2024.0014.04
label: catalog number
content: 2024.0014.04
label: accession number
content: 2024.0014
objectType: label: Object Name
content: punch cards
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 6 in x 8 in; 15.24 cm x 20.32 cm