Wooden Box Model Comptometer
date: label: date made
content: 1887
name: label: maker
content: Felt & Foster
notes: label: Description
content: This key-driven non-printing adding machine has eight columns of metal keys with nine keys in each column. It is an early production model of an adding machine designed by Dorr E. Felt of Chicago.
label: Description
content: The keys in each column are stamped with the digits from 1 to 9 and the digits are painted white. No complementary digits are indicated, and the key tops are flat and entirely of metal. There is a spring around each key stem and the key stem passes through the key top. The stems become progressively longer as the digits become larger. The case is of cherry. The lower part of the metal plate on the front side is missing. Nine windows in the upper part of this plate reveal digits on nine number wheels that indicate totals. A zeroing lever and knob are on the right side of the machine. There are no decimal markers or subtraction levers.
label: Description
content: A metal tag screwed to the top of the machine behind the keyboard reads: FELT & FOSTER (/) CHICAGO (/) PAT’D JULY 19.87.OCT 11.87. A label received with the machine indicates that it was used by Mr. G. W. Martin in offices of the Chicago Gas Company from 1887 to 1903.
label: Description
content: A metal model tag stored with the object reads: 3. Photographs in the Accession Journal of Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company indicate that machine #3 in that collection was rather different, resembling more closely a wooden box Comptometer in the Smithsonian collections with catalog number MA.273035.
label: Description
content: References: U.S. Patents 366945 and 371496.
label: Description
content: Felt & Tarrant, Accession Journal, 1991.3107.06.
label: Description
content: J. A. V. Turck, <I>Origin of Modern Calculating Machines</I>, Chicago: Western Society of Engineers, 1921.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Illinois, Chicago
topic: label: Subject
content: Mathematics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
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content: Adding Machines
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content: Science & Mathematics
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Victor Comptometer Corporation
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MA.323648
label: catalog number
content: 323648
label: accession number
content: 250163
objectType: label: Object Name
content: adding machine
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: cherry wood (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 12.9 cm x 19.2 cm x 36 cm; 5 3/32 in x 7 9/16 in x 14 3/16 in