Turck Model 510 Comptometer
date: label: date made
content: 1916
name: label: maker
content: Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company
notes: label: Description
content: In the early 20th century, inventors strove to adapt a variety of adding machines to electrical power sources. This experimental model represents an early attempt of Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company to do this for the Comptometer.
label: Description
content: This full-keyboard non-printing adding machine has a metal case, painted black. It has seven columns of digit keys and eight recording wheels for results. A single column of nine blue plastic keys is on the left. Complementary digits are indicated on the keys. The keys are alternately concave (odd digits) and flat (even digits). Subtraction levers are just in front of the keys, then a row of seven decimal markers, and, in front of these, a row of eight windows. An “ADD. / MULT.” lever is at the back left of the machine. A zeroing lever is on the right side, and a crank at the back is used to provide power.
label: Description
content: When the machine is set on “mult.,” one presses a number to be multiplied on the black and white keys, and the digit by which it is to be multiplied, on the blue keys. One then turns the crank at the back a number of times equal to the multiplier (alternately, this crank could be turned by an outside motor). When one has completed the sequence, all the keys pop up. In adding, one presses down a number to be added, turns the crank at the back entering the number, presses down another number, and turns the crank to complete the addition (again, the turning of the crank could be replaced by the action of a motor). This machine was never produced, although the “rock frame” was used in the Model H Comptometer and became a standard feature of later Comptometers.
label: Description
content: The model was in the collections of Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company and donated to the Smithsonian by the successor firm of Victor Comptometer Corporation.
label: Description
content: References:
label: Description
content: Felt & Tarrant, Accession Journal 1991.3107.06. The machine is Catalogue No. 75.
label: Description
content: U.S. Patent 1371954, granted to J. A. V. Turck on March 15, 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.323645
label: catalog number
content: 323645
label: accession number
content: 250163
objectType: label: Object Name
content: adding machine
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: steel (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: plastic (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 12 cm x 26 cm x 31 cm; 4 23/32 in x 10 1/4 in x 12 7/32 in