Japanese Proportional Dividers
date: label: date made
content: before 1876
notes: label: Description
content: These brass dividers have metal points, short at one end and longer at the other. The legs are slotted to allow a brass set screw to be placed at one of several positions on two proportional scales that are engraved on one of the legs. The scales are labeled with Japanese characters, but they are presumably for drawing lines and circles at different ratios.
label: Description
content: The Japanese Empire Department of Education displayed this instrument at the 1876 World's Fair, the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia, in order to demonstrate its nation's modernity and progress. In fact, the Department of Education had just been established in 1870 to replace an Educational Board and assume a more active role in the management of primary, middle, and secondary schools. John Eaton, the U.S. Commissioner of Education, arranged for the transfer of the entire exhibit in which these dividers appeared to the Bureau of Education (then part of the Department of the Interior) for a planned museum. The museum closed in 1906 due to high maintenance costs, and much of the collection was transferred to the Smithsonian in 1910.
label: Description
content: Other educational mathematical objects exhibited by Japan in 1876 include MA.261301, MA.261305, and MA.261306.
label: Description
content: References: Michael Scott-Scott, <i>Drawing Instruments</i> (Aylesbury, England: Shire Publications Ltd., 1986), 14–15; Japan. Department of Education, <i>An Outline History of Japanese Education: Prepared for the Philadelphia International Exhibition, 1876 </i> (New York: D. Appleton, 1876), 121–122, 191–202; U.S. Centennial Commission, <i>International Exhibition, 1876. Reports and Awards </i>, ed. Francis A. Walker (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1880), viii:143, 335; U.S. Bureau of Education, <i>Annual Report of the Commissioner </i> (1876), ccxi–ccxii.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: Japan
topic: label: Subject
content: Mathematics
label: Subject
content: Dividers, Proportional
label: Subject
content: Education
label: Subject
content: Expositions and Fairs
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
label: See more items in
content: Science & Mathematics
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content: Dividers and Compasses
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Transfer from Bureau of Education, Department of the Interior
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: MA.261313
label: accession number
content: 51116
label: catalog number
content: 261313
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Proportional Dividers
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: steel (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: brass (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1.7 cm x 17.2 cm x 1.5 cm; 21/32 in x 6 25/32 in x 19/32 in