Locke Adder
date: label: date made
content: 1901
name: label: maker
content: C. E. Locke Manufacturing Company
notes: label: Description
content: The first American-made adder to enjoy modest commercial success was developed by Clarence E. Locke (1865-1945), a native of Edgerton, Wisconsin, who graduated from Cornell College in Mt. Vernon, Iowa, in 1892. Locke worked for a time as a civil engineer in Minnesota, and then joined his father in operating a lumberyard in Kensett, Iowa.
label: Description
content: This early version of the device has a wooden base with grooves for nine sliding metal rods that move crosswise. Each rod represents a digit of a number being added. Protruding knobs on the rods represent different numerals. The rods are held in place by a metal cover that extends over about a third of the right top, and by a metal bracket on the left side. When the device is in zero position, all the rods are in their rightmost position. Numbers are entered by sliding rods to the left, and the result appears in numbers immediately to the left of the metal cover. There is no carry mechanism. The cover is brown, not black or silver-colored as in later Locke adders.
label: Description
content: The instrument is marked on the cover: C.E. LOCKE (/) MFG. Co. It is also marked: KENSETT, IOWA. [/] U.S.A. This example came to the Smithsonian from the collection of Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company (later Victor Comptometer Corporation).
label: Description
content: References: Robert Otnes, “Sliding Bar Calculators,” <I>ETCetera</I> #11 (June 1990): pp. 6-8.
label: Description
content: P. Kidwell, “Adders made and Used in the United States,” <I>Rittenhouse</I>, 8, (1994): pp. 78-96.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Iowa, Kensett
topic: label: Subject
content: Mathematics
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Mathematics
label: See more items in
content: Adder
label: See more items in
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.323620
label: catalog number
content: 323620
label: accession number
content: 250163
objectType: label: Object Name
content: adder
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: metal (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: wood (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 1.5 cm x 28.4 cm x 11.1 cm; 19/32 in x 11 3/16 in x 4 3/8 in