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The Tabulator: 1917
... The next model had a clear "celluloid" case! Herman Hollerith This technology was originated by Herman Hollerith, in time for the Census of 1890, and is considered the foundation for ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/27/2012 - 1:20pm -

1917. "Census Bureau, Department of Commerce, tabulating machine." An early punch-card tabulator, a distant forebear of today's computers. Two photos of this monster yet to come. Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size. Linux already bootingWe've brought up the Linux kernel on this machine, but many of the usual device drivers are proving to be a challenge. For further information -- and especially assistance from Linux driver engineers experienced with the peripherals of the era -- please visit: http://tabulator-linux.org/ [I wonder if it needs a bigger cooling fan. - Dave] "I Bring You Peace"Is this what the remake of "Colossus: The Forbin Project" will look like? Or is that the new Mac Pro? It's the new iTabThe next model had a clear "celluloid" case! Herman HollerithThis technology was originated by Herman Hollerith, in time for the Census of 1890, and is considered the foundation for early computer input systems. Two months ago Herman's grandson was elected to be the new presiding bishop for the Episcopal Diocese of Southern Virginia; he came out of Bruton Parish Church in Williamsburg, which itself is Shorpy-worthy. For those who've been, Bruton Parish is the large church in Colonial Williamsburg. Now, how to save this to show "before and after" shots of our lab's cleanup at work.... [Speaking of Bruton Parish Church, my step-grandfather is buried there. - Dave] DOSDOS,The early years. Hollerith CardsPunch cards (more accurately, Hollerith cards) were the same size as the greenbacks of the day, so they could use the same tray feeders and storage bins. There's also a direct relationship between the size of legal paper and 3.5" mini-floppy diskettes. Quite the server rackThey don't make 'em like that anymore. Look at the latch at the bottom of the door. Could hold up as an Apollo airlock. Looks like the machine had given a few years' hard service, from the wear around the base. My first programming experience was Fortran on cards. In the LA high school, they didn't give out cardpunch machines, so you had to mark the cards with a #2 pencil like an SAT test. Encouraged tight code, it did. The vault?Those round pegs along the side of the "door" look like ones you'd see on a vault. Would something like this have been locked in that manner? Or are those "pegs" in fact rollers. Herman HollerithHollerith did not found IBM, T.J. Watson did. When Watson asked Hollerith to help improve the punch card machines, Hollerith said the machines were already perfect and could not be improved. Herman HollerithBesides the card tabulator, Herman Hollerith invented the keypunch machine and other card-handling devices to provide a complete tabulating system. His efforts saved $5 million in conducting the 1890 Census, back when that was a lot of money, and earned him a PhD from Columbia University. His next little accomplishment was founding IBM! IBMStrictly speaking Hollerith didn't found IBM. He started the Tabulating Machine Company, which merged with three other companies to be named the Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation. Thomas J. Watson became the President of CTR in 1924 and renamed it the International Business Machine Company. (Technology, The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing)
THINK: 1941
... indistinct to read. I'm stumped. [They look to be Hollerith tabulators (punch-card machines) made by IBM, a technology that ... IT&T in The Hague. We had to enter our results onto Hollerith cards but the machine to do that with was a lot smaller than the ones ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 09/29/2022 - 11:22am -

December 1941. "Washington apartment house turned into office space for the Foreign Function Bureau." Acetate negative by John Collier, Office of War Information. View full size. StinkI’m sorry but that sign is just a little bit insulting. And what would it say today? Hydrate. De-stress. Work harder. If I could put such signs in the workplace, I might do: Awake and sing! ["THINK" is an IBM mantra that goes way, way back. - Dave] ThinkingOnce again I can't help but think about my own mother who went from Ohio to Washington, D.C. to work for the government during the war. She met my father there and eventually they wound up back in Ohio! Top, TOP SECRET Foreign Function Bureau: an agency so obscure that a newspaper search actually turns up no matches (Not entirely surprising, perhaps, as it looks like they're working with some kind of encrypters punch machines.) OK, I'll be grateful if I even get partial credit on this one, tho I guess one could make an argument a punch card is in a sense 'encrypted'; and even worse I may have actually operated something like this: Cal was still using cards in the early 80's and one of the perks of being an upperclassman was knowing there were places where you could go and DIY cards, rather than waiting in line. IBMLooks like an IBM logo on the back of the machines they are using. I wonder if the 'Think' sign was some swag provided by IBM. "THINK" ... maybe not so much.It looks like they are using IBM Type 016 Electric Duplicating Key Punch machines. That has to be a tedious and boring job. Just a small thingI like their nails – practical and efficient yet still pretty. Somebody out there ...must know what these machines are -- they don't look like anything I've ever seen. The have some sort of adjustable scale device on the right, but not a standard keyboard so I don't think it's for making address labels or dog tags. The labels are too blurry and indistinct to read. I'm stumped. [They look to be Hollerith tabulators (punch-card machines) made by IBM, a technology that goes back to the 1890s. - Dave] Now I see it! On the girl's right is a stack of cards held down by a weight, and on her left is a collection tray. Thanks Dave! CrinklyI love black crinkle finish equipment. Seems very heavy duty, and at the same time very attractive. Ouch!Honey, after work my right hand and the right side of my neck are sore and cramped. I wonder why? Can you rub them a little? On another note, what are they entering? What kind of machines are those? Foreign Function BureauI had never heard of the Foreign Function Bureau so I did an internet search. Curiously, every link is to this photo, or other photos by the same photographer from the same series. [The FFB does get a shout-out in this 2016 romance novel set in 1942. - Dave] Looking forward to it!I bet the office parties are really wild! Best behaviorNo folding, spindling or mutilating going on there! I think, therefore I ambored ... really, really bored. And my right hand is killing me. The woman in the middle has a cord attached to the side of her machine (on her right) that the other two don't have. I wonder why the difference. I remember typing computer punch cards in college. Fortran was clearly not the future, but it was the only system they had to teach. If you made a mistake typing, the mainframe rejected your entire submission and you had to search out the flawed card, retype, and resubmit the whole thing ... only to learn your next typing mistake was three cards later. I think the most brilliant feature ever invented for any computer is "undo." It's one of the first things I ask about on any new program. I think we should have it in real life. "Oh, did I say that? Let me just hit undo." Three Horses BroochThe woman in the middle is sporting a very cool brooch depicting three horses. You can get one on eBay for about $40! DoorstopBy the 1960's, the standard issue THINK sign came glued onto an IBM blue plastic easel, with an angled back support. We found that the angle of the support made the sign a perfect doorstop to the computer room door, 9 edge face down. Once the metal sign came off the easel, I took it home, along with the red CHECK STOP light from the 1620 when it went to its reward. Preferred the massive 026 keypunch, you couldn't move the 029's keyboard around far enough to be comfortable. IT&TMy first summer job was stock-taking for IT&T in The Hague. We had to enter our results onto Hollerith cards but the machine to do that with was a lot smaller than the ones in the picture. Guess we were a lot slower in doeing so as well. This was in 1971, in 1980 I was enrolled in a programming course where they still used cards. No holes to punch though, you had to mark the spot with a pencil (and again and again ...). After that was Teletype. Pity they are gone as well, we used to have nice parties with the extra money we got from selling the mountains of used paper. Logo Looks FamiliarThe logo on the machine looks like one I had on my tool bag as a teletype tech in the Air Force about a hundred years ago. The machine is definitely used to create punch cards. Punch cards were used in data processing as early as the 1930s and while I couldn't find this particular machine listed in any Teletype Corp listing I have access to, I suspect this is an IBM design, the construction of which was contracted out to Teletype Corp, and was part of the expansion of the government taking place both before and after the U.S. entry into WWII. [The IBM machines in our photo have nameplates reading MOTOR DRIVE DUPLICATING KEY PUNCH. They appear to be Model 016 punches, introduced in 1929. - Dave] No snark intendedBut the wee lass in front needs a self-care day. Lose the frazzled look. Get a manicure (her polish appears chipped but it's understandable given the circumstances) and visit the hair salon. Maybe a bubble bath and early night with a few fashion magazines. She's cute. Safety fanin 2004 I worked in an industrial setting that still had a floor fan with a blade guard you could put your fist through. Even then, given the hot summer temps, it took me a while to bring it to the manager's attention. (Technology, The Gallery, D.C., John Collier, The Office, WW2)
Data Entry: 1942
... spectator pumps if they were currently in style. Hollerith cards with a vintage IBM ten key entry system. Probably the same ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 10/22/2014 - 9:57am -

June 1942. Washington, D.C. "U.S. Office of Defense Transportation system of port control and its traffic channel control." More antique IBM punch-card equipment. Photo by Albert Freeman for the Office of War Information. View full size. SpectatorWhen I look at the photo, all I can see is her awesome spectator pumps. These shoes always remind me of my Mom, who at 102 years old, would still be wearing spectator pumps if they were currently in style. Hollerith cardswith a vintage IBM ten key entry system. Probably the same kind my wife trained on. My wife really complained when the companies switched the key pad around from ten-key to calculator style on data entry systems. Verifier?I wonder if there's a verification step. 60s keypunch operators punched out the deck from the sheet first, and then another operator did the same thing with a verifier machine, which punched a notch on the top of cards that matched the verifier's input. A card in the deck without the notch is easily seen and can be checked for which way it's wrong, a puncher mistake or a verifier mistake. Otherwise you wind up with mistakes in the data, which is pretty serious in numeric data. Digital temperatures in the basement tend to record as 56 57 57 55 999999999945 56 54 ... which positively ruins your averages. IBM 040I can't identify the lady, but the machine is an IBM 040 tape-controlled card punch. It is described on their handy-dandy website. Looks like it can be operated from paper tape as well as manual entry. That would explain the huge control box under the desk. DisasterThis was something I did in the Army of the 70's (with a bit more modern equipment) just as punch cards were being phased out. The cards had no printing on them at all. To drop a stack of them was an utter disaster. Ergonomic catastropheMy old typing teacher would have gone apoplectic looking at this picture. Feet flat! Pull your chair up! Sit straight! (Technology, The Gallery, Albert Freeman, The Office, WW2)
Keypunch Orchestra: 1937
... cards, it would have been called a "52 pick-up"; in Hollerith cards, it might have been a 5200 pick-up, or worse. They used to ... at the time (when some utility bills were still on these Hollerith cards) was that if you soaked them in a mixture of diluted bleach ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 02/23/2013 - 8:57pm -

June 1937. "Baltimore, Maryland. For every Social Security account number issued an 'employee master card' is made in the Social Security board records office. Testifying data, given on the application blank form SS-5, is transferred to this master card in the form of upended quadrangular holes, punched by key punch machines, which have a keyboard like a typewriter. Each key struck by an operator causes a hole to be punched in the card. The position of a hole determines the letter or number other machines will reproduce from the master card. From this master card is made an actuarial card, to be used later for statistical purposes. The master card also is used in other machines which sort them numerically, according to account numbers, alphabetically according to the name code, translate the holes into numbers and letters, and print the data on individual ledger sheets, indexes, registry of accounts and other uses. The photograph above shows records office workers punching master cards on key punch machines." Whew. Longest caption ever? Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size. Re: I dropped my first tray of cardsIn playing cards, it would have been called a "52 pick-up"; in Hollerith cards, it might have been a 5200 pick-up, or worse. They used to make a metal rod for carrying the cards, so they would stay neatly in order. It looked like a short spear, or a very large knitting needle. I am not at liberty to say how I know this, but I've heard through the grapevine that occasionally college students would use the rods for medieval sword fights. Again, that is just a rumor I heard; nothing I can personally confirm. The day I punched a key punch machineAs a damp-eared U.S. Army second lieutenant in the early 1960s, I was assigned to supervise some reservists during their two-week summer deployment to the Erie Ordnance Depot near Camp Perry, Ohio. We were a supply unit there to train on the Army's sizeable bank of IBM keypunch machines and all went reasonably well for a few days, with thousands of cards churned out to record the whereabouts and quantities of tons of military equipment. It was clear the Cold War would tilt in our direction because there was no way, I was sure, the Russkies had such technology on their side. About five days in, a soldier whose machine wasn't punching keys correctly called me over to help him. I knew zero about these things (hardly the first time the army put someone in charge of something he/she barely could recognize) but it was clear to me that if I pushed hard on these jammed keys here and maybe that bunch there, they'd pop in place and our nation would remain safe. The army had to fly an IBM wonk (he'd be an IT guy today, of course) in from New York to fix everything. The days I kicked a key punch machineOn the old IBM 029 card punch, my unjamming technique was to KICK the right side of the machine, HARD. Seldom required a second kick. The Candler BuildingAfter assisting in the field-measuring of every floor of the Candler building in the late 80's or early 90's, its octagonal columns and other memorable attributes are hard to forget! The building started out life as a Coca-Cola bottling facility. The individual column facets are not as uniform in shape as one might imagine. SortsYou do card sorts by running the cards into one of ten bins based on the last number. Then stack up all the cards from successive bins and run them through again into bins based on the second-last number. After running them through that way on all the digits, they're in order on all the digits. The chief hazard is card destruction by the machinery. In 1960 the keypunchers were all women but the boss was a woman too. Gradually the self-service keypunch area grew and the keypunch service shrank, as programmers learned to type faster than the turn-around on the provided service. Today programmers are all speed-typists. IT Guy From NYYep, that's me. I started in "computers" back in 1969, and they STILL had keypunch machines (albeit a newer, updated model from the one in this photo)at that time. Ladies known as "keypunch girls", later changed to "data entry clerks" were still the norm in '69. Not only was data created, but guys like me had to learn how to use the machine to create the cards that were read in to the computer to run the programs to process the data. Big grey tray cabinets (similar to the old card indexes in public libraries - anyone remember those?) held hundreds of trays with data. PC's were still a long way off. I worked for the Lincoln Savings Bank in Brooklyn until 1972, when I got married, and left for a better job with more money. I am still in the IT field, just turned 65, and work for Barnes & Noble, the booksellers. Haven't seen a keypunch machine in a long time, Everything now is server driven. Great Photo! Brings back a lot of good memories, especially for us "wonks". OH BTW - they call us "geeks" nowadays. For a good reasonThere is no backspace key on a keypunch. I dropped my first tray of cardsOn the tab room floor around 1968 The Sorter Ate My ProgramI was an operator/programmer during my tour in the Marine Corps. I used to HATE it when one of the pieces of equipment mangled some of my program cards, but the worst offender was the antique (even then) IBM 1401. Three units - CPU, Printer and card reader - each the size of a Volkswagen and giving a blistering 4 megbytes of memory. It was our fiscal computer and usually a lot of Marines leaving the service liked to "tinker" with the system, usually by inserting a card which instructed the machine to disregard any and all programs after a certain date (usually a month after said Marine had left the service). This photo brought back a LOT of memories. Early IBM SystemsThe IBM 701 was known as the Defense Calculator and it was announced to the public on April 29, 1952. It was also considered a Scientific Computer. The IBM 1401 was announced to the public on October 5, 1959. The IBM 1620 Model I was also introduced in 1959 and it was the first computer I learned about and used in 1962. ConfettiAs a young'un growing up in the 1970s, I spent MANY hours with stacks of punch cards my father brought home. We cut them up to make confetti. The rows of numbers made it easy to cut straight lines lengthwise, then cut a second set at a 90 degree angle. The holes made it fun, akin to driving over cobblestone as the scissors went from card to hole to card multiple times in a single cut. 1401 RestoredHere is a 1401 that has been restored to working condition; I was able to have helped out a tiny bit (no pun intended - well, okay maybe it was) with this project a few years ago. I have stood on that raised floor and listened to the glorious noise the machine makes when running a procedure that called for a lot of the machine resources at once - all the blowers and vacuum pumps and fans and motors; the smell of warm electronics and computer tape; the chatter of the printer; my my my! SO many memories!Yeah, my first IT job was about '69 as well. We were still hard-wiring unit record machines for reports and paycheck printing! rhardin has the sorter described perfectly. Of course, there were tricks to the job, when you had thousands of cards to sort. Among them was NOT placing the follower weight on top of a stack as you added them to the input hopper. That way, the machine ran continuously, until the output bins were filling up. Problem came when you got distracted and let the input hopper run down to (almost) empty. The bottom card would often buckle, tossing the last dozen or so above it into the air, and usually damaging the card. That's when JohnBraungart's title came in! DaveB 66 and still geeking IBM 1401s JohnBraungart: I started an IT career way back when as well, and remember the 1401 as well. I suspect you mean 4K of storage (we never called it RAM); the 1401 maxed out at 16K. It was a good machine in its way, and you certainly did learn a lot operating it. After that I was "promoted" to our 7080, and then to our two 360/40 systems. After that we went modern with the 370 series, and I fell in love with VM; ended my IT stint with the same company and retired after 35 years in IT. 701!The 701 was the predecessor to the 1401 (the first one I worked on). It was the last IBM tubed mainframe. They programmed one to control the traffic lights on Queens Boulevard in NYC. This was a first and they kept in service until the mid 90s! I did my thesis on a Univac 1600, a 20 K machine. The key punch machines never punched true. As StatPak took 18K and there needed to have room for the input data, the operators would swap out the operating system. We knew we had a bad card when the printer would start printing out paper with zeros by the box full. By the way, they still call the program that starts a mainframe the start up deck, even though punch cards have not been used in decades. Type 31 and expensive confettiSince nobody else mentioned it, those are Type 31 Alphabetical Duplicating keypunch machines. They were at the forefront of keypunch technology at the time, having a very typewriter-like keyboard with a separate number pad, a real numeric '1' key, and automatic card eject and feed. JS: You were making pretty expensive confetti! Circa 1975, used punch cards sold for around $110-$125 per ton. They were very high quality paper and the recyclers liked them a lot, and they also liked green bar paper. It took about 180 boxes of punched cards (2000 cards/box) to make a ton. We financed several Physics Department parties from recycled cards and green bar paper (which I think was around $75-$90/ton, but I'm not real sure of that one). FlashbacksOh my -- the infamous 1401... I still had to use one of these in the late '70s when attending Nassau CC at Mitchell Field (in the basement of a former barracks, no less) -- when computer sciences was still known as "Electronic Data Processing" -- oy. They jammed constantly and the only reprieve was getting past the first programming class where we were then "privileged" to have a pool of operators key in our programs for us (anyone ever punch out an entire program in Assembler on one of these?!?!) -- woe betide the hapless victim who mis-coded their punch sheets and got their deck back with all the "O"s as zeroes & vice versa. Rumor at the time (when some utility bills were still on these Hollerith cards) was that if you soaked them in a mixture of diluted bleach & alum they would shrink the holes just enough to pass thru a sorter unread. Me tooI'm another USMC vet who started off with the old keypunch machine in 1967. Someone once pointed out to me that the unique thing about punch cards was that they are the only medium that can be read by both a machine and the human eye. [Were, anyway, in the days before OCR. - tterrace] Punch cards: binary for the massesYes, those IBM cards where coded in binary, but the translation was printed on the top. One side benefit of punch cards was the chad (what was punched out to make the holes) was as a random number generator of sorts. Put a bit of moisture on your finger tip, stick it in the chad bucket and out would come a nice selection of random numbers stuck to your finger. Useful for the lottery, office pools, etc. With early IBM computers (like the 1401, et al) where there was no macro to control input/output you could issue the "start read/feed" to the card reader and see how may instructions you could run before you had to issue a "read" - i.e. before the card actually hit the read head. Thank Herman HollerithThose "IBM cards" are properly "Hollerith cards", after the inventor of the punched card system. He came up with it for the 1890 census. An operator would lower a thing with lots of pins which looked like a meat tenderizer onto the card, which had been punched with holes detailing the characteristics of a person (age, race, etc). Where a pin went through a hole and hit a contact, an electric current would advance a clock dial by one. As a result, the 1890 census was tabulated in only a year, compared to eight years for the 1880 census. The size of the card was no accident - it is the size of the dollar bill at the time. Hollerith picked it because then the cards could be sorted into racks designed for banks to sort cash. (Technology, The Gallery, Baltimore, Harris + Ewing, The Office)
Punch It: 1920
... are very high-class. I've only ever seen paper ones." Hollerith cards seen here (and nowadays often incorrectly called IBM cards) are ... currency, i.e. the old "greenbacks." Greenbacks and Hollerith cards are the same size. Here's a short Wikipedia article on ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 09/12/2011 - 7:05pm -

Washington, D.C., circa 1920. "Tabulating Machine Co." Our second look at the company's equipment. This installation is at the Old Post Office on Pennsylvania Avenue. Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size. Primitive card sortersThese card sorting machines are so unfinished-looking! No covers. It looks like a model 70, judging from this website. The IBM 83 sorting machines a couple decades later had the output hoppers arranged horizontally, eliminating the need for the operator to transfer the cards from the vertical stack to the horizontal one. Spittoons seem to be standard equipment. Those wooden card boxes are very high-class. I've only ever seen paper ones. I would give my eye teethfor those ceiling fixtures. Huge...Some kind of giant computer eh??? Behold . . .Birth of the geek. Mind-NumbingI used to work with those IBM machines in the sixties -- the ones pictured are sorters. All of the old work with punched cards was mind-numbing. I only lasted a year or two and went off to find something more stimulating. No matter what eraAnd no matter what computer you work on, inevitably you find yourself sitting there, staring at your machine, waiting for your job to finish — just like the three seated here. All that's missing from this picture are the stacks of empty Mountain Dew cans, the Twinkie wrappers, and the half-eaten bags of Doritos. I wonder if these guys ever got together for LAN parties after work. Spitting imageOn one of those enameled receptacles on the floor can be seen a stenciled "P.O.D." This being Washington, D.C., the immediate association that springs to mind is Post Office Department, leading to the speculation that this photo illustrates a working installation of the Tabulating Machine Company's wares. [Indeed, the view through the transom shows the atrium of the Old Post Office on Pennsylvania Avenue. - Dave] Computer MaintenanceI guess it consisted of the oil can situated above the number 3 on the sorting bin in the front right of the picture. FanThe fan on the wall is deliberately pointed up toward the ceiling to circulate air indirectly. I can imagine that one of those powerful old fans could cause some grief were it pointed in the direction of all those paper cards, and then switched on. BellowsThere seems to be a bellows hanging from the right end of the nearest machine. Were they planning to burn the cards that got folded, spindled or mutilated? It Takes MoneyNixiebunny commented: "Those wooden card boxes are very high-class. I've only ever seen paper ones." Hollerith cards seen here (and nowadays often incorrectly called IBM cards) are the size they are because at the time a ready storage container was already commercially available: boxes for storing currency, i.e. the old "greenbacks." Greenbacks and Hollerith cards are the same size. Here's a short Wikipedia article on Herman Hollerith and his Tabulating Machine Company which was one of the companies that in 1924 formed IBM. All Questions AnsweredMy first impreesion of this picture was that there was a very ornate, Art Noveau design machine in the adjoining room where a patron would write a question on a card, slip it into a slot, and receive an answer in the flick of an eye. With lots of whirring and buzzing and other Rube Goldberg sort of activities, invisible to him, and then the card, with the answer, would pop up for him from another slot! Magic! And Frank Morgan would be in charge! Bellowscould be used to blow paper dust or chads out of the machinery. (Technology, The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo, The Office)
The Tabulators: 1920
... stuff to them. These machines just punch holes in the Hollerith cards. The machinery at the back of the room does all the adding up ... F first, ten minutes please Punch cards Herman Hollerith introduced tabulating machines and punched card tabulating systems to ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 07/23/2012 - 3:39pm -

Washington, D.C., circa 1920. One of half a dozen images labeled "Tabulating Machine Co." Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size. I know nothingabout tabulators versus computers, but, as with most of these early office photos, the men in this one seem to be standing around looking good while the women work their nimble fingers to the bone. All that is missing is a whip and a chair! Thank goodness, they've come a long way, baby. Chinatown - San FranciscoAlthough we may look at this group and declare them "obsolete", I was in S.F. last summer and made some purchases in Chinatown. Without exception, each purchase was figured out on an abacus. These comptometers or adding machines are actually based on that device as the abacus is the forerunner of these machines. Everything old is new again. CPU architectureLooks like they have a register file of seven 8-bit registers - the last 2 rows are the stack register (with extra parity bits) and status register. The I-cache operators are standing by in the back to the left, while the 2 D-cache operators are standing in the back to the right (with there kilobytes of storage). Looks like there are a few bad bits (staring at the camera) that will cause a timing violation. Where's the boundary scan? TabulatorsIn 1920, I believe those people would have been called - Computers. Seriously. The adding machineYou know, the movie with Phyllis Diller? I wonder which one is going to lose it... My guess is the one in the front row looking straight into the camera. Drive-in office?Am I imagining things, or is this office space a converted parking garage? I love the hat and coat storage up on the ramp! They're not adding machines!These are card punch machines, not adding machines. Adding machines of this time period had a lot more mechanical stuff to them. These machines just punch holes in the Hollerith cards. The machinery at the back of the room does all the adding up work. One or TwoI'm sitting here and can't believe my lying eyes. One or two of these gals are not heinous. I better take a break, and look again. Bathroom breakRows A through F first, ten minutes please Punch cards Herman Hollerith introduced tabulating machines and punched card tabulating systems to the census in 1890 and they were used through at least 1940. Later known as IBM cards. ComputersUntil the 1960's and the advent of the electronic calculator, groups of women like this -- it was a women's occupation -- performed calculations on mechanical calculators. The women were, in fact, called computers. Tabulating Machine CoHerman Hollerith founded the Tabulating Machine Co. in 1896 in Georgetown. The building still stands, with a commemorative plaque. In 1924 it merged with three other companies to become IBM. CPMHahaha!! Loved the CPU architecture reference. I seriously wonder, how many cycles per second (Hertz) or IPS a human cluster like this would do as a whole. Did they measure efficiency by calculations per minute, as in words per minute for typists? Card punchesThese machines are 10-key card punches of the old style as shown on this page (scroll to the center). Data entryThe ladies are not doing computing, they are doing data entry. They are using an early version of an IBM keypunch (numerics only). The lady at the near end of the fourth row is checking her work. P&VLikely two operations going on here - punching and then verifying. When I worked in an IBM environment in the sixties we had a room with a lot fewer ladies who did exactly that - punch and verify. (The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing, The Office)
Fourteenth Census: 1919
... Foundation of Empire Card sorter, invented by Herman Hollerith in the late 1800s, the machine that built the company that later ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 05/17/2014 - 10:02pm -

December 1919. Washington, D.C. "Sorting machine, U.S. Census." Getting ready to tabulate the 1920 Census. Under-height operators will please furnish their own boxes. National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size. Foundation of EmpireCard sorter, invented by Herman Hollerith in the late 1800s, the machine that built the company that later became IBM. The machines for punching the cards were important, too, but it was the sorter that eliminated manual ordering and made the process more efficient. Along the top of the machine are flexible splines made of spring material, one ending at each output bin. At the input end, there is an arrangement that determines which hole is punched, and a solenoid lifts the input end of the appropriate spline. The card goes under the spline, and when it reaches the right output bin a bend in the spline forces it through the slot. If the card isn't perfectly flat it hangs up somewhere, jamming the whole machine and probably ruining more cards. That's why the legendary admonition "do not bend, fold, spindle, staple, crush, crease, or mutilate" the cards. The reading mechanism can only read one column at a time. In an early model like this one there's only one reader, which is moved mechanically to the column to be sorted. To sort on multiple columns, start with the least significant digit, run all the cards through, and stack them in the trays below the machine. Then move the reader to the next most significant column and do it again, starting with the pile in the least-significant column of the stacker. That was my first job in Data Processing, and occupied many hours on Saturdays and evenings. These cards all have square corners. Clipping one corner, to make the correct orientation of the card obvious, had to wait for a later inventor. The operator had to pay close attention, so it was a skilled (and well-paid) job. Getting a card, or (worse) a partially-sorted stack, reversed or upside down meant the whole pile had to be manually re-ordered, a daunting task if there are a lot of cards. Father of SpartacusThat man could easily be the father of Kirk Douglass. There is possibly a cleft chin as well. To top it off he is extending his height by standing on a box and Kirk Douglass often used lifts in his shoes to make him appear to be about 5' 11". [More like Son of Frederick, unless you lose an S. -Dave] Ah - right you are Dave! One S too many. Of course, his real name is Demsky anyway. OSHA Approved?The last guy using the sorter wound up in the "Mortality" bin, just behind it! I dropped my first tray of cardsOn the tab room floor around 1965. Happens to everyone sooner or later. Interesting the cards are loaded on the left side; all the later machines were on the right side, I guess to make it easier for right handed folks. I just saw oneThere are some International card sorters at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California if you'd like a closer look. You won't get much more color, though, as they were available in such exciting colors as black and, later, grey. (Technology, The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo)
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