Michael Dell’s PC’s Limited Turbo PC came with an eighty-four-key AT-style keyboard. The AT-style keyboard was compatible with the IBM PC/AT computer and featured the function keys to the left, ten numerical keys at the top, and light-up buttons indicating Caps Lock, Number Lock, and Scroll Lock. The keyboard connected to the Turbo PC via a five-pin DIN connector.
This guide for use of the programming language BASIC is stored in a grey-brown padded vinyl binder containing documentation used with a Compaq portable computer. The computer has museum number 1988.0175.01.
An inscription in the case holding this frame for trial lenses reads “Paul Weiss / OPTICIAN / 1606 CURTIS ST. / DENVER.” Paul Weiss (1864-1943) was born in Switzerland, and moved to the United States in 1881. By 1891 he was working as an optician in Denver, Colorado.
Telegraph message, printed in Morse code, transcribed and signed by Samuel F. B. Morse. This message was transmitted from Baltimore, Maryland, to Washington, D.C., over the nation's first long-distance telegraph line.
In 1843, Congress allocated $30,000 for Morse (1791-1872) to build an electric telegraph line between Washington and Baltimore. Morse and his partner, Alfred Vail (1807-1859), completed the forty-mile line in May 1844. For the first transmissions, they used a quotation from the Bible, Numbers 23:23: "What hath God wrought," suggested by Annie G. Ellsworth (1826-1900), daughter of Patent Commissioner Henry L. Ellsworth (1791-1858) who was present at the event on 24 May. Morse, in the Capitol, sent the message to Vail at the B&O Railroad's Pratt Street Station in Baltimore. Vail then sent a return message confirming the message he had received.
The original message transmitted by Morse from Washington to Baltimore, dated 24 May 1844, is in the collections of the Library of Congress. The original confirmation message from Vail to Morse is in the collections of the Connecticut Historical Society.
This tape, dated 25 May, is a personal souvenir transmitted by Vail in Baltimore to Morse in Washington the day following the inaugural transmissions. The handwriting on the tape is that of Morse himself. Found in Morse’s papers after his death the tape was donated to the Smithsonian in 1900 by his son Edward, where it has been displayed in many exhibitions.
Spring lancets for bloodletting have been known since the early eighteenth century and remained popular throughout the nineteenth century. This example belonged to Launcelot Jackes (1750-ca. 1827), a Maryland physician who served as a surgeon in the Continental Army during the American Revolution.
A brass escutcheon on the case of this cupping set reads “Dr. J. M. Cockrill / Presented by / J. J. Cockrill.” Joseph M. Cockrill (1848-1898) was a physician in Baltimore.
This set includes an introducer, seven graduated hard rubber intubation tubes with metal rods, and a scale stamped “ERMOLD.” Another inscription reads “PAT. JULY 12. 1892 / PAT. PENDING / ERMOLD. George Ermold (d. 1931) was a surgical instrument maker in New York City who received U.S. Patent 478,582 for a “Larynx-Tube” on July 12, 1892.
A typed note inside the case reads "Presented by Dr. Benjamin Rich / Intubation Set which / belonged to Dr. Jesse Downey."
A map of the United States that shows the political tours by Kentucky Senator Thurston Morton while GOP National Chairman April 11, 1959- July 8, 1960.
This software, VIC Payroll by Microspec, is on a 5 in. floppy disk. There also is a user's guide in a 7" x 9" three-ring binder. The materials were designed for use with the VIC-20 microcomputer.
In the mid-1960s, Dartmouth College professors John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz developed a computer language intended to be easy to learn and use. They called it BASIC -- Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code. Students learned BASIC on a teletype terminal that communicated with a central computer. Several terminals were linked to one computer as part of a system called timesharing. Students on remote terminals could use the computer without seeing it--or even knowing what kind of computer it was. This particular BASIC tape was used with a MITS Altair 8800, a later microcomputer.
A "Programmer's Aid Cartridge" (designated the VIC-1212) that plugs into an expansion interface on the VIC-20. Also included is an instruction guide. The accession also included a VIC-20 microcomputer.