Computers & Business Machines - Overview
Imagine the loss, 100 years from now, if museums hadn't begun preserving the artifacts of the computer age. The last few decades offer proof positive of why museums must collect continuously—to document technological and social transformations already underway.
The Museum's collections contain mainframes, minicomputers, microcomputers, and handheld devices. A Cray2 supercomputer is part of the collections, along with one of the towers of IBM's Deep Blue, the computer that defeated reigning champion Garry Kasparov in a chess match in 1997. Other artifacts range from personal computers to ENIAC, the Altair, and the Osborne 1. Computer components and peripherals, games, software, manuals, and other documents are part of the collections. Some of the instruments of business include adding machines, calculators, typewriters, dictating machines, fax machines, cash registers, and photocopiers
"Computers & Business Machines - Overview" showing 5 items.
Magnetic Tape Station for the RCA 501 Computer
- Description
- This transistorized unit was used to read, write, and erase binary characters on mylar-based magnetic tape for entry into the RCA 501 computer. The central rack assembly has components for reading, writing, and erasing magnetic tape. These include a tape transport mechanism, amplifiers, control circuits, and a power supply. This example has a single tape reel.
- The rack assembly fits into a specially built cabinet, from which it could be removed. In this instance the cabinet is painted blue-gray and white. Each RCA 501 computer had at least 6 tape stations. Depending on the components selected, the entire computer system rented for $11,700 to $20,445 per month. Should a business choose to buy the system, the list price of one magnetic tape station alone was $25,000 – $30,000. This is over twice the price of a typical American single family house at the time.
- The tape station is marked on the inside at the center toward the top: R58111. It is marked on the inside of the lower portion of the cabinet: RCA (/) MI SER 1515 (/) RADIO CORPORATION OF AMERICA. A plaque attached to the right side of the cabinet is marked : UNIVAC SPERRY RAND (/) SERIES 70. The form of the Sperry Rand trademark on the plaque was, according to trademark records, first used in commerce in 1967.
- References:
- "Tape Station," RCA 501 Electronic Data Processing System, Catalog EDP 581, Camden, N.J.: Radio Corporation of America, 1958.
- Martin H. Weik, "A Third Survey of Domestic Electronic Digital Computing Systems," Aberdeen Proving Ground: Ballistics Research Laboratories, March, 1961, pp. 778-803.
- U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Historical Census of Housing Tables Home Values. Available online.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1959 or later
- date made
- 1959
- maker
- RCA Corporation
- ID Number
- 1979.0418.06
- catalog number
- 1979.0418.06
- accession number
- 1979.0418
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Unityper II, Data Entry Device for the Univac Computer
- Description
- The Unityper II, a modified Remington electric typewriter, was equipped with electronic circuits that converted type strokes into pulse patterns and recorded them on magnetic tape. The tape housing is located slightly above and behind the typewriter carriage. The coded tapes were used as input for UNIVAC computers.
- Reference: Remington Rand Univac, "Operator’s Manual Unityper II," 1955.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1957
- maker
- Remington Rand Univac Division of Sperry Rand Corporation
- ID Number
- 1982.0638.02
- accession number
- 1982.0638
- catalog number
- 1982.0638.02
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Jack Kilby's Integrated Circuit
- Description (Brief)
- Jack Kilby’s demonstration of the first working integrated circuit (IC) in 1958 revolutionized the field of microelectronics. Instead of using discrete transistors, resistors, and capacitors to form a circuit, Kilby’s IC design integrated a transistor, a capacitor, and the equivalent of three resistors all on the same chip. Kilby fabricated three types of circuits to test his idea: a flip flop, a multi vibrator and a phase shift oscillator. This chip is the phase-shift oscillator.
- The first IC was made out of a thin slice of germanium (the light blue rectangle) as a bulk resistor and contained a single bipolar transistor (under the large aluminum bar in the center). It had four input/output terminals (the small vertical aluminum bars), a ground (the large bar on the far right), and wires of gold. The microchips of today have been improved by hundreds of innovations, but Kilby’s prototype was an important early step.
- date made
- 1958
- maker
- Texas Instruments
- Kilby, Jack S.
- ID Number
- 1987.0487.320
- accession number
- 1987.0487
- collector/donor number
- G00012
- catalog number
- 1987.0487.320
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
First Draft of the Progamming Language COBOL
- Description
- During 1959 the first plans for the computer language COBOL emerged as a result of meetings of several committees and subcommittees of programmers from American business and government. This heavily annotated typescript was prepared during a special meeting of the language subcommittee of the Short-Range Committee held in New York City in November. COBOL programs would actually run the following summer, and the same program was successfully tested on computers of two different manufacturers in December 1960.
- Reference: Jean E. Sammet, "The Early History of COBOL," History of Programming Languages, ed. Richard L. Wexelblat, New York: Academic Press, 1981, 199-277.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1959
- maker
- Conference on Data Systems Languages. Language Subcommittee of the Short-Range Committee
- ID Number
- 2010.3050.4
- catalog number
- 2010.3050.4
- nonaccession number
- 2010.3050
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
National Cash Register, Class 51
- Description
- In the 1950s Americans increasingly bought groceries in supermarkets, which served large numbers of customers. Consumers selected their own goods, and took them to a clerk who rang up sales. To make transactions as efficient as possible, the National Cash Register Company introduced machines that dispensed coins automatically, avoiding time and errors associated with making change. This change-making cash register went on the market in 1954, with a new model in 1958. This example was given to the Smithsonian by NCR in 1959, on the occasion of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the company.
- Reference:
- Accession file.
- date made
- 1959
- maker
- National Cash Register Company
- ID Number
- MA*316702
- accession number
- 225455
- catalog number
- 316702
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center