Engineering, Building, and Architecture - Overview
Not many museums collect houses. The National Museum of American History has four, as well as two outbuildings, 11 rooms, an elevator, many building components, and some architectural elements from the White House. Drafting manuals are supplemented by many prints of buildings and other architectural subjects. The breadth of the museum's collections adds some surprising objects to these holdings, such as fans, purses, handkerchiefs, T-shirts, and other objects bearing images of buildings.
The engineering artifacts document the history of civil and mechanical engineering in the United States. So far, the Museum has declined to collect dams, skyscrapers, and bridges, but these and other important engineering achievements are preserved through blueprints, drawings, models, photographs, sketches, paintings, technical reports, and field notes.
"Engineering, Building, and Architecture - Overview" showing 3 items.
Pickett 904-ES Decimal Keeper Duplex Slide Rule
- Description
- This aluminum duplex slide rule has a yellow coating and a clear plastic indicator. The "ES" in the model number refers to the rule's "Eye Saver" yellow color. The rule and indicator are held together with aluminum braces that have protruding grooves. The front of the rule has K, A, DF, D, and L scales, with CF, S, T, CI, and C scales on the slide. The scales are 9-1/2 inches long. The back of the rule has a D* scale, with T*, S* Cl*, and C* scales on the slide. Instead of covering the typical one decade of C and D scales, the scales with asterisks cover twenty decades, from 1010 to 10-10. These scales helped inexperienced users keep track of the decimal point. They performed their calculation first on the back, to determine the order of magnitude, and then a second time on the front, to make the answer precise to three significant figures.
- The front of the slide is marked: MODEL 904-ES (/) TRIG AND (/) DECIMAL KEEPER (/) SPEED RULE. A Pickett logo is at the other end of the slide, with the number 47 printed above the logo. The back of the rule is marked: PATENT (/) APPLIED FOR; DECIMAL KEEPER; PICKETT & ECKEL, INC. (/) CHICAGO 3, ILL. - ALHAMBRA, CAL. The logo on this rule is that used by Pickett from 1958 to 1962. The shape and material of the cursor and the braces suggest a date of 1957–1959. Hence, the object appears to have a rough date of 1958–1959.
- The donor patented an "automatic decimal point slide rule" and assigned the patent to Pickett. He also distributed Pickett slide rules through his own mail order firm of Devonics, Inc.
- The rule was received in a plastic bag. For somewhat related documentation, see 1995.0126.04. See also Lawrence J. Kamm, "Automatic Decimal Point Slide Rule" (U.S. Patent 2,893,630 issued July 7, 1959).
- References: Dieter von Jezierski, Slide Rules: A Journey Through Three Centuries (Mendham, N.J.: Astragal Press, 2000), 75–76, 100; Ron Manley, "Pickett 904-ES – Trig and decimal keeper," http://www.sliderules.info/collection/10inch/090/1096-pickett-904.htm; "Slide Rule Dates and Time-Lines," http://sliderulemuseum.com/SR_Dates.htm.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1958-1959
- maker
- Pickett & Eckel, Incorporated
- ID Number
- 1995.0126.01
- accession number
- 1995.0126
- catalog number
- 1995.0126.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Pickett N4-ES Vector-Type Log Log Duplex Slide Rule
- Description
- This aluminum ten-inch linear duplex slide rule is coated in Pickett's "Eye Saver" yellow plastic. The flat nylon indicator is screwed within a white plastic frame. The front top of the base has three extended cube root scales (one for numbers with 1, 4, 7, 10, or more digits before the decimal point; one for numbers with 2, 5, 8, 11, or more digits; and one for numbers with 3, 6, 9, 12, or more digits) and a DF scale. The front bottom of the base has D, DI, and square root scales. The top square root scale gives roots of numbers on the D scale with an odd number of digits before the decimal point; the lower square root scale gives roots of numbers with an even number of digits. The front of the slide has CF, CIF, double T, ST, S, CI, and C scales.
- The left end of the slide is marked: MODEL N4-ES (/) Vector-Type LOG LOG (/) DUAL-BASE SPEED RULE. The right end has "Pickett" in script on a triangle with a dot at one point. MADE IN U.S.A. appears beneath the logo. This form of logo was in use from 1958 to 1962. The style of the grooved stamped aluminum posts is also consisted with this timeframe.
- The top back of the base has LL1, LL2, and DF/M scales. D, LL3, and LL4 scales are on the bottom of the base. The back of the slide has CF/M, TH, SH, Ln, L, CI, and C scales. The back of the slide is marked at the left end: COPYRIGHT 1959© (/) PATENT APPLIED FOR. The right end is marked: PICKETT (/) ALL METAL (/) SLIDE RULES (/) PICKETT & ECKEL INC. (/) CHICAGO ILL. U.S.A. The mention on the instrument of a patent application may refer to a patent for a case issued to John W. Pickett in 1960. Pickett was the son of company founder Ross C. Pickett and served as president of the firm from 1957 to 1967.
- The slide rule is in a red-brown leather case lined in white plastic. The triangular Pickett logo is stamped in gold on the front of the case, and a metal ring on the back is for a leather strap (no longer with the instrument) that can be hung around a belt loop. See 1980.0097.04 for instructions.
- The donor, engineer Edgar F. Peebles, obtained this slide rule free of charge as a replacement when the numbers came off the slide rule he had used in college. He first used it from 1959 to 1965 in the satellite control facility of the Air Force at Sunnyvale, Calif. He then used it as a down range representative for Lockheed Missiles and Space Company from 1965 to 1968 in tests of the Polaris missile. Finally, from 1968 to 1969 he used the slide rule in the checkout area of the test Polaris missile manufacturing plant in Sunnydale.
- References: Rodger Shepherd, "Pickett's 'Eye Saver Yellow,'" Journal of the Oughtred Society 1, no. 1 (1992): 18; International Slide Rule Museum, "Pickett All-Metal Slide Rules," http://sliderulemuseum.com/SR_Dates.htm#Pickett; Maurice L. Hartung, How to Use . . . Pickett Dual Base Log Log Slide Rules (Chicago: Pickett & Eckel, Inc., 1953), http://sliderulemuseum.com/Manuals/M103_Pickett_HowToUseDualBase_1953.pdf; John W. Pickett, "Slide Rule Case" (U.S. Patent D187,632 issued April 5, 1960); accession file.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1959
- maker
- Pickett & Eckel, Incorporated
- ID Number
- 2000.0203.01
- accession number
- 2000.0203
- catalog number
- 2000.0203.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Pickett N15-T Hydraulic Duplex Slide Rule for Georgia Iron Works
- Description
- From the 1650s people have devised special-purpose slide rules for tasks such as carpentry and tax collection. In 1961 Danforth (Danny) W. Hagler of the Georgia Iron Works Company in Augusta, Ga., designed this slide rule to replace the 100-page notebook of graphs carried by each GIW engineer. GIW also distributed the rule to customers to assist with ordering and operating pumps and pipelines. Pickett & Eckel, the California slide rule manufacturer, assisted with the design and produced the slide rules. For Pickett company history, see 1998.0119.02 and 2000.0203.01.
- This ten-inch, two-sided white aluminum instrument has metal endpieces and a nylon cursor with white plastic edges. The front has logarithmic scales for calculating the kinetic energy and flow rate of a liquid or slurry moving through a pipeline. The top of the base is marked: HYDRAULIC SLIDE RULE (/) GEORGIA IRON WORKS CO. (/) EST. 1891 (/) AUGUSTA GEORGIA. The left end of the slide has a GIW logo. The right end of the slide has the triangular Pickett logo used between 1958 and 1962 and is marked: 338. The bottom of the base is marked: DESIGNED BY D. W. HAGLER.
- The back has logarithmic scales for determining the head produced by a pump, impeller peripheral speed, brake horsepower, and specific speed. Standard C and D scales were added around 1969. The right end of the slide is marked: PICKETT (/) MODEL N 15-T (/) 337. The rule fits in an orange leather case with a belt loop. The front of the case is marked: HYDRAULIC SLIDE RULE (/) GIW (/) D. W. HAGLER (/) Pickett. The case fits inside a redwood box.
- This particular rule was Hagler's personal example of the instrument in production. GIW was his family's business, and his brother, Tom, wrote an instruction manual for the rule (2009.0100.02). Hagler went on to work on computer software for production control. He sold his interest in GIW in 1986.
- References: Helen Callahan, Georgia Iron Works: The First 100 Years (Columbia, S.C.: The R. L. Bryan Company, [1991]), 46–49; Michael V. Konshak, "Developing the Georgia Iron Works Hydraulic Slide Rule: Negotiating with Pickett & Eckel to Make a Special Slide Rule," Journal of the Oughtred Society 19, no. 2 (2010): 33–37; accession file.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1961
- maker
- Pickett & Eckel, Incorporated
- ID Number
- 2009.0100.01
- accession number
- 2009.0100
- catalog number
- 2009.0100.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center