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- Description
- This set of Double Twelve Express Dominoes was made by the Embossing Company, an Albany, N.Y., firm that produced wooden blocks and puzzles. A sheet of instructions, “HOW TO PLAY DOMINOES,” is included in the box of ninety-six rectangular tiles. Five of these are completely blank and ninety-one are made up of two squares with each square either blank or marked with up to 12 spots, usually called pips.
- The traditional American domino set is called Double Six, because each rectangular tile is made up of two squares with each square blank or marked with 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 pips. In a Double Six set, one can see seven different types of tile depending on the smallest number of pips in one of its squares. If the smallest number of pips is 0, at least one square is blank and there are seven possibilities for the number of pips in the other square, i.e., 0 through 6. If the smallest number of pips is 1, neither square is blank and at least one square has a single pip. In this case there are six possibilities for the number of pips in the other square, i.e., 1 through 6. In general when the smallest number of pips that appear on a square of a tile is k, the other square must have k, k+1, …, 6 pips on it, and it is always the case that there are 7-k numbers on the list k, k+1, …, 6. If we look at all be seven possible types of tiles in a Double Six set, we find that there are 7+6+5+4+3+2+1=28 tiles.
- A similar computation can be done for any Double n set of dominoes. I.e., there are n+1 tiles with one or both squares blank, n tiles with no blanks and 1 the smallest number of pips, and n+1-k tiles with no blanks and k the smallest number of pips. This leads to a total of (n+1)+ n+(n-1)+…+1 tiles, i.e., the sum of the first n+1 integers. A mathematical formula known for many centuries says that the sum of the first n integers is n(n+1)/2 so the sum of the first n+1 integers is (n+1)(n+2)/2. For a set of Double Six dominoes n+1 is 7 so we get (7)(8)/2 or 28 tiles. Other common Double n sets include Double Nine, Double Twelve, Double Fifteen, and Double Eighteen. For the Double Twelve set, n+1 is 13 so there are (13)(14)/2 or 91 tiles. In order not to leave empty space in the box, five completely blank tiles were included in this set of Double Twelve dominoes.
- These dominoes belonged to Olive C. Hazlett (1890–1974), one of America's leading mathematicians during the 1920s. Hazlett taught at Bryn Mawr College, Mount Holyoke College, and the University of Illinois, after which she moved to Peterborough, N.H. Her set of dominoes was collected from the Carmelite community of Leadore, Idaho. Brothers from this community who had lived in New Hampshire had befriended Hazlett there.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1920
- maker
- Embossing Company
- ID Number
- 1998.0314.01
- accession number
- 1998.0314
- catalog number
- 1998.0314.01
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- Description
- This bundle consists of about one hundred pieces of plastic-coated wire, each about 30 cm (11.8 in) long. Each piece of wire represents the distance an electrical signal travels in a nanosecond, one billionth of a second. Grace Murray Hopper (1906–1992), a mathematician who became a naval officer and computer scientist during World War II, started distributing these wire "nanoseconds" in the late 1960s in order to demonstrate how designing smaller components would produce faster computers.
- The "nanoseconds" in this bundle were among those Hopper brought with her to hand out to Smithsonian docents at a March 1985 lecture at NMAH. Later, as components shrank and computer speeds increased, Hopper used grains of pepper to represent the distance electricity traveled in a picosecond, one trillionth of a second (one thousandth of a nanosecond).
- Reference: Kathleen Broome Williams, Grace Hopper: Admiral of the Cyber Sea, Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2004.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1985
- distributor
- Hopper, Grace Murray
- ID Number
- 1985.3088.01
- catalog number
- 1985.3088.01
- nonaccession number
- 1985.3088
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- Description
- These twelve interlocking three-dimensional wooden puzzles were made in Japan, likely by the Yamanaka Kumiki Works. Each is individually wrapped in plastic and includes a sheet showing how to assemble it. A trademark on the bottom of the box includes an image of a globe surrounded by the letters T T N Y. According a 1978 application to the US Patent and Trademark Office by the Traveler Trading Company, Inc., the mark was first used in commerce in 1950. Since imports from Japan between 1945 and 1952 had to be labeled “Made in occupied Japan” and the labels on the box, the puzzles, and the instructions, all read “Made in Japan,” these puzzles were imported into the United States some time after 1952.
- These types of Japanese puzzles are called “kumiki” and are said to be related to the traditional construction of wooden buildings that did not use nails or glue. This particular set includes four familiar geometrical shapes (a sphere, a cube, a barrel, and an octagonal prism), four animals (an elephant, a pig, a bird, and a dog), and four shapes without common names. Only the dog and one of the unnamed shapes are unassembled.
- These kumiki puzzles belonged to Olive C. Hazlett (1890–1974), one of America's leading mathematicians during the 1920s. Hazlett taught at Bryn Mawr College, Mount Holyoke College, and the University of Illinois, after which she moved to Peterborough, New Hampshire. The puzzles were collected from the Carmelite community of Leadore, Idaho. Brothers from this community had lived in New Hampshire earlier, and befriended Hazlett there.
- REFERENCE: Jerry Slocum and Rik van Grol, “Early Japanese Export Puzzles: 1860s to 1960s,” in Puzzlers’ Tribute: A Feast for the Mind, eds. David Wolfe and Tom Rodgers (Natick, MA: A. K. Peters, 2002): pp. 257-71.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1955
- ID Number
- 1998.0314.02
- accession number
- 1998.0314
- catalog number
- 1998.0314.02
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- Description
- The pamphlet was published on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the college mathematics honor society Kappa Mu Epsilon. The pamphlet is accompanied by a leaflet is entitled "Kappa Mu Epsilon Mathematics Honor Society Founded 1931."
- This objects are associated with the mathematician Helen Sullivan.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1981
- maker
- Thomas, Harold L.
- ID Number
- 1993.3019.02
- nonaccession number
- 1993.3019
- catalog number
- 1993.3019.02
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- Description
- In April 1981 in Springfield, Missouri, Kappa Mu Epsilon celebrated its fiftieth anniversary. At this celebration KME, a mathematics honor society with chapters at institutions that emphasize undergraduate mathematics programs, named fifty members as Distinguished Members. Sister Helen Sullivan was one of those so honored.
- In about 1936 Sister Helen Sullivan organized Euclid’s Circle, a mathematics club at Mount St. Scholastica College. In 1940 she founded the Kansas Gamma Chapter of Kappa Mu Epsilon there. Sullivan often served as the faculty sponsor of her local chapter of KME, and in 1967 the alumnae of that chapter established the Sister Helen Sullivan scholarship in her honor. On the national level Sullivan served as KME’s historian in the years 1943–47, and as an assistant editor of its journal, The Pentagon, during those years and again from 1961–70.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1981
- maker
- Kappa Mu Epsilon
- ID Number
- 1993.3019.03
- nonaccession number
- 1993.3019
- catalog number
- 1993.3019.03
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- Description
- Sister M. Helen Sullivan (1907-1998) was a college teacher whose only mathematical research publication was her dissertation from Catholic University but who wrote about, among other subjects, the teaching of mathematics. She interacted with her own students as well as other students and mathematicians through her involvement in Kappa Mu Epsilon, a mathematical honor society, and on committees and panels of professional organizations that related to teaching.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 1993.3019.07
- nonaccession number
- 1993.3019
- catalog number
- 1993.3019.07
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- Description
- This example of Adders, a set of four puzzles, belonged to Olive C. Hazlett (1890–1974). Hazlett was one of America's leading mathematicians during the 1920s. She taught at Bryn Mawr College, Mount Holyoke College, and the University of Illinois, after which she moved to Peterborough, New Hampshire. This and other of her puzzles and books of puzzles were collected from a community of Discalced Carmelite brothers who had lived in New Hampshire and who had befriended Hazlett there.
- Adders was made by the Douglass Novelty Company of Detroit, Michigan, and sold for ten cents. The box contains a shiny green cardboard playing board and twelve small silver cardboard discs, three blank and the others numbered 1 through 9. The directions for the four different puzzles are printed on the inside of the cover of the box. The playing board is square and has various lines and circles marked on it. Three of the four puzzles involve placing the numbered discs in specified ways so that specified sets of discs add to a given number.
- Adders was probably made in about 1930, since another set of puzzles in the collections, Kangaroo (2015.0027.07), was made about then by the same company and has very similar packaging, playing board, and discs.
- The first puzzle has many solutions, all of which are related to the three-by-three magic square, which is known as the Lo Shu square. That square—in which the rows, columns, and diagonals all add up to 15—appears in Chinese literature dating back to 650 BCE. Some of the solutions are equivalent to the Lo Shu square, and all the other solutions can be derived from a solution equivalent to the Lo Shu square by switching two discs, neither of which lies in the center of the circle, but are on the same line through the center of the circle.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1930
- maker
- Douglass Novelty Company, Inc.
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.02
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.02
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- Description
- This example of Mystery Maze belonged to Olive C. Hazlett (1890–1974). Hazlett was one of America's leading mathematicians during the 1920s. She taught at Bryn Mawr College, Mount Holyoke College, and the University of Illinois, after which she moved to Peterborough, New Hampshire. This and other of her puzzles and books of puzzles were collected from a community of Discalced Carmelite brothers who had lived in New Hampshire and who had befriended Hazlett there.
- On the back of this puzzle there are marks that indicate that it was manufactured by the Harmonic Reed Corporation of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and that a patent had been applied for. The following description of the puzzle appears in the February 3, 1951, issue of The Billboard: The Amusement Industry’s Leading Newsweekly on page 66 under Merchandise Topics: “To retail for 50 cents, Harmonic Reed Corporation has introduced its Mystery Maze puzzle. The plastic tilt puzzle, with clear top and standard beebee ball, has the unusual feature of a concealed section. Though unseen by the player, the ball must pass thru this section to reach the finish. However, if a mistake is made, the ball will not go farther and must be returned to the puzzle’s starting point before another try at the concealed section can be made.”
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1951
- maker
- Harmonic Reed Corporation
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.05
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.05
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- Description
- This "entertaining and approved educational game" consists of forty playing cards. Each card has a drawing of a plant or animal on it, with appropriate background. Instructions describe playing the game and give information about the wildlife shown. The cards and instructions are in a box. One card has a back that is a different color than the others.
- The mathematician Olive C. Hazlett once owned this game. For related objects, see 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- According to Dan Gifford, former archivist at the National Wildlife Foundation, the cards date from about 1959 (when the character Rick the Racoon (later called Ranger Rick) that is shown on the back of the cards was introduced) to 1961.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1959-1961
- ca 1959-1961
- maker
- National Wildlife Federation
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.08
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.08
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- Description
- The mathematical puzzles that belonged to the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett included these six translucent plastic die. Three are green and three red. All have the standard faces, ranging from one to six white spots.
- For related objects, see transactions 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.09
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.09
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- Description
- The mathematical puzzles that belonged to the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett included these three tiny white plastic cubical dice with black spots. The faces are standard, ranging from one to six spots. The dice fit in a cylindrical metal case.
- For related objects, see transactions 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.10
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.10
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- Description
- This set of game pieces is for a game of Chinese checkers. A cardboard box divided into three sections holds fifteen red, fifteen yellow, and fifteen green wooden pieces. The box also holds a booklet of instructions.
- A mark on the lid of the box reads: Ching Gong (/) ORIENTAL CHECKERS (/) [. . .] SAML. GABRIEL SONS & COMPANY - NEW YORK MADE IN U. S. A. No. 99. The term "Ching Gong oriental checkers" was trademarked by Samuel Gabriel Sons & Company November 23, 1935.
- Another mark on the lid reads: O.C. Hazlett. This is the signature of the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- after 1935
- maker
- Samuel Gabriel Sons & Company
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.11
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.11
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- Description
- This paper puzzle has fourteen cardboard pieces that can be arranged in different ways to form an 8 x 8 checkerboard. The pieces fit in a cardboard box. Pencil marks on the pieces number them from 1 to 14.
- The lid of the box indicates that there were over seventy-eight different solutions. A sticker on the inside of the lid indicates that 85 solutions were known and that Vasen Industries of Davenport, Iowa would pay $5.00 for any new solution. A mark on the lid of the box reads: THE FAMOUS and BAFFLING (/) CHECKER BOARD (/) PUZZLE (/) 15c. A mark inside the lid reads: THE VASEN MFG. COMPANY (/) Davenport, Iowa
- According to Slocum and Botermans, "The first checkerboard puzzle seems to have originated in 1880, when a certain Henry Luers obtained a U.S. patent for a 'Sectional Checkerboard', consisting of fifteen differently shaped pieces of complete squares of a checkerboard."
- According to newspaper records, the Vasen Manufacturing Company was incorporated in 1927. It apparently was still in business in 1964.
- Associated with the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett. For related objects, see acquisitions 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- References:
- Jerry Slocum and Jack Botermans, Puzzles Old and New How to Make and Solve Them, Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1986, p. 14.
- The Davenport Democrat and Leader, Davenport, Iowa, May 22, 1927, p. 15.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- after 1926
- mid-twentieth century
- maker
- Vasen Manufacturing Company
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.12
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.12
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- Description
- This wire disentanglement puzzle includes three pieces that are presently linked and four additional pieces. No inscriptions on pieces. Received in cardboard box that once held thank you notes.
- The pieces were once owned by mathematician Olive C. Hazlett. For related objects, see acquisitions 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.13
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.13
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- Description
- This game consists of a wooden octagonal board with handle and thirty-seven white pegs in an open box. There are thirty-six holes in the board, arranged as in European peg solitare. There is a badly worn set of instructions, giving the name of the game and the rules in French. The board shown on the instructions is not exactly the same shape in its handle as the one received.
- The dimensions given include the instructions, unfolded.
- Associated with the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett.
- For related objects, see 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- For an account of a similar object, see The Jerry Slocum Mechanical Puzzle Collection, Lilly Library, Indiana University, object 03664.
- Reference:
- John D. Beasley, The Ins and Outs of Peg Solitaire, Oxford: Oxford University Press,1985.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.14
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.14
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- Description
- This solitaire game consists of a round transparent plastic case holding a white plastic pegboard and thirty-three red plastic pegs. The thirty-three holes in the board are arranged as in English peg solitare. Instructions are in the case, visible through the bottom.
- A mark on the lid of the case reads: "YOGO" (/) JUMP-a-PEG (/) PUZZLE. Another mark on the lid reads: BROOKLYN NY (/) PLAS-TRIX.
- The mathematician Olive C. Hazlett once owned this game.
- For an account of a similar object, see The Jerry Slocum Mechanical Puzzle Collection, Lilly Library, Indiana University, object 11226.
- According to advertisements and articles in the New York Times, Plas-Trix Company was in business in Brooklyn by 1950 and went bankrupt in 1960.
- Reference:
- John D. Beasley, The Ins and Outs of Peg Solitaire, Oxford: Oxford University Press,1985.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1950-1960
- maker
- Plas-Trix Company
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.15
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.15
-
- Description
- This cloth bag includes pieces for the No. 1 Archarena combination game board made by the Carrom Company of Luddington, Michigan. There is no game board, nor does the bag include two long cues included as part of the game.
- In the bag are thirty wooden rings. Some are painted green (12 rings), red (12 rings), or black (one ring). Five are uncolored. Also in the bag are fifteen paper discs numbered from 1 to 15, ten small wooden tenpins about the size of chess pieces, three wooden spinning tops, one collapsible dice box, two wooden dice, three wooden yellow discs that fit in holes in the rings, three wooden green discs of the same size, one book of rules, one card for recording "pin scoring", a cardboard leaflet describing Carrom bridge tables and giving rules for ten pins (this leaflet may serve as a backstop for playing tenpins), and a tag describing the equipment. Also listed on the tag are fifty-seven games that could be played on the board.
- According to the company web site, the Style D No. 2 board was made from 1902 to 1941 and the Style E from 1899 to 1939. The company was called Carrom Company from 1914 to 1939. The instructions list copyrights of 1898, 1899, 1900, and 1901. A number on the back page of the rules is 330, indicating rules printed in March of 1930. Hence the date 1930 assigned to the object.
- The bag of game pieces was once owned by the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett. For related objects, see transactions 1998.0314 and 2015.3004.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1930
- maker
- Carrom Company
- ID Number
- 2015.0027.16
- accession number
- 2015.0027
- catalog number
- 2015.0027.16
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- Description
- This Japanese puzzle consists of six differently notched wooden rods that fit together to form the symmetrical object illustrated on the front of the cardboard box. The idea of wooden interlocking puzzles may have come from carpenters who made ancient wooden shrines in Japan. These shrines would not be able to withstand earthquakes with nails and glue, so wood with interlocking joints was used in place of other materials.
- International interest in these puzzles began when Japan reopened to the west after being closed from the mid-seventeenth century until the mid-nineteenth century.
- The box also holds a sheet of instructions.
- This copy of the puzzle belonged to the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett. A mark on the lid reads: THE (/) YAMATO (/) BLOCK PUZZLE. Another mark there reads: MADE IN OCCUPIED JAPAN. After the Japanese surrender at the close of World War II, Allied forces occupied the country until the spring of 1952.
- Compare MA.335284.
- Reference:
- Jerry Slocum and Rik van Grol, “Early Japanese Export Puzzles: 1860s to 1969s”, Puzzlers’ Tribute A Feast for the Mind, eds. David Wolfe and Tom Rodgers, Natick, Massachusetts: A K Peters, 2002, pp. 257-272.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1950
- ID Number
- 2015.3004.04
- nonaccession number
- 2015.3004
- catalog number
- 2015.3004.04
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- Description
- This cloth-bound book was imported from England and given to Robert Hazlett (the father of mathematician Olive C. Hazlett) by his father in 1882. The author of the book was "One of the Old Boys" and it was published by "Hand and Heart" Publishing Office. The preface is by the Rev, Charles Bullock, B.D.
- For related transactions see 2015.0027 and 1998.0314.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1882
- ca 1882
- ID Number
- 2015.3004.01
- nonaccession number
- 2015.3004
- catalog number
- 2015.3004.01
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- Description
- This cloth-bound book of riddles was published by the Peter Pauper Press and illustrated by Henry R. Martin.
- For a book by the same publisher, see 2015.0027.03.
- The book, once owned by the mathematician Olive C. Hazlett, has her signature on the front and on the back cover.
- For related transactions, see 2015.0027 and 1998.0314.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1954
- ID Number
- 2015.3004.02
- nonaccession number
- 2015.3004
- catalog number
- 2015.3004.02
