This is a borderline off-topic area, since there are other mailing lists for
the purpose. Also, mechanical calculators are certainly computers, but
they're special-purpose and nonprogrammable. But I might as well spread
useful information. If you reply, please concentrate on URL's and other
pointers to information.
See my plea at the end about electronic calculators. I consider electronic
calculators on-topic since most of them are small computers (in the modern
sense) even if they can't always be reprogrammed.
> Today I run into a Monroe CAA-10 electromechanical calculator,
> totally accidentally and unplanned. I am not in electromechanical
> devices, but it looked nice, so I bought it for approx. US$60.
Congratulations. I found one made by Marchant (which is currently being
fixed).
> Question: Is this in any way rare or significant, or is it something
> where everybody has already 10 pieces of ?
I don't know. The history of "how many of this type of thing are around,
and how much are they worth?" is different for calculators versus computers.
You may have trouble finding a duplicate of a particular model -- often,
companies produced a huge number of variations (in color and style and
complexity). Of course that was partly because of technological advances,
but it was also driven by marketing, I'm sure. On the other hand, finding
someone who has a machine more-or-less like yours is more straightforward.
There are calculator-collecting lists out there, for both mechanical and
early electronic calculators. I'm tempted not to say this... calculator
collecting so far has been a very quiet hobby. (I hope it stays that way!)
That doesn't mean things are cheap, or that you can always find what you
want. But the list I'm on has very light traffic and a very high S/N ratio.
The Web sites I've seen are informative and rather "gentlemanly". Use of
eBay doesn't seem to be encouraged.
> Does anyone know the manufacturing period ? There is no date on the machine,
> but the style impresses me as definitely 50-ish.
Then the manufacturing period is probably the '50s or early '60s. OK, I'm
a total novice and I could be wrong. But my machine from 1940 does NOT look
like it was made in the '50s. Machines made before the '40s definitely
look old. And by the mid-to-late '60s and early '70s, the style and
technology had changed again. This is partly because of refinements, but
also, mechanical technology had to fight against the new (and increasingly
popular) electronic machines.
Here are some URL's from my bookmark file:
<li><a href="
http://users.lewiston.com/two/office4.html">Buying manuals for adding machines</a>
<li><a href="
http://www.dotpoint.com/xnumber/carticles_mech.htm">Collecting Mechanical Calculators - Articles</a>
<li><a href="
http://www.wins.uva.nl/faculteit/museum/olivetti/Programma101.html">Olivetti Programma 101</a>
<li><a href="
http://www.astro.virginia.edu/~rjp0i/museum/marchant.short.html">Marchant Silent Speed</a>
<li><a href="
http://www.astro.virginia.edu/~rjp0i/museum/">Marchant ads</a>
<li><a href="
http://www.calculator.net/">Calculator Net</a>
The first is good for ordering manuals for your machine.
Also see the CALCLIST-L mailing list. Send mail to
LISTSERV_at_TECHUNIX.TECHNION.AC.IL
with these commands in the message body:
subscribe calclist-l
set calclist-l ack norepro
The last command is optional -- it confirms your messages but does not send
copies back to you.
Now... to bring this message back ON-TOPIC, can anyone suggest some URL's
or a mailing list for collectors of _electronic_ calculators? I already
know about the MOSCOW site, but others might not. And I'm sure there are
other interesting resources out there!
-- Derek
Received on Sat Jan 30 1999 - 08:25:14 GMT