9 Jun
2018
9 Jun
'18
12:04 a.m.
I think RS took it and left it behind someone's
car at one as a practical joke.
That behemoth was built to last. It would surely stop a car.
Moving it single-handed would be quite a feat. When Andy Hall
retired his, he was able to push it as far as his back porch,
where it remained for more than a year.
Under the keyboard was remarkable mechanical crossbar
encoder that dripped machine oil. Fortunately the operator's
knees were protected by a drip pan. The oil smell led me
to keep mine in my workshop; its fragrance reminded
me of the first major piece of computing equipment I saw
as a child: Vennevar Bush's mechanical differential
analyzer, a room-size table of shafts, gears and integrators
that was redolent of machine shop.
Doug