Accession No
5821
Brief Description
"Consul, the Educated Monkey", a mechanical calculating device for children, By Tep Manufacturing Company Inc., American, circa 1920
Origin
U.S.A; Michigan; Detroit; 2-114 General Motors Building
Maker
Tep Manufacturing Company Inc.
Class
calculating; mathematics
Earliest Date
1916
Latest Date
1925
Inscription Date
Material
metal (steel); paper (card, paper)
Dimensions
height 140mm; width 150mm
Special Collection
Provenance
Purchased from Tesseract, Box 151, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York 10706, U.S.A., on or before 21/12/2000. Item No. 35 from Catalogue 68 Winter 2000/2001.
Inscription
on the calculator
"Consul" Educated
THE Monkey
Description Notes
"Consul, the Educated Monkey", a mechanical calculating device, American, circa 1920. Made from enamelled steel. Linkage at the arms and feet mean that when the monkey's feet are set to point at two numbers, its fingers indicate their product or sum on a table ordered in pyramidic fashion. It is complete with the original printed card holder with directions, and a card "Addition Table" for converting it to an adder.
References
Events
Description
The American inventor William Henry Robertson designed ‘Consul, the Educated Monkey’ in 1915. He intended the ‘educated monkey’ to serve as a calculating device for children. You can conduct simple sums by moving the monkey’s feet so that they point at the two numbers you wish to add or multiply and the rest of the body is geometrically arranged with metal pins in such a way that it will then point at the correct answer. It is thought that Robertson found the inspiration for his device in a trained chimpanzee called Consul, who performed on the New York vaudeville stage six years before Robertson placed the patents for his invention.
22/05/2009
Created by: Nathalie Botcherby [work experience student, using Caitlin Wylie’s MPhil essay] on 22/05/2009
FM:46226
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