Thanks for the link... Very interesting... and the reference to the tracing of telephone calls, reminds me of the old movies where the tension built up as the telephone company was making the trace. The scenes showed banks of switches that were clicking much like the ones in the video.
Although not well know at the time, the company that I worked for, was on the cutting edge of practical computer use in the retail industry. In the early 1960's there were "white rooms" with banks of computer tape to tape memory, with IBM punchcards used for input. As a District Manager, in the mid 1970s I carried a portable, somewhat primitive fax machine that used a spinning reader and transmitted documents over the phone lines.
Perhaps a little off topic, but also in the early 1960's the company was using teletype machines. Later, perhaps 1968 or so, all of the 2,000+ company field offices had teletype machines, used at night in long distance offpeak times to transmit orders to the main offices for processing.
Your mention of the punch tape reminded me of this... During the day, teletype operators would keypunch the info and print out long rolls of the yellow punch tape. At night, the teletype machine would be set for automatic call-in and tape to tape tranmission.
Most of our machines were ASR33,'s made in Chicago by "Teletype".
Teletype Machines
One more thing, on a personal note. Much later on, in the mid 1980's our company gradually went out of business, and stopped using the machines. At that time, I was special projects manager for shutting down the field operations, and was working myself out of a job. As the project progressed, disposal of fixtures and equipment became an major effort, and the top level management decided to take full losses on the mostly depreciated equipment. The teletype machines which originally cost $2000+, (I think), were offered for disposal @$20.00 ea.
That brings in another use for the machines which at the time was still cutting edge technology... Teletype for the hearing and speech impaired.
See this:
Telecommunications device for the deaf - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
My plan was to keep the machines in their storage locations, and to lease them out on a monthly basis/ @$25.00/mo. Business plan was pretty good, and initial capital equipment cost was only $4000.... plus storage fees.
My buddy kicked me in the head, and I stopped... It was the best thing in the long run, as I decided to go into a different self employed business.
Anyway, I can still remember the clicking and chunking of the machines in operation, and the small "ding" with every carriage return. Kept one of the ASR33's for many years as a memento, until a small flood ruined the mechanics.
No, not the oldest computer, but a big part of computer history, that is now long forgotten.
Quote:
Linear Mode
