IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and media viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. Visit the IIIF page to learn more. The scales on this 22-inch, two-sided ...

IIIF provides researchers rich metadata and media viewing options for comparison of works across cultural heritage collections. Visit the IIIF page to learn more. This is a two-foot, two-fold boxwood ...

It was the only technological tool widely and continuously used for over three centuries. For math and science geeks it was a badge of honor, nestled neatly into a plastic pocket protector along with ...

Used by engineers for centuries, they were displaced by pocket calculators and all but forgotten until Mr. Shawlee created a subculture of obsessives and cornered the market. By Alex Traub For about ...

The slide rule, sometimes called a slipstick, was a type of mechanical analog computer. It was and still is, used primarily for multiplication and division, and also for functions such as roots, ...

While some (math-phobics) still may relish the simple beauty and non-threatening functionality of the abacus, there are those who have made the transition to more challenging computing gadgets—many ...

In our most recent 5 Engineers post — part of this blog and our Fun Friday newsletter, where we toss out a question and invite our audience to respond with their wittiest answers — we asked: What’s ...

Who could imagine that the slide rule, once ubiquitous in high school mathematics classes, would be used to figure the odds at horse races or to calculate the alcohol content of a barrel of beer? But ...

The cutting-edge tools in engineering have evolved in the past four decades from slide rules to spread sheets to computer programs that do the math. Rodney Huffman, 63, and Richard Neu, 65, have lived ...

We recently ran a post about engineers being worse, better, or the same than they “used to be” and it got me thinking. Of course “used to be” is in the eyes of the beholders. To me, that’s the 1950s ...