R.E. Drake, Jr., born in 1898, was a University of Michigan, class of 1920, BS in engineering. (His dad — Rollin Edward Drake — too, was a Michigan grad, with a degree in dentistry.) Young Rollin was a member of Beta Theta Pi, and, I surmise from my brief research, also received an MS from UM in 1922.
This is his slide rule. It is 10” in length and made of mahogany covered with engraved white celluloid:
Keuffel & Esser Co. was a leading slide rule manufacturer for many years. This model, the 4092, was available from 1909 to 1921. But the 4092 with the indicator in frameless glass with plastic edges fastened by screws, well, that was introduced in 1915. It sold for $12.50 at the time, which with inflation would be $291.65 today.
I speculate that Rollin received it from his parents — his mother’s name was Rose, by the way — as a high school graduation gift in 1916 in preparation for going off to college, but that is purely my speculation.
Normally the 4092 came in a cardboard box, but as you see here Rollin’s slide rule has a lovely leather case, also by K&E. He liked it so much, he wrote his name on it in three places!
Curiously, the case has a “snap,” although you can plainly see it was not designed for one. (And there is nothing for the snap to snap into.) I tried looking up Dempster Place, but beyond it being a place name in Canada, the UK, and Australia, could find nothing on it. I am thinking that Dempster Place must have had some sort of emotional resonance with Rollin, although I suppose he might just have liked the look of the snap.
While they were still in common use when I first went to college in 1970, in a few years slide rules disappeared virtually overnight with the advent of electronic calculators. Slide rules are mechanical analog computers. They were invented in the early 17th century, and the duplex slide rule, like the one shown here, in the late 19th. We went to the moon based on slide rule calculations!
Me, I admire slide rules in general, and this K&E 4092 in particular. The quality, the precision, the smoothness with which it can be manipulated, the clear importance of the instrument to the man who owned it, what the slide rule meant to the advance of human civilization... All of these things impress me. Perhaps “move me” is more accurate.
And I haven’t the slightest idea of how to use one. (I am a liberal arts guy, through and through. Arithmetic challenges me!) My youngest son, however, is something of a math whiz, and just received his MS in Engineering a few months ago. He enjoys stuff like Linear Algebra, Convex Optimization, AI, Deep Learning, and a bunch of other stuff I can’t recall. Off my payroll with a good job in his field now, too.
I am very proud of him.
So, I am gonna give this slide rule to him. (Hope he likes it.) Maybe I will repair the top of the case. I am pretty good at stuff like that.
And Rollin? Well, he passed away on 16 December 1982 at the age of 84. Rest in peace, brother. I hope you had a good life.
And, oh yeah. I bought this 4092 at a thrift shop a couple of days ago for $5.00.
This is his slide rule. It is 10” in length and made of mahogany covered with engraved white celluloid:
Keuffel & Esser Co. was a leading slide rule manufacturer for many years. This model, the 4092, was available from 1909 to 1921. But the 4092 with the indicator in frameless glass with plastic edges fastened by screws, well, that was introduced in 1915. It sold for $12.50 at the time, which with inflation would be $291.65 today.
I speculate that Rollin received it from his parents — his mother’s name was Rose, by the way — as a high school graduation gift in 1916 in preparation for going off to college, but that is purely my speculation.
Normally the 4092 came in a cardboard box, but as you see here Rollin’s slide rule has a lovely leather case, also by K&E. He liked it so much, he wrote his name on it in three places!
Curiously, the case has a “snap,” although you can plainly see it was not designed for one. (And there is nothing for the snap to snap into.) I tried looking up Dempster Place, but beyond it being a place name in Canada, the UK, and Australia, could find nothing on it. I am thinking that Dempster Place must have had some sort of emotional resonance with Rollin, although I suppose he might just have liked the look of the snap.
While they were still in common use when I first went to college in 1970, in a few years slide rules disappeared virtually overnight with the advent of electronic calculators. Slide rules are mechanical analog computers. They were invented in the early 17th century, and the duplex slide rule, like the one shown here, in the late 19th. We went to the moon based on slide rule calculations!
Me, I admire slide rules in general, and this K&E 4092 in particular. The quality, the precision, the smoothness with which it can be manipulated, the clear importance of the instrument to the man who owned it, what the slide rule meant to the advance of human civilization... All of these things impress me. Perhaps “move me” is more accurate.
And I haven’t the slightest idea of how to use one. (I am a liberal arts guy, through and through. Arithmetic challenges me!) My youngest son, however, is something of a math whiz, and just received his MS in Engineering a few months ago. He enjoys stuff like Linear Algebra, Convex Optimization, AI, Deep Learning, and a bunch of other stuff I can’t recall. Off my payroll with a good job in his field now, too.
I am very proud of him.
So, I am gonna give this slide rule to him. (Hope he likes it.) Maybe I will repair the top of the case. I am pretty good at stuff like that.
And Rollin? Well, he passed away on 16 December 1982 at the age of 84. Rest in peace, brother. I hope you had a good life.
And, oh yeah. I bought this 4092 at a thrift shop a couple of days ago for $5.00.
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