IBM Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator, 16-page informational booklet 1948 (SSEC).
International Business Machines Corp., NY, 1948, 16 pages, fold-out fullpage photographs, diagrams etc., double-column text.
Condition: Good overall, 8.5x11 stapled cardstock covers, old dampstains along front cover and rear cover bottoms, and along bottom margins of pages; chipping and edgewear with small folds all along covers; covers detached from staples with old clear-tape remnants along spine, but all internal pages attached to staples. No marks internally save for old notations on a photograph of the Section of the electronic arithmetical unit showing typical arrangement of tubes -- the notations label each such as, RI Gates, Result Counter, Carry Control, etc.
Categories: 1950's computers and computing, Biography and Company Histories, Computers and Society, Databooks, Handbooks, Manuals, IBM, Ephemera, Odd Stuff and Miscellaneous, Hardware, Highspots in the History of Computing
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Price: $750.00
Item Description
Describes the IBM Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator ... 'Its flexibility far exceeds that of the IBM Automatic Sequence Controlled Calculator completed in 1944, and its overall productive capacity if far in excess of anything previously achieved...' Brief chapter headings include, Charting the Research Program; How the IBM Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator Operates; Traffic Arteries; Memory; Reading and Recording; Programming; Dedication of IBM Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator Marks a Milestone in Scientific Aid; photo page of IBM Scientists and Engineers who collaborated in producing the IBM Selective Sequence Electronic Calculator; Historical Highlights of Computing Machine DevelopmentThe SSEC, an enormous room-sized machine using 12,500 vacuum tubes and 21,400 relays, debuted on January 27, 1948. It was the largest and most complex electromechanical computer ever built... (Hook & Norman, OOC 580).