CURTA TYPE II YEAR 1967

The Curta was a mechanical calculator introduced in 1948. It was small, and had a hand crank to operate it. It had a brilliantly compact design, a small cylinder that fit in the palm of your hand. It could be used to perform addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and with more difficulty, square roots and other operations.

The Curta calculator was invented by Curt Herzstark while he was a prisoner in the Buchenwald concentration camp. Herzstark survived the field, finishing and perfecting the design after the end of World War II. The calculators were made by Contina AG Mauren in Liechtenstein, and were widely considered the best portable calculators available, until they were displaced by electronic calculators in the 1970s.

Numbers were entered using sliders on the side of the device. The revolution counter and result counter were on the lid. A single turn of the crank would add the input number to the result counter, in any position, and consequently increment the revolution counter. Pulling the crank out slightly before turning it would perform a subtraction instead of an addition. Multiplication, division, and other functions required a series of crank operations. The Curta calculator was affectionately known as the "pepper grinder" due to its physical form and manner of operation. She literally "grinded" the answers.

There were two Curta calculators. The Curta Type I had 8-digit sliders, a 6-digit revolution counter, and an 11-digit result counter. The larger Curta Type II, introduced in 1954, had sliders to represent 11 digits, an 8-digit revolution counter, and a 15-digit result counter. (It is estimated) 140,000 Curta calculators were made (80,000 Type I and 60,000 Type II). The last Curta calculator was produced in November 1970.

This one we sell is the Curta II in green. You can also find this model in black. We can know that with serial number 543767 it was manufactured in October 1967. It is in very good condition and works perfectly. We send an instruction manual in Spanish via PDF file, if the client wishes.

 

Age: 1967

Measurements: 6x11 cm

Condition: Very good

Reference: 12785