Herman Hollerith
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Herman Hollerith was a German-American statistician, inventor, and businessman who developed an electromechanical tabulating machine for punched cards to assist in summarizing information and, later,
Hollerith c. 1888
Replica of Hollerith tabulating machine with sorting box, c. 1890. The "sorting box" was an adjunct to, and controlled by, the tabulator. The "sorter", an independent machine, was a later development.
Hollerith punched card
Hollerith's grave at Oak Hill Cemetery in Georgetown in Washington, D.C.
Punched card
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A punched card is a stiff paper-based medium used to store digital information via the presence or absence of holes in predefined positions. Developed over the 19th to 20th centuries, punched cards we
A set of two 12-row/80-column punched cards (one blank, one used) from the mid-twentieth century
Carpet loom with Jacquard apparatus by Carl Engel, around 1860. The chain feed is on the left.
A worker changing Jacquard cards in a lace machine, September 1918. The pattern of the lace is dictated by the holes in the cards.
Woman operating the card puncher, c. 1940