What's the Story Behind My Vintage Computer Collection?

[SteamKing]

At my old HS, the physics classroom had a large slide rule which spanned the width of the chalkboard, and it was large enough to be visible to students sitting in the back of the class. Of course, once calculators (even expensive four-function ones) became available in the early '70s, I don't think the instructor or anyone else ever touched that classroom slide rule again.

 

[Astronuc]

At my old HS, the physics classroom had a large slide rule which spanned the width of the chalkboard, and it was large enough to be visible to students sitting in the back of the class. Of course, once calculators (even expensive four-function ones) became available in the early '70s, I don't think the instructor or anyone else ever touched that classroom slide rule again.

My high school had one of those large slide rules above the chalkboard. I can't remember if it was in physics or chemistry, but I think it might have been portable (two people carrying it).

One of my classmates had one of the first TI calculators, but he had to use a slide rule just like the rest of us.

I first used an HP-35 during the summer of 1974. It had 9 memory registers. I was impressed. However, it cost something like $400.

The physics department of the first university I attended was desperately searching for any student, undergrad or graduate, who could program microprocessors to do physics calculations.

 

[SteamKing]

I had bought a K+E slide rule, a fancy one, for taking physical science in HS in 1972. It could do logs, trig, etc. and had a fancy leather case. I don't recall ever using it for schoolwork, because soon after getting the SR and starting class, some of the students had some early calculators, including perhaps the HP-35. Well, that was way out of my price range, but my folks did get a 4-function Brother calculator, which was about the size and weight of a brick. I forget the price of the Brother, but it was cheaper than the HP.

Later, when I started chemistry about two years later, the Brother was hopelessly outdated, so I got a TI SR-50 scientific calculator, which cost about $150 IIRC. Not as cool perhaps as an HP, but it could hold its own.

The big news came in my senior year at HS when I was taking physics. One of my classmates, whose father was a petroleum engineer, traded in his HP-45 on the then brand-new HP-65 programmable, which then cost a whopping $795 retail (In those days, a new compact car had a base price of about $3500.) My father had retired from NASA by that time, and the Marshall SFC in Huntsville was offering HP-65s at a slight discount.

My folks snatched one up for me, but when I got the HP-65 and started using it, the display crapped out after a couple days, so I had to send it right back to HP to be fixed. I finally got it back later that summer, and it worked pretty much flawlessly, but I back slid to the old TI SR-50, which I used at college.

The HP-65 did have a neat plastic clam-shell carrying case, into which one could put the calculator, the charger, and a few of the magnetic cards which could be used to store programs for the calculator to load and execute.