Editing Unit record equipment (section)

===Timeline===
[[File:HollerithMachine.CHM.jpg|thumb|Replica of Hollerith tabulating machine with sorting box, circa 1890. The "sorting box" was an adjunct to, and controlled by, the tabulator.  The "sorter", an independent machine, was a later development.<ref name=":0">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?isbn=1483572811|title=Herman Hollerith: Forgotten Giant of Information Processing|last=Austrian|first=Geoffrey D.|publisher=Columbia University Press|year=1982|isbn=0-231-05146-8|pages=41, 178–179}}</ref>]]
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* 1884: Herman Hollerith files a patent application titled "Art of Compiling Statistics";  granted {{US Patent|395,782}} on January 8, 1889.
* 1886: First use of tabulating machine in Baltimore's Department of Health.<ref name=":0" />
* 1887: Hollerith files a patent application for an integrating tabulator (granted in 1890).<ref name=":1">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MGZqAAAAMAAJ&q=Integrating+Tabulator+Hollerith&pg=PA84|title=The development of punch card tabulation in the Bureau of the Census, 1890-1940: with outlines of actual tabulation programs|last=Truesdell|first=Leon Edgar|date=1965|publisher=U.S. G.P.O.|pages=84–86|language=en}}</ref>
* 1889: First recorded use of integrating tabulator in the Office of the Surgeon General of the Army.<ref name=":1" />
* 1890-1895: [[1890 United States census|U.S. Census]], Superintendents [[Robert Percival Porter|Robert P. Porter]] 1889-1893 and Carroll D. Wright 1893–1897, tabulations are done using equipment supplied by Hollerith.
* 1896: The Tabulating Machine Company founded by Hollerith, trade name for products is ''Hollerith''
* 1901: Hollerith Automatic Horizontal Sorter<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/attic2/attic2_056.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050221102531/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/attic2/attic2_056.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=February 21, 2005 |title=IBM Archives: Hollerith Automatic Horizontal Sorter|date=23 January 2003 }}</ref>
* 1904: Porter, having returned to England, forms [[British Tabulating Machine Company|The Tabulator Limited (UK)]] to market Hollerith's machines.<ref>Austrian, 1982, p.216</ref>
* 1905: Hollerith reincorporates the Tabulating Machine Company as ''The'' Tabulating Machine Company<!-- italics to emphasize the subtle change -->
* 1906: Hollerith Type 1 Tabulator, the first tabulator with an automatic card feed and control panel.<ref>[http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/#early Computing at Columbia: Timeline - Early]</ref>
* 1909: The Tabulator Limited renamed as [[British Tabulating Machine Company]] (BTM).
* 1910: Tabulators built by the Census Machine Shop print results.<ref>{{cite book |last=Durand |first= Hon. E. Dana |title=Tabulation by Mechanical Means - Their Advantages and Limitations, volume VI |publisher= Transactions of the Fifteenth International Congress on Hygiene and Demography |date= September 23–28, 1912}}</ref>
* 1910: Willy Heidinger, an acquaintance of Hollerith, licenses Hollerith's The Tabulating Machine Company patents, creating [[Dehomag]] in Germany.
* 1911: [[Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company]] (CTR),  a [[holding company]], formed by the amalgamation of The Tabulating Machine Company and three other companies.
* 1911: James Powers forms Powers Tabulating Machine Company, later renamed  [[Powers Accounting Machine Company]].  Powers had been employed by the Census Bureau to work on tabulating machine development and was given the right to patent his inventions there. The machines he developed sensed card punches mechanically, as opposed to Hollerith's electric sensing.<ref>{{cite book|last=Cortada |first=James W. |title=Before the Computer: IBM, NCR, Burroughs, & Remington Rand & The Industry they Created 1865—1956 |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |date=February 8, 1993 |pages=56–59 |isbn=978-0691048079}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Cemach |first= Harry P. |year=1951 |title=The Elements of Punched Card Accounting |publisher= Pitman |page= 5}}</ref>
* 1912: The first Powers horizontal sorting machine.<ref name=RR1941>{{cite book|title=Know-How Makes Them Great|publisher=Remington Rand |year=1941}}</ref>
* 1914: Thomas J. Watson hired by CTR.
* 1914: The Tabulating Machine Company produces 2 million punched cards per day.<ref name=Endicott195x>[https://web.archive.org/web/20070129022846/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/endicott/endicott_chronology1950.html IBM Archives: Endicott chronology, 1951-1959]</ref>
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*1914: The first Powers printing tabulator.<ref name=jeanbellec>[http://jeanbellec.pagesperso-orange.fr/information_technology_1.htm Information Technology Industry TimeLine]</ref>
* 1915 Powers Tabulating Machine Company establishes European operations through the Accounting and Tabulating Machine Company of Great Britain Limited.<ref name="Cortada p.57">Cortada p.57</ref><ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|259}}<ref name="Van Ness 1962 15">{{cite book |last= Van Ness |first= Robert G. |title= Principles of Punched Card Data Processing |publisher= The Business Press |year= 1962 |page=15}}</ref>
* 1919: [[Fredrik Rosing Bull]], after studying Hollerith's machines, constructs a prototype 'ordering, recording and adding machine' (tabulator) of his own design.  About a dozen machines were produced during the following several years for his employer.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
*1920s: Early in this decade punched cards began use as bank checks.<ref>{{cite book |title= Punched Hole Accounting |publisher= IBM |year= 1924 |page= 18}}</ref><ref>Engelbourg p.173</ref>
* 1920: [[British Tabulating Machine Company|BTM]] begins manufacturing its own machines, rather than simply marketing Hollerith equipment.
* 1920: The Tabulating Machine Company's first printing tabulator, the Hollerith Type 3.<ref>{{cite web |title = IBM Archives: 1920 |date= 23 January 2003 |publisher= IBM |url= http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/year_1920.html|archive-url= https://archive.today/20120719003636/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/history/year_1920.html|url-status= dead|archive-date= July 19, 2012}}</ref>
* 1921: Powers-Samas develops the first commercial alphabetic punched card representation.<ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Rojas |editor-first = Raul |title= Encyclopedia of Computers and Computer History |publisher= Fitzroy Dearborn |year= 2001 |page=656}}</ref>
* 1922: Powers develops an alphabetic printer.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
* 1923: Powers develops a tabulator that accumulates and prints both sub and grand totals (rolling totals).<ref name="RR1941"/>
* 1923: CTR acquires 90% ownership of Dehomag, thus acquiring patents developed by them.<ref>{{cite book | editor-last = Aspray |editor-first = William | title = Computing Before Computers |publisher = Iowa State University Press | year = 1990 |isbn = 0-8138-0047-1 |page = 137}}</ref>
* 1924: [[Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company]] (CTR) renamed [[International Business Machines]] (IBM).  There would be no IBM-labeled products until 1933.
* 1925: The Tabulating Machine Company's first horizontal card sorter, the Hollerith Type 80, processes 400 cards/min.<ref name=jeanbellec/><ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20050119221507/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/attic3/attic3_136.html IBM Type 80 Electric Punched Card Sorting Machine]</ref>
* 1927: [[E. Remington and Sons#Remington Typewriter Company|Remington Typewriter Company]] and [[James Rand, Jr.|Rand Kardex]] combine to form [[Remington Rand]].  Within a year, Remington Rand acquires the [[Powers Accounting Machine|Powers Accounting Machine Company]].<ref name=SperryRand/>
* 1928: The Tabulating Machine Company's first tabulator that could subtract, the Hollerith Type IV tabulator.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20060826033153/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/attic2/attic2_122.html IBM 301 Accounting Machine (the Type IV)]</ref>  The Tabulating Machine Company begins its collaboration with Benjamin Wood, [[Wallace John Eckert]] and the Statistical Bureau at Columbia University.<ref>[http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/benwood.html Columbia University Professor Ben Wood]</ref><ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|67}} The [[Punched card#IBM 80-column format and character codes|Tabulating Machine Company's 80-column card]] introduced.  ''[[Leslie Comrie|Comrie]] uses punched card machines to calculate the motions of the moon. This project, in which 20,000,000 holes are punched into 500,000 cards continues into 1929. It is the first use of punched cards in a purely scientific application.''<ref>{{cite book |title= The Origins of Cybersace |publisher = Christie's |year =2005 |page = 14}}</ref>  
* 1929 The Accounting and Tabulating Machine Company of Great Britain Limited renamed [[Powers-Samas|Powers-Samas Accounting Machine Limited]] (Samas, full name Societe Anonyme des Machines a Statistiques, had been the Power's sales agency in France, formed in 1922). The informal reference "Acc and Tab" would persist.<ref name="Cortada p.57"/><ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|259}}<ref name="Van Ness 1962 15"/>
* 1930: The [[Punched card#Powers/Remington Rand/UNIVAC 90-column format|Remington Rand 90 column card]], offering "more storage capacity [and] alphabetic capability"<ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|50}}
* 1931: [[Groupe Bull|H.W.Egli - BULL]] founded to capitalize on the punched card technology patents of Fredrik Rosing Bull.<ref>[http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/frbull/heide_bull.pdf Heide, Lars (2002) ''National Capital in the Emergence of a Challenger to IBM in France''] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304194200/http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/frbull/heide_bull.pdf |date=March 4, 2016 }}</ref> The Tabulator model T30 is introduced.<ref>[http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/bull_t30/tabu_t30.htm H.W.Egli - BULL Tabulator model T30] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120507132416/http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/bull_t30/tabu_t30.htm |date=May 7, 2012 }}</ref>  
<!--- following reference deleted.  Has no detail, not consistent with other sourced refs.
* 1931 Bull develops the first fully alphanumerical system, followed by The Tabulating Machine Company(1933) and Remington Rand (1939).<ref>Rojas p.656</ref> ------------------>
* 1931: The Tabulating Machine Company's first punched card machine that could multiply, the ''600 Multiplying Punch''.<ref name="ibm-early-computers">{{cite book |title=IBM's Early Computers |last=Bashe |first=Charles J. |author2=Johnson, Lyle R. |author3=Palmer, John H. |author4=Pugh, Emerson W. |year=1986 |publisher=MIT Press |isbn=0-262-02225-7 |url=https://archive.org/details/ibmsearlycompute00bash }}</ref>{{rp|14}}   Their first alphabetical accounting machine - although not a complete alphabet, the Alphabetic Tabulator Model B was quickly followed by the full alphabet ATC.<ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|50}}
* 1931: The term "Super Computing Machine" is used by the [[New York World]] newspaper to describe the ''Columbia Difference Tabulator'', a one-of-a-kind special purpose tabulator-based machine made for the Columbia Statistical Bureau, a machine so massive it was nicknamed "[[Packard]]".<ref>{{cite book |last=Eames |first=Charles |author2=Eames, Ray  |title=A Computer Perspective |year=1973 |publisher=Harvard University Press |location= Cambridge, Mass |page = 95 }} The date given, 1920, should be 1931 (see the Columbia Difference Tabulator web site)</ref><ref>[http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/packard.html Columbia Difference Tabulator]</ref>  The ''Packard'' attracted users from across the country: "the Carnegie Foundation, Yale, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Ohio State, Harvard, California and Princeton."<ref>''Columbia Alumni News'', Vol.XXIII, No.11, December 11, 1931, p.1</ref>
* 1933: [[Groupe Bull|Compagnie des Machines Bull]] is the new name of the reorganized H.W. Egli - Bull.
* 1933: The Tabulating Machine Company name disappears as subsidiary companies are merged into IBM.<ref>New York Times, July 15, 1933, All subsidiaries of the International Business Machines Corporation in this county have been merged with the parent company to obtain efficient operation.</ref><ref>{{cite book | author = William Rodgers | year = 1969 | title = THINK: A Biography of the Watsons and IBM | url = https://archive.org/details/thinkbiographyof00rodg | url-access = registration | page=[https://archive.org/details/thinkbiographyof00rodg/page/83 83]| isbn = 9780297000235 }}</ref>  The ''Hollerith'' trade name is replaced by ''IBM''. IBM introduces removable control panels.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
* 1933: Dehomag's BK tabulator (developed independently of IBM) announced.<ref>{{cite book |last=Rojas |first=Raul |author2=Hashagen, Ulf  |title=The First Computers |year=2000 |publisher=MIT}}</ref>
* 1934: IBM renames its Tabulators as Electric Accounting Machines.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
* 1935: BTM Rolling Total Tabulator introduced.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
* 1937: [[Leslie Comrie]] establishes the Scientific Computing Service Limited - the first for-profit calculating agency.<ref>{{cite book| last= Campbell-Kelly, Martin & Aspray, William|title= COMPUTER A History of the Information Machine|publisher = Westview|year=2004|page=59}} The world's first for-profit calculating agency.</ref>
* 1937: The first collator, the IBM 077 Collator<ref>[https://archive.today/20120719140949/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/vintage/vintage_4506VV4004.html IBM 077 Collator]</ref>  The first use of an electronic component in an IBM product was a photocell in a Social Security bill-feed machine.<ref name="Pugh 1995"/>{{rp|65}}  By 1937 IBM had 32 presses at work in Endicott, N.Y., printing, cutting and stacking five to 10 million punched cards every day.<ref name="Endicott">[https://web.archive.org/web/20050122192348/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/vintage/vintage_4506VV2159.html IBM Archive: Endicott card manufacturing]</ref>
* 1938: Powers-Samas multiplying punch introduced.<ref name=jeanbellec/>
* 1941 Introduction of Bull Type A unit record machines based on 80 column card.<ref>[http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/serie_150/serie_150a.htm Equipements à cartes perforées (Punched cards machines) type A (GR) 1941-1950] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130821174522/http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/serie_150/serie_150a.htm |date=August 21, 2013 }}</ref>
* 1943: "IBM had about 10,000 tabulators on rental <nowiki>[...] 601 multipliers numbered about 2000 [...]</nowiki> keypunch[es] 24,500".<ref name="ibm-early-computers"/>{{rp|21}}
* 1946: The first IBM punched card machine that could divide, the [[IBM 602]], was introduced. Unreliable, it "was upgraded to the 602-A (a '602 that worked') <nowiki>[...]</nowiki> by 1948".<ref>[http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/602.html The IBM 602 Calculating Punch]</ref> The [[IBM 603]] Electronic Multiplier was introduced, "the first electronic calculator ever placed into production.".<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20050122182222/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/vintage/vintage_4506VV2193.html IBM 603 Electronic Multiplier]</ref>
* 1948: The [[IBM 604]] Electronic Punch. "No other calculator of comparable size or cost could match its capability".<ref name="ibm-early-computers"/>{{rp|62}}
* 1949: The IBM 024 Card Punch, 026 Printing Card Punch, [[IBM 82|082 Sorter]], [[IBM 403|403 Accounting machine]], [[IBM 407|407 Accounting machine]], and [[IBM CPC|Card Programmed Calculator]] (CPC) introduced.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20070129062455/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/endicott/endicott_chronology1940.html IBM Archives: Endicott chronology 1941-1949]</ref>
* 1952: Bull Gamma 3 introduced.<ref>[http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/gamma3/gamma3.htm Bull Gamma 3 1952-1960] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130727083838/http://www.feb-patrimoine.com/projet/gamma3/gamma3.htm |date=July 27, 2013 }}</ref><ref name="Bull Gamma 3">[http://www.technikum29.de/en/computer/gamma3 Bull Gamma 3]</ref> An electronic calculator with [[delay-line memory]], programmed by a connection panel, that was connected to a tabulator or card reader-punch.  The Gamma 3 had greater capacity, greater speed, and lower rentals than competitive products.<ref name="ibm-early-computers"/>{{rp|461–474}}
* 1952: [[Remington Rand 409]] Calculator (aka. UNIVAC 60, UNIVC 120) introduced.
* 1952: Underwood Corp acquires the American assets of Powers-Samas.<ref>[http://www.computerhistory.org/brochures/companies.php?alpha=t-z&company=com-42bc23edd93e2 Computer History Museum: Underwood Corporation]</ref><ref>[http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-underwood-samas-sorter-which-makes-filing-more-news-photo/3337176 An Underwood-Samas sorter]</ref>

[[File:Miss Cowell with Hollerith Machine, 1964.jpg|thumb|Hollerith machine in use at the [[London School of Economics]] in 1964]]
By the 1950s punched cards and unit record machines had become ubiquitous in academia, industry and government. The warning often printed on cards that were to be individually handled, "Do not fold, spindle or mutilate", coined by Charles A. Philips, became a motto for the post-[[World War II]] era (even though many people had no idea what [[Spindle (stationery)|spindle]] meant).<ref>Lee, J.A.L. (1995) ''Computer Pioneers'', IEEE, p.557</ref><!--- parts of this paragraph copied from [[History of computing hardware#801: punched card technology]] --->

With the development of computers punched cards found new uses as their principal input media.  Punched cards were used not only for data, but for a new application - computer programs, see: [[Computer programming in the punched card era]].  Unit record machines therefore remained in computer installations in a supporting role for keypunching, reproducing card decks, and printing.

* 1955: IBM produces 72.5 million punched cards per day.<ref name=Endicott195x/>
* 1957: The [[IBM 608]], a transistor version of the 1948 IBM 604. First commercial all-transistor calculator.<ref name="ibm-early-computers"/>{{rp|34}}<ref>{{cite book |last1=Pugh |first1=Emerson W. |last2=Johnson |first2=Lyle R. |last3=Palmer |first3=John H. |year=1991 |title=IBM's 360 and early 370 systems |url=https://archive.org/details/ibms360early370s0000pugh |url-access=registration |publisher=MIT Press |isbn=0-262-16123-0 |page=[https://archive.org/details/ibms360early370s0000pugh/page/34 34] }}</ref>
* 1958: The "Series 50", basic accounting machines, was announced.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20090130120726/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/dpd50/dpd50_chronology.html IBM Archives - DPD chronology]</ref>  These were modified machines, with reduced speed and/or function, offered for rental at reduced rates.  The name "Series 50" relates to a similar marketing effort, the "Model 50", seen in the IBM 1940 product booklet.<ref name=IBM1940>{{cite web|url=http://bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/productDescriptions/A-4060_IBM_Products_1940.pdf|title=IBM 1940 products brochure}}</ref> An alternate report identifies the modified machines as "Type 5050" introduced in 1959 and notes that Remington-Rand introduced similar products.<ref>{{cite book |last= Van Ness |first= Robert G.  |title= Principles of Punched Card Data Processing |publisher= Business Press |year= 1962 |page=10 }}</ref>
* 1959: [[British Tabulating Machine Company|BTM]] is merged with rival Powers-Samas to form [[International Computers and Tabulators]](ICT).
* 1959: The [[IBM 1401]], internally known in IBM for a time as "SPACE" for "Stored Program Accounting and Calculating Equipment" and developed in part as a response to the Bull Gamma 3, outperforms three IBM 407s and a 604, while having a much lower rental.<ref name="ibm-early-computers"/>{{rp|465–494}}  That functionality combined with the availability of tape drives, accelerated the decline in unit record equipment usage.<ref>{{cite book |title=IBM 1401 Data Processing System: From Control Panel to Stored Program |url=http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/ibm/punchedCard/AccountingMachine/224-1614-13_402-403-419.pdf |author=IBM Corporation |year=1959 |series=Order number F20-208}}</ref>
* 1960: The IBM 609 Calculator, an improved 608 with core memory.  This will be IBMs last punched card calculator.<ref>[http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/609.html Columbia University: The IBM 609 Calculator]</ref>

Many organizations were loath to alter systems that were working, so production unit record installations remained in operation long after computers offered faster and more cost effective solutions. Cost or availability of equipment was another factor; for example in 1965 an [[IBM 1620]] computer did not have a printer as standard equipment, so it was normal in such installations to punch output onto cards and then print these cards on an [[IBM 407]] accounting machine. Specialized uses of punched cards such as toll collection, [[microform]] [[Punched card#Formats|aperture cards]], and [[Voting machine#Punched card|punched card voting]] kept unit record equipment in use into the twenty-first century.

* 1968: [[International Computers and Tabulators]] (ICT) is merged with [[English Electric Computers]], forming [[International Computers Limited]] (ICL).
* 1969: The IBM [[System/3]], renting for less than $1,000 a month, the ancestor of IBM's [[IBM midrange computer|midrange computer]] product line, aka. [[minicomputer]]s, was aimed at new customers and organizations that still used IBM 1400 series computers or unit record equipment.  It featured a new, smaller, punched card with a [[punched card#IBM 96 column punched card format|96 column format]]. Instead of the rectangular punches in the classic IBM card, the new cards had tiny (1&nbsp;mm), circular holes much like [[paper tape]]. By July 1974 more than 25,000 System/3s had been installed.<ref name=System3>[https://web.archive.org/web/20071025054059/http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/rochester/rochester_4008.html IBM System 3]</ref>
* 1971: The [[Keypunch#IBM 129 Card Data Recorder|IBM 129 Card Data Recorder]] (keypunch and auxiliary on-line card reader/punch) is the last, or among the last, 80-column card unit record product announcements (other than [[Punched card reader|card readers]] and [[card punch]]es attached to computers).
* 1975  [http://www.cardamation.com Cardamation] founded, a U.S. company that supplied punched card equipment and supplies until 2011.<ref>[https://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.03/punchcards.html Dyson, George (1999) ''The Undead (Cardamation)'', Wired v.7.03]</ref>