What is a Tabulating Machine?
Tabulating machines made their first appearance in the United States as a valuable tool in helping to provide an accurate count for the national census. Introduced to help order and process data associated with the 1890 national census, the tabulating machine was developed by Herman Hollerith. The purpose of the tabulating machine was to speed up the process of assimilating census data into a usable form that would meet the needs of a country that was experiencing a significant growth in population from one decade to the next. The need for an improved method of processing data related to the population of the country reached a peak after the 1880 census. Over seven years were required to organize the collected information and produce a relatively reliable report on the status of the country’s population. Estimates on the increase in population between 1880 and 1890 indicated that it would take roughly twice as long to produce results from the next census. In response to this need for q
Tabulating machines made their first appearance in the United States as a valuable tool in helping to provide an accurate count for the national census. Introduced to help order and process data associated with the 1890 national census, the tabulating machine was developed by Herman Hollerith. The purpose of the tabulating machine was to speed up the process of assimilating census data into a usable form that would meet the needs of a country that was experiencing a significant growth in population from one decade to the next. The need for an improved method of processing data related to the population of the country reached a peak after the 1880 census. Over seven years were required to organize the collected information and produce a relatively reliable report on the status of the country’s population. Estimates on the increase in population between 1880 and 1890 indicated that it would take roughly twice as long to produce results from the next census. In response to this need for
