Dorr Felt

Dorr Felt
Dorr E. Felt
Born	Dorr Eugene Felt March 18, 1862(1862-03-18) Newark, Wisconsin, U.S.
Died	August 7, 1930(1930-08-07) (aged 68) Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
Occupation	Inventor, businessman
Spouse	Agnes McNulty (m. 1891) «start: (1891)»"Marriage: Agnes McNulty to Dorr Felt" Location: (linkback://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorr_Felt)
Children	Virginia Elizabeth Constance Dorothea
Parents	Eugene Kincaid Felt Elizabeth (Morris) Felt
Signature

Dorr Eugene Felt (1862–1930) was an American inventor and industrialist who was known for having invented the Comptometer,^[1] an early computing device, and the Comptograph, the first printing adding machine. The Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company that he co-founded with Robert Tarrant on January 25, 1889^[2] remained a major player in the calculator industry until the mid 1970s.

Biography

Dorr E. Felt was born in Newark, Wisconsin^[3] where he grew up on the family farm and which he left at age 14 to seek employment.

At 16, "his bent of mind, leaning towards mechanics, led him to seek work in a machine shop in Beloit where he found his first employment in the spring of 1878."^[3]

At 18, he started to learn French and eventually spoke it fluently.^[4]

In early 1882, at age 20, he came to Chicago and worked as foreman of a rolling mill that had a daily output valued at $2,000.^[4]

During the US Thanksgiving holidays of 1884 he decided to build the prototype of a new calculating machine that he had invented. Because of his limited amount of money, he used a macaroni box for the outside box, and skewers, staples and rubber bands for the mechanism inside. It was finished soon after New Year's Day, 1885.^[5]

Felt brought his idea to Chicago businessman Robert Tarrant. They signed a partnership contract on November 28, 1887,^[2] and incorporated the Felt & Tarrant Manufacturing Company on January 25, 1889. Felt later went on to invent more devices and acquired 46 domestic patents and 25 foreign ones. The original macaroni box prototype and the first Comptograph ever sold are now part of the Smithsonian Museum collection of antique calculators.^[6][7]

Felt was awarded the John Scott Medal of The Franklin Institute in 1889.

He was married to Agnes McNulty in 1891 and the couple had four daughters together.

Dorr Felt also was the first ambassador for the Department of Commerce formed to study labor abroad after World War I. He was an excellent photographer, and many of his war-time and post-war time photos were used by the government. Dorr traveled the world and loved learning.

He made his home in Chicago and summered in Laketown Township, Michigan, where the Felt Mansion^[8] is a well-known historic site.

Dorr E. Felt died of a stroke in Chicago on August 7, 1930. He was 68 years old.

Bibliography

Biographies

• W.W. Johnson, "Scars on My Hands: The Life of Dorr Eugene Felt, Inventor and Industrialist," (unpublished), Schmidt Collection, Mathematics, NMAH.
• Comptometer website
• World of Computer Science
• 1918 Biographical Sketch
• Wisconsin Biographies

References

1. ^ Detroit in its world setting; a 250-year chronology, 1701-1951. Detroit Public Library. 1953. pp. 168. http://www.archive.org/texts/flipbook/flippy.php?id=detroitinitsworl00detrrich. Retrieved 2009-12-07. 
2. ^ ^{a b} J. Turk, p. 75 (1921)
3. ^ ^{a b} Felt and Allied Families, p. 12 (1921)
4. ^ ^{a b} Papers in Illinois, p.66 (1922)
5. ^ J. Turk, p. 55 (1921)
6. ^ G.C. Chase, p. 223 (1980)
7. ^ J. Turk, p. 119 (1921)
8. ^ The Felt Estate Retrieved 2010-10-03

Sources

Books by Felt

• Felt, Dorr E. (1916). Mechanical arithmetic, or The history of the counting machine. Chicago: Washington Institute. http://www.archive.org/details/mechanicalarithm00feltrich. 
• Felt, Dorr E.; Holman, Alfred L. (1921). A register of the ancestors of Dorr Eugene Felt and Agnes (McNulty) Felt. Chicago: Priv. print. for D. E. Felt. http://www.archive.org/details/aregisterancest00feltgoog. 

Other books

• Turck, J.A.V. (1921). Origin of modern calculating machines. The western society of engineers. 
• Meyer, Patricia. The Felt Mansion: A Story of Restoration. Laketown Township, Michigan. http://www.feltmansion.org/feltcoffeetablebook.html. 
• Chase, G.C. (July 1980). History of Mechanical Computing Machinery. IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, Volume 2, Number 3. Arlington, VA: The American Federation of Information Processing Societies. 
• Papers in Illinois history and transactions. Illinois State Historical Society. Springfield. 1922. http://www.archive.org/stream/papersinillinois1921illi#page/n69/mode/1up/search/felt. Retrieved 2009-12-07. 

External links

Biography portal

• Dorr Felt at Find a Grave

Persondata
Name	Felt, Dorr Eugene
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	March 18, 1862
Place of birth	Newark, Wisconsin, U.S.
Date of death	August 7, 1930
Place of death	Chicago, Illinois, U.S.