C. Winter

On April 12, 1859, a certain C. Winter of Piqua, county of Miami and State of Ohio, was granted a 3-pages USA patent No 23637 for Improved Adding-Machine (a single column adding device), which seems to be the second in the USA keyboard adder, after the machine of Parmelee, and fourth in the world, after the machines of Torchi and Schwilgué (see the first page of the Winter's patent below).

The first page from the patent drawing of the machine of Winter

In contrast of the machine of his compatriot Parmelee however, the machine of Winter survived to the present, namely the Original U.S. Patent Model (up to 1880, the Patent Office required inventors to submit a model with their patent application), which is a property of Auction Team Breker, Koeln, Germany (see the photos below).

Front view of the machine of Winter (© 2009 by Auction Team Breker, Cologne, Germany, www.breker.com)

Rear view of the machine of Winter (© 2009 by Auction Team Breker, Cologne, Germany, www.breker.com)

The size of the machine is 27 x 22 x 25 cm. The box is made from oak, with ivory key taps and two dial faces on top of registers. The base part of the internal calculating mechanism is the ratchet-wheel (marked with K on the patent drawing), which is provided with 100 teeth, bevel-wheels j and i, pawls s and z, cord o, and pulley P. The big dial B is divided to 100 divisions, while the smaller dial C is divided to 6 divisions.