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The Oughtred Society was founded in 1991 by a group of slide rule collectors and is dedicated to the preservation and history of slide rules and other calculating instruments. In the past 26 years it has evolved to an international organization with members in 19 countries. It is noted for its highly acclaimed Journal of the Oughtred Society, published twice annually. The Society is a non-profit educational organization. Society goals include the dissemination and sharing of information and encouragement for collectors. We are affiliated with organizations in the United Kingdom, Germany, The Netherlands and Italy. Our activities are carried out by members who volunteer to do various tasks and projects. Membership is open to anyone. Click "Membership" in the left navigation menu for more information about member activities and benefits.

• IN MEMORIAM: The Oughtred Society sadly announces the death of David D. McFarland, Professor Emeritus at UCLA on April 20, 2017. David had three main interests in his work, 1) social inequality and social mobility, 2) Mathematical models of social phenomena including graphical and statistical tools for analyzing data, and 3) Computers as tools, toys and as social phenomena to be studied. We of course knew David as an intrepid slide rule collector and participant at Oughtred Society meetings. We often marveled at David’s spirit, when confined to a wheel chair, he continued to attend meetings with his wife helping him get around. One of is his notable quotes: "A slide rule might work, but there are two potential problems to consider. Both the prospective users and the slide rule itself are short on relevant experience." We all will certainly miss David!

• Archive of Collections. New Collection added to this Archive. The first collection in this Archive was that of the late Tom Wyman. Now we have added the first installment of another significant collection, that of Paul Tarantolo of Houstan, Texas. This first installment contains 90 Otis King calculators, 39 antique ivory sectors, and 95 pocket watch calculators. Take a look! Paul's next installment will include more than 500 K & E slide rules, in which he details all known variants. Following that will be Gilson circular rules, Lawrence slide rules, and Stanley Fuller's calculators. We invite you to view this new Archive of Collections and consider having us post your collection to the OS website for posterity.
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  Slide Rules of the Major Makers. A New feature on the Oughtred Society Web Site: In this new feature we present all slide rules produced by the eight major makers. This information has existed in several web locations but now exists here in one location. This data was gathered over many years by dedicated researchers.
  ♦Post and Hemmi have complete archives with photos and details for all rules
  ♦K&E has a cross reference with details for all rules, plus a partial photo archive.
  ♦Faber-Castell has a list of all rules with limited details, plus a partial photo archive.
  ♦Dennert & Pape/Aristo have a list of all rules with limited details, plus a partial photo archive.
  ♦Pickett has a cross reference with details for all rules.
  ♦Dietzgen has a cross reference with details for all rules, plus a dateline matrix.
  ♦Nestler has a list of all rules with limited details.
• IM2017 - September 22-24 2017 located in Bonn, Germany.
  The International Meeting 2017 of collectors and researchers of slide rules and other historic computing instruments or IM2017 for short will be held on September 22-24, 2017 at the Arithmeum, the museum of computing instruments at Bonn University, Germany. Details IM2017

• 2017 Oughtred Society Annual Meeting Report: The Oughtred Society Annual Meeting for 2017 was held at the Atomic Testing Museum in Las Vegas, Nevada and featured a great day at the museum with fascinating displays, two presentations, two very nice dinners, and many interesting items at auction and for sale.
• New Galleries: The Oughtred Society is proud to present two additonal slide rule image galleries - one devoted to Hyperbolic Slide Rules and one devoted to Long Scale Slide Rules Both sites were developed by Rod Lovett based on Bill Robinson's Hyperbolic slide Rule Spreadsheet and Ed Chamberlain's Long Scale Spreadsheet, respectively.
• The Oughtred Society 2016 Hall of Fame.
  In 2016, in Trento, Italy, it was announced at the IM2016 that Günter Kugel (Germany) was given the Oughtred Society Award. and four Fellowships were added to the rolls: Herbert Bruderer (Germany), Jose Fernández (Spain), David Walker (United Kingdom), David Siminovitch (Canada).
• JOS DVD is available for sale, containing 25 years of the Journal of the Oughtred Society in PDF format. OS members and non-members(individuals and institutions) may purchase the DVD by going to the Journal page and paying for the disk via Paypal.
• A Search Facility for the Journal of The Oughtred Society awaits your use.
  (See Journal Search in main menu at left.) This new Search Facility displays high resolution PDFs of Journal articles. You may search by several methods -- author, title, keyword, or for any word that appears in any article, or for all articles in a given year, etc.The search facility was created by Rod Lovett.
• Request for Articles for 2017 Journals. Be a contributing author and share your knowledge and interests. For ideas and inspiration, read "Yes, You Can Write for the Journal of the Oughtred Society" (82KB pdf).
• Current Journal of the Oughtred Society
  
  Cover, Table Of Contents, Sample Page


• Sample Articles from the Journal of the Oughtred Society. The Oughtred Society is pleased to present seven articles from past issues of the Journal. See NEWS ARCHIVES.
  • JOS 21.2 p8-15: Chemistry Slide Rules - Their history and Use, by Louis Gotlib
  • JOS 21.1 p67-68 Aviation Novelty Slide Rules, by Clay Castleberry
  • JOS 20.2 p49-51 Eels and a Joint Slide Rule, by Colin Barnes
  • JOS 20.1 p57-62 Building a Thacher by Bob Wolfson
  • JOS 20.1 p5-6 Colorful Slide Rules by Otto E. van Poelje
  • JOS 19.2 p28-31 Magnifiers by Bob Koppany
  • JOS 19.1 p29 Early Cooperation between A.W. Faber and Dietzgen by Peter Holland
• JOS Plus is the website location where supplemental material appears for articles in the Journal of the Oughtred Society. View these supplemental materials by going to JOS Plus.
• NEWS ARCHIVES - Past announcements and news.

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last modified June 10, 2017