Edvard Scheutz

Edvard Georg Raphael Scheutz (born September 13, 1821 in Stockholm ; † January 28, 1881 there ) was a Swedish engineer and designer of calculating machines . With his father Georg Scheutz , he built the first functional difference machine , following the ideas of Charles Babbage , which was actually used, was commercially available and, with a connected printer, was intended for the creation of mathematical tables.

Scheutz was the son of the publisher, translator and inventor Georg Scheutz and Anna Margaretha Schaumann (* 1796, † 1823). When Georg Scheutz came across a practically non-illustrated description of the principle of differential machines in the Edinburgh Review in 1834 , he constructed a model out of wood, wire and cardboard in order to convince himself of the functionality of the principle. In the summer of 1837 Edvard Scheutz, who had been a student at the Royal Technical University in Stockholm since November 1835 , began to build a larger model out of wood and metal. From 1839 to 1840 Edvard Scheutz interrupted his studies to complete the difference machine. In 1843 the prototype of the difference machine, including an attached printer, was presented to the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences under Johann Jakob Berzelius . However, Georg and Edvard Scheutz did not receive the hoped-for financial support from the British government, the British refused on the grounds that they had just invested large sums in the development of Babbage. Babbage himself, who never finished his own difference machine and instead devoted himself to his analytical engine , supported father and son Scheutz during their stay in London.

In 1853 a second model was built by the toolmaker Johan Wilhelm Bergström (* 1812, † 1881) in Stockholm. In 1854 a patent was granted for this second model in London. A year later, the machine was awarded a gold medal at the World Exhibition in Paris. It was sold in Albany , New York to the Dudley Observatory , which was under construction , and is now in the National Museum of American History , Washington, DC.A third Scheutz machine was built in the workshop of Bryan Donkin in London in 1859 and registered by the British Registry Office (General Register Office) is used to print tables (the main purpose for which Georg and Edvard Scheutz built and used the machine). The copy is now in the Science Museum London.

Edvard Scheutz did not benefit financially from building the calculating machines; he died impoverished. In addition to the difference machine, he also invented a steam turbine and a process for printing postage stamps. As a teenager he wrote a comedy that was printed by his father's publishing house in 1836.

literature

Michael Lindgren: Glory and Failure. The Difference Engines of Johann Müller, Charles Babbage and Georg and Edvard Scheutz. MIT Press 1990.

swell

↑ ^a ^b ^c Michael Lindgren: Glory and failure. The difference engines of Johann Müller, Charles Baggage and Georg and Edvard Scheutz (= Stockholm papers in history and philosophy of technology . Volume 2017 ). 2nd Edition. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 1990, ISBN 0-585-35107-4 , pp. 415 , urn : nbn: se: liu: diva-35291 (English, also dissertation Linköping University [Linköping studies in arts and science, Volume 9, 1987] Translator: Craig G. McKay).

^ Dionysius Lardner: Babbage's calculating engine . In: The Edinburgh Review . tape July 59 , 1834. Dionysius Lardner: Babbage's calculating engine . In: Martin Campbell-Kelly (Ed.): The Works of Charles Babbage . The Difference Engine and Table Making. tape
2 , Royal Technical College. William Pickering, London 1989, ISBN 1-85196-005-8 , pp. 118-186 (reprinted from The Edinburgh Review of 1834).
↑ Biography of Georg Scheutz, History of Computer

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Scheutz, Edvard
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Scheutz, Edvard Georg Raphael (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Swedish calculating machine designer
DATE OF BIRTH	September 13, 1821
PLACE OF BIRTH	Stockholm
DATE OF DEATH	January 28, 1881
Place of death	Stockholm

[Lindgren_1990-1] Michael Lindgren: Glory and failure. The difference engines of Johann Müller, Charles Baggage and Georg and Edvard Scheutz (= Stockholm papers in history and philosophy of technology . Volume 2017 ). 2nd Edition. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 1990, ISBN 0-585-35107-4 , pp. 415 , urn : nbn: se: liu: diva-35291 (English, also dissertation Linköping University [Linköping studies in arts and science, Volume 9, 1987] Translator: Craig G. McKay).