Martin Wiberg
Martin Wiberg (born September 4, 1826 in Viby , † December 29, 1905 in Stockholm ) was a Swedish inventor and designer of calculating machines .
Wiberg studied from 1845 at the University of Lund , where he first studied medicine, but turned to science for financial reasons and received his Magister ( filosofie magister ) in 1850 .
Inspired by the difference machines from Georg Scheutz and Edvard Scheutz , he built his own, more compact machine in 1875 that calculated and printed log tables. The tables appeared in Swedish, English, French and German. He presented them to the French Academy of Sciences. It is now in the Technical Museum in Stockholm. For the construction he had the support of some influential personalities, including the later King Oscar II . For this he received a cash prize from the Swedish government and several prizes.
However, he had no commercial success with his calculating machine or the logarithm tables it printed - the latter partly because of the poor print image.
Several other inventions came from him, but they were also not very successful commercially. He wasn't a good businessman either. For example, he invented heaters and speed controls for trains, torpedoes, devices that could collect plants and animals from the seabed, a device for making matchboxes, a coffee extractor and separator for liquids of various densities, and an automatic gun. In 1896 he received a patent for a "spectral apparatus", which could be operated with different colored light beams with a keyboard.
Some of his inventions were presented at the Swedish part of the 1876 World's Fair.
literature
- Article in Nordisk Familjebok
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wiberg, Martin |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Swedish calculating machine designer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 4, 1826 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Viby |
| DATE OF DEATH | December 29, 1905 |
| Place of death | Stockholm |