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Punched card
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Paper-based recording medium
"Overpunch" redirects here. For the COBOL code, see Signed overpunch.
A 12-row/80-column IBM punched card from the mid-twentieth century
A punched card (also punch card^[1] or punched-card^[2]) is a piece of
stiff paper that holds digital data represented by the presence or
absence of holes in predefined positions. Punched cards were once
common in data processing applications or to directly control automated
machinery.
Punched cards were widely used through much of the 20th century in the
data processing industry, where specialized and increasingly complex
unit record machines, organized into semiautomatic data processing
systems, used punched cards for data input, output, and
storage.^[3]^[4] The IBM 12-row/80-column punched card format came to
dominate the industry. Many early digital computers used punched cards
as the primary medium for input of both computer programs and data.
While punched cards are now obsolete as a storage medium, as of 2012,
some voting machines still used punched cards to record votes.^[5] They
also had a significant cultural impact.
Close-up of a Jacquard loom's chain, constructed using 8 * 26 hole
punched cards
[ ]
Contents
* 1 History
+ 1.1 Precursors
+ 1.2 20th century
* 2 Nomenclature
* 3 Formats
+ 3.1 Hollerith's early cards
+ 3.2 IBM 80-column format and character codes
+ 3.3 IBM Stub card and Short card formats
+ 3.4 IBM 40-column Port-A-Punch card format
+ 3.5 IBM 96-column format
+ 3.6 Powers/Remington Rand/UNIVAC 90-column format
+ 3.7 Powers-Samas formats
+ 3.8 Mark sense format
+ 3.9 Aperture format
* 4 Manufacturing
* 5 Cultural impact
+ 5.1 Do Not Fold, Spindle or Mutilate
* 6 Standards
* 7 Punched card devices
* 8 See also
* 9 Notes
* 10 References
* 11 Further reading
* 12 External links
History[edit]
The idea of control and data storage via punched holes was developed
independently on several occasions in the modern period. In most cases
there is no evidence that each of the inventors was aware of the
earlier work.
Precursors[edit]
Carpet loom with Jacquard apparatus by Carl Engel, around 1860. Chain
feed is on the left.
Basile Bouchon developed the control of a loom by punched holes in
paper tape in 1725. The design was improved by his assistant
Jean-Baptiste Falcon and by Jacques Vaucanson.^[6] Although these
improvements controlled the patterns woven, they still required an
assistant to operate the mechanism.
In 1804 Joseph Marie Jacquard demonstrated a mechanism to automate loom
operation. A number of punched cards were linked into a chain of any
length. Each card held the instructions for shedding (raising and
lowering the warp) and selecting the shuttle for a single pass.^[7]
Semyon Korsakov was reputedly the first to propose punched cards in
informatics for information store and search. Korsakov announced his
new method and machines in September 1832.^[8]
Charles Babbage proposed the use of "Number Cards", "pierced with
certain holes and stand[ing] opposite levers connected with a set of
figure wheels ... advanced they push in those levers opposite to which
there are no holes on the cards and thus transfer that number together
with its sign" in his description of the Calculating Engine's
Store.^[9] There is no evidence that he built a practical example.
In 1881 Jules Carpentier developed a method of recording and playing
back performances on a harmonium using punched cards. The system was
called the Melographe Repetiteur and "writes down ordinary music played
on the keyboard dans la langage de Jacquard",^[10] that is as holes
punched in a series of cards. By 1887 Carpentier had separated the
mechanism into the Melograph which recorded the player's key presses
and the Melotrope which played the music.^[11]^[12]
20th century[edit]
At the end of the 1800s Herman Hollerith invented the recording of data
on a medium that could then be read by a machine,^[dubious -
discuss]^[13]^[14]^[15]^[16] developing punched card data processing
technology for the 1890 U.S. census.^[17] His tabulating machines read
and summarized data stored on punched cards and they began use for
government and commercial data processing.
Initially, these electromechanical machines only counted holes, but by
the 1920s they had units for carrying out basic arithmetic
operations.^[18]^: 124 Hollerith founded the Tabulating Machine Company
(1896) which was one of four companies that were amalgamated via stock
acquisition to form a fifth company, Computing-Tabulating-Recording
Company (CTR) (1911), later renamed International Business Machines
Corporation (IBM) (1924). Other companies entering the punched card
business included The Tabulator Limited (Britain, 1902), Deutsche
Hollerith-Maschinen Gesellschaft mbH (Dehomag) (Germany, 1911), Powers
Accounting Machine Company (US, 1911), Remington Rand (US, 1927), and
H.W. Egli Bull (France, 1931).^[19] These companies, and others,
manufactured and marketed a variety of punched cards and unit record
machines for creating, sorting, and tabulating punched cards, even
after the development of electronic computers in the 1950s.
Woman operating the card puncher, c.1940
Both IBM and Remington Rand tied punched card purchases to machine
leases, a violation of the US 1914 Clayton Antitrust Act. In 1932, the
US government took both to court on this issue. Remington Rand settled
quickly. IBM viewed its business as providing a service and that the
cards were part of the machine. IBM fought all the way to the Supreme
Court and lost in 1936; the court ruled that IBM could only set card
specifications.^[20]^[21]^: 300-301
"By 1937... IBM had 32 presses at work in Endicott, N.Y., printing,
cutting and stacking five to 10 million punched cards every day."^[22]
Punched cards were even used as legal documents, such as U.S.
Government checks^[23] and savings bonds.^[24]
During World War II punched card equipment was used by the Allies in
some of their efforts to decrypt Axis communications. See, for example,
Central Bureau in Australia. At Bletchley Park in England, "some 2
million punched cards a week were being produced, indicating the sheer
scale of this part of the operation".^[25] In Nazi Germany, punched
cards were used for the censuses of various regions and other
purposes^[26]^[27] (see IBM and the Holocaust).
Punched card technology developed into a powerful tool for business
data-processing. By 1950 punched cards had become ubiquitous in
industry and government. "Do not fold, spindle or mutilate," a warning
that appeared on some punched cards distributed as documents such as
checks and utility bills to be returned for processing, became a motto
for the post-World War II era.^[28]^[29]
In 1956^[30] IBM signed a consent decree requiring, amongst other
things, that IBM would by 1962 have no more than one-half of the
punched card manufacturing capacity in the United States. Tom Watson
Jr.'s decision to sign this decree, where IBM saw the punched card
provisions as the most significant point, completed the transfer of
power to him from Thomas Watson, Sr.^[21]
The Univac UNITYPER introduced magnetic tape for data entry in the
1950s. During the 1960s, the punched card was gradually replaced as the
primary means for data storage by magnetic tape, as better, more
capable computers became available. Mohawk Data Sciences introduced a
magnetic tape encoder in 1965, a system marketed as a keypunch
replacement which was somewhat successful. Punched cards were still
commonly used for entering both data and computer programs until the
mid-1980s when the combination of lower cost magnetic disk storage, and
affordable interactive terminals on less expensive minicomputers made
punched cards obsolete for these roles as well.^[31]^: 151 However,
their influence lives on through many standard conventions and file
formats. The terminals that replaced the punched cards, the IBM 3270
for example, displayed 80 columns of text in text mode, for
compatibility with existing software. Some programs still operate on
the convention of 80 text columns, although fewer and fewer do as newer
systems employ graphical user interfaces with variable-width type
fonts.
Nomenclature[edit]
A deck of punched cards comprising a computer program. The red diagonal
line is a visual aid to keep the deck sorted.^[32]
The terms punched card, punch card, and punchcard were all commonly
used, as were IBM card and Hollerith card (after Herman Hollerith).^[1]
IBM used "IBM card" or, later, "punched card" at first mention in its
documentation and thereafter simply "card" or "cards".^[33]^[34]
Specific formats were often indicated by the number of character
positions available, e.g. 80-column card. A sequence of cards that is
input to or output from some step in an application's processing is
called a card deck or simply deck. The rectangular, round, or oval bits
of paper punched out were called chad (chads) or chips (in IBM usage).
Sequential card columns allocated for a specific use, such as names,
addresses, multi-digit numbers, etc., are known as a field. The first
card of a group of cards, containing fixed or indicative information
for that group, is known as a master card. Cards that are not master
cards are detail cards.
Formats[edit]
The Hollerith punched cards used for the 1890 U.S. census were
blank.^[35] Following that, cards commonly had printing such that the
row and column position of a hole could be easily seen. Printing could
include having fields named and marked by vertical lines, logos, and
more.^[36] "General purpose" layouts (see, for example, the IBM 5081
below) were also available. For applications requiring master cards to
be separated from following detail cards, the respective cards had
different upper corner diagonal cuts and thus could be separated by a
sorter.^[37] Other cards typically had one upper corner diagonal cut so
that cards not oriented correctly, or cards with different corner cuts,
could be identified.
Hollerith's early cards[edit]
Hollerith card as shown in the Railroad Gazette in 1895, with 12 rows
and 24 columns.^[38]
Herman Hollerith was awarded three patents^[39] in 1889 for
electromechanical tabulating machines. These patents described both
paper tape and rectangular cards as possible recording media. The card
shown in U.S. Patent 395,781 of January 8 was printed with a template
and had hole positions arranged close to the edges so they could be
reached by a railroad conductor's ticket punch, with the center
reserved for written descriptions. Hollerith was originally inspired by
railroad tickets that let the conductor encode a rough description of
the passenger:
I was traveling in the West and I had a ticket with what I think was
called a punch photograph...the conductor...punched out a
description of the individual, as light hair, dark eyes, large nose,
etc. So you see, I only made a punch photograph of each
person.^[18]^: 15
When use of the ticket punch proved tiring and error-prone, Hollerith
developed the pantograph "keyboard punch". It featured an enlarged
diagram of the card, indicating the positions of the holes to be
punched. A printed reading board could be placed under a card that was
to be read manually.^[35]^: 43
Hollerith envisioned a number of card sizes. In an article he wrote
describing his proposed system for tabulating the 1890 U.S. census,
Hollerith suggested a card
3 by 5+1/2 inches (7.6 by 14.0 cm) of Manila stock "would be sufficient
to answer all ordinary purposes."^[40] The cards used in the 1890
census had round holes, 12 rows and 24 columns. A reading board for
these cards can be seen at the Columbia University Computing History
site.^[41] At some point,
3+1/4 by 7+3/8 inches (83 by 187 mm) became the standard card size.
These are the dimensions of the then-current paper currency of
1862-1923.^[42]
Hollerith's original system used an ad hoc coding system for each
application, with groups of holes assigned specific meanings, e.g. sex
or marital status. His tabulating machine had up to 40 counters, each
with a dial divided into 100 divisions, with two indicator hands; one
which stepped one unit with each counting pulse, the other which
advanced one unit every time the other dial made a complete revolution.
This arrangement allowed a count up to 9,999. During a given tabulating
run counters were assigned specific holes or, using relay logic,
combination of holes.^[40]
Later designs led to a card with ten rows, each row assigned a digit
value, 0 through 9, and 45 columns.^[43] This card provided for fields
to record multi-digit numbers that tabulators could sum, instead of
their simply counting cards. Hollerith's 45 column punched cards are
illustrated in Comrie's The application of the Hollerith Tabulating
Machine to Brown's Tables of the Moon.^[44]
IBM 80-column format and character codes[edit]
Punched card from a Fortran program: Z(1) = Y + W(1), plus sorting
information in the last 8 columns.
By the late 1920s, customers wanted to store more data on each punched
card. Thomas J. Watson Sr., IBM's head, asked two of his top inventors,
Clair D. Lake and J. Royden Pierce, to independently develop ways to
increase data capacity without increasing the size of the punched card.
Pierce wanted to keep round holes and 45 columns, but allow each column
to store more data. Lake suggested rectangular holes, which could be
spaced more tightly, allowing 80 columns per punched card, thereby
nearly doubling the capacity of the older format.^[45] Watson picked
the latter solution, introduced as The IBM Card, in part because it was
compatible with existing tabulator designs and in part because it could
be protected by patents and give the company a distinctive
advantage.^[46]
This IBM card format, introduced in 1928,^[47] has rectangular holes,
80 columns, and 10 rows.^[48] Card size is
7+3/8 by 3+1/4 inches (187 by 83 mm). The cards are made of smooth
stock, 0.007 inches (180 mm) thick. There are about 143 cards to the
inch (56/cm). In 1964, IBM changed from square to round corners.^[49]
They come typically in boxes of 2000 cards^[50] or as continuous form
cards. Continuous form cards could be both pre-numbered and pre-punched
for document control (checks, for example).^[51]
Initially designed to record responses to yes-no questions, support for
numeric, alphabetic and special characters was added through the use of
columns and zones. The top three positions of a column are called zone
punching positions, 12 (top), 11, and 0 (0 may be either a zone punch
or a digit punch).^[52] For decimal data the lower ten positions are
called digit punching positions, 0 (top) through 9.^[52] An arithmetic
sign can be specified for a decimal field by overpunching the field's
rightmost column with a zone punch: 12 for plus, 11 for minus (CR). For
Pound sterling pre-decimalization currency a penny column represents
the values zero through eleven; 10 (top), 11, then 0 through 9 as
above. An arithmetic sign can be punched in the adjacent shilling
column.^[53]^: 9 Zone punches had other uses in processing, such as
indicating a master card.^[54]
An 80-column punched card with the extended character set introduced
with EBCDIC in 1964.
Diagram:^[55] Note: The 11 and 12 zones were also called the X and Y
zones, respectively.
_______________________________________________
/ &-0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQR/STUVWXYZ
12| x xxxxxxxxx
11| x xxxxxxxxx
0| x xxxxxxxxx
1| x x x x
2| x x x x
3| x x x x
4| x x x x
5| x x x x
6| x x x x
7| x x x x
8| x x x x
9| x x x x
|________________________________________________
In 1931, IBM began introducing upper-case letters and special
characters (Powers-Samas had developed the first commercial alphabetic
punched card representation in 1921).^[56]^[57]^[nb 1] The 26 letters
have two punches (zone [12,11,0] + digit [1-9]). The languages of
Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Spain, Portugal and Finland require
up to three additional letters; their punching is not shown
here.^[58]^: 88-90 Most special characters have two or three punches
(zone [12,11,0, or none] + digit [2-7] + 8); a few special characters
were exceptions: "&" is 12 only, "-" is 11 only, and "/" is 0 + 1). The
Space character has no punches.^[58]^: 38 The information represented
in a column by a combination of zones [12, 11, 0] and digits [0-9] is
dependent on the use of that column. For example, the combination
"12-1" is the letter "A" in an alphabetic column, a plus signed digit
"1" in a signed numeric column, or an unsigned digit "1" in a column
where the "12" has some other use. The introduction of EBCDIC in 1964
defined columns with as many as six punches (zones [12,11,0,8,9] +
digit [1-7]). IBM and other manufacturers used many different 80-column
card character encodings.^[59]^[60] A 1969 American National Standard
defined the punches for 128 characters and was named the Hollerith
Punched Card Code (often referred to simply as Hollerith Card Code),
honoring Hollerith.^[58]^: 7
Binary punched card.
For some computer applications, binary formats were used, where each
hole represented a single binary digit (or "bit"), every column (or
row) is treated as a simple bit field, and every combination of holes
is permitted.
For example, on the IBM 701^[61] and IBM 704,^[62] card data was read,
using an IBM 711, into memory in row binary format. For each of the
twelve rows of the card, 72 of the 80 columns would be read into two
36-bit words; a control panel was used to select the 72 columns to be
read. Software would translate this data into the desired form. One
convention was to use columns 1 through 72 for data, and columns 73
through 80 to sequentially number the cards, as shown in the picture
above of a punched card for FORTRAN. Such numbered cards could be
sorted by machine so that if a deck was dropped the sorting machine
could be used to arrange it back in order. This convention continued to
be used in FORTRAN, even in later systems where the data in all 80
columns could be read.
As an aid to humans who had to deal with the punched cards, the IBM 026
and later 029 and 129 key punch machines could print human-readable
text above each of the 80 columns.
Invalid "lace cards" such as this pose mechanical problems for card
readers.
As a prank, punched cards could be made where every possible punch
position had a hole. Such "lace cards" lacked structural strength, and
would frequently buckle and jam inside the machine.^[63]
The IBM 80-column punched card format dominated the industry, becoming
known as just IBM cards, even though other companies made cards and
equipment to process them.^[64]
A 5081 card from a non-IBM manufacturer.
One of the most common punched card formats is the IBM 5081 card
format, a general purpose layout with no field divisions. This format
has digits printed on it corresponding to the punch positions of the
digits in each of the 80 columns. Other punched card vendors
manufactured cards with this same layout and number.
IBM Stub card and Short card formats[edit]
Long cards were available with a scored stub on either end which, when
torn off, left an 80 column card. The torn off card is called a stub
card.
80-column cards were available scored, on either end, creating both a
short card and a stub card when torn apart. Short cards can be
processed by other IBM machines.^[51]^[65] A common length for stub
cards was 51 columns. Stub cards were used in applications requiring
tags, labels, or carbon copies.^[51]
IBM 40-column Port-A-Punch card format[edit]
According to the IBM Archive: IBM's Supplies Division introduced the
Port-A-Punch in 1958 as a fast, accurate means of manually punching
holes in specially scored IBM punched cards. Designed to fit in the
pocket, Port-A-Punch made it possible to create punched card documents
anywhere. The product was intended for "on-the-spot" recording
operations--such as physical inventories, job tickets and statistical
surveys--because it eliminated the need for preliminary writing or
typing of source documents.^[66]
* IBM Port-A-Punch
IBM Port-A-Punch
* FORTRAN Port-A-Punch card. Compiler directive "SQUEEZE" removed the
alternating blank columns from the input.
FORTRAN Port-A-Punch card. Compiler directive "SQUEEZE" removed the
alternating blank columns from the input.
* Port-a-punch
Port-a-punch
IBM 96-column format[edit]
IBM 96-column punched card
In 1969 IBM introduced a new, smaller, round-hole, 96-column card
format along with the IBM System/3 low-end business computer. These
cards have tiny (1 mm), circular holes, smaller than those in paper
tape. Data is stored in 6-bit BCD, with three rows of 32 characters
each, or 8-bit EBCDIC. In this format, each column of the top tiers are
combined with two punch rows from the bottom tier to form an 8-bit
byte, and the middle tier is combined with two more punch rows, so that
each card contains 64 bytes of 8-bit-per-byte binary coded data.^[67]
As in the 80 column card, readable text was printed in the top section
of the card. There was also a 4th row of 32 characters that could be
printed. This format was never very widely used; it was IBM-only, but
they did not support it on any equipment beyond the System/3, where it
was quickly superseded by the 1973 IBM 3740 Data Entry System using
8-inch floppy disks.
Powers/Remington Rand/UNIVAC 90-column format[edit]
A blank Remington Rand UNIVAC format card. Card courtesy of MIT Museum.
A punched Remington Rand card with an IBM card for comparison
The Powers/Remington Rand card format was initially the same as
Hollerith's; 45 columns and round holes. In 1930, Remington Rand
leap-frogged IBM's 80 column format from 1928 by coding two characters
in each of the 45 columns - producing what is now commonly called the
90-column card.^[31]^: 142 There are two sets of six rows across each
card. The rows in each set are labeled 0, 1/2, 3/4, 5/6, 7/8 and 9. The
even numbers in a pair are formed by combining that punch with a 9
punch. Alphabetic and special characters use 3 or more
punches.^[68]^[69]
Powers-Samas formats[edit]
The British Powers-Samas company used a variety of card formats for
their unit record equipment. They began with 45 columns and round
holes. Later 36, 40 and 65 column cards were provided. A 130 column
card was also available - formed by dividing the card into two rows,
each row with 65 columns and each character space with 5 punch
positions. A 21 column card was comparable to the IBM Stub card.^[53]^:
47-51
Mark sense format[edit]
HP Educational Basic optical mark-reader card.
Mark sense (electrographic) cards, developed by Reynold B. Johnson at
IBM,^[70] have printed ovals that could be marked with a special
electrographic pencil. Cards would typically be punched with some
initial information, such as the name and location of an inventory
item. Information to be added, such as quantity of the item on hand,
would be marked in the ovals. Card punches with an option to detect
mark sense cards could then punch the corresponding information into
the card.
Aperture format[edit]
Aperture card
Aperture cards have a cut-out hole on the right side of the punched
card. A piece of 35 mm microfilm containing a microform image is
mounted in the hole. Aperture cards are used for engineering drawings
from all engineering disciplines. Information about the drawing, for
example the drawing number, is typically punched and printed on the
remainder of the card.
Manufacturing[edit]
Institutions, such as universities, often had their general purpose
cards printed with a logo. A wide variety of forms and documents were
printed on punched cards, including checks. Such printing did not
interfere with the operation of the machinery.
A punched card printing plate.
IBM's Fred M. Carroll^[71] developed a series of rotary presses that
were used to produce punched cards, including a 1921 model that
operated at 460 cards per minute (cpm). In 1936 he introduced a
completely different press that operated at 850 cpm.^[22]^[72]
Carroll's high-speed press, containing a printing cylinder,
revolutionized the company's manufacturing of punched cards.^[73] It is
estimated that between 1930 and 1950, the Carroll press accounted for
as much as 25 percent of the company's profits.^[21]
Discarded printing plates from these card presses, each printing plate
the size of an IBM card and formed into a cylinder, often found use as
desk pen/pencil holders, and even today are collectible IBM artifacts
(every card layout^[74] had its own printing plate).
In the mid-1930s a box of 1,000 cards cost $1.05 (equivalent to $21 in
2021).^[75]
Cultural impact[edit]
A $75 U.S. Savings Bond, Series EE issued as a punched card. Eight of
the holes record the bond serial number.
Cartons of punched cards stored in a United States National Archives
Records Service facility in 1959. Each carton could hold 2,000 cards.
While punched cards have not been widely used for a generation, the
impact was so great for most of the 20th century that they still appear
from time to time in popular culture. For example:
* Accommodation of people's names: The Man Whose Name Wouldn't
Fit^[76]^[77]
* Artist and architect Maya Lin in 2004 designed a public art
installation at Ohio University, titled "Input", that looks like a
punched card from the air.^[78]
* Tucker Hall at the University of Missouri - Columbia features
architecture that is rumored to be influenced by punched cards.
Although there are only two rows of windows on the building, a
rumor holds that their spacing and pattern will spell out "M-I-Z
beat k-U!" on a punched card, making reference to the university
and state's rivalry with neighboring state Kansas.^[79]
* At the University of Wisconsin - Madison, the exterior windows of
the Engineering Research Building^[80] were modeled after a punched
card layout, during its construction in 1966.
* At the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks, a portion of the
exterior of Gamble Hall (College of Business and Public
Administration), has a series of light-colored bricks that
resembles a punched card spelling out "University of North
Dakota."^[81]
* In the 1964-1965 Free Speech Movement, punched cards became a
metaphor... symbol of the "system"--first the registration system
and then bureaucratic systems more generally ... a symbol of
alienation ... Punched cards were the symbol of information
machines, and so they became the symbolic point of attack. Punched
cards, used for class registration, were first and foremost a symbol
of uniformity. .... A student might feel "he is one of out of 27,500
IBM cards" ... The president of the Undergraduate Association
criticized the University as "a machine ... IBM pattern of
education."... Robert Blaumer explicated the symbolism: he referred
to the "sense of impersonality... symbolized by the IBM
technology."...
-- Steven Lubar^[28]
* A legacy of the 80 column punched card format is that a display of
80 characters per row was a common choice in the design of
character-based terminals.^[citation needed] As of September 2014,
some character interface defaults, such as the command prompt
window's width in Microsoft Windows, remain set at 80 columns and
some file formats, such as FITS, still use 80-character card
images.
* In Arthur C. Clarke's early short story "Rescue Party", the alien
explorers find a "... wonderful battery of almost human Hollerith
analyzers and the five thousand million punched cards holding all
that could be recorded on each man, woman and child on the
planet".^[82] Writing in 1946, Clarke, like almost all SF authors,
had not then foreseen the development and eventual ubiquity of the
computer.
* In "I.B.M.", the final track of her album This Is a Recording,
comedian Lily Tomlin gives instructions that, if followed, would
purportedly shrink the holes on a punch card (used by AT&T at the
time for customer billing), making it unreadable.
Do Not Fold, Spindle or Mutilate[edit]
A common example of the requests often printed on punched cards which
were to be individually handled, especially those intended for the
public to use and return is "Do Not Fold, Spindle or Mutilate" (in the
UK "Do not bend, spike, fold or mutilate").^[28]^: 43-55 Coined by
Charles A. Phillips,^[83] it became a motto^[84] for the post-World War
II era (even though many people had no idea what spindle meant), and
was widely mocked and satirized. Some 1960s students at Berkeley wore
buttons saying: "Do not fold, spindle or mutilate. I am a
student".^[85] The motto was also used for a 1970 book by Doris Miles
Disney^[86] with a plot based around an early computer dating service
and a 1971 made-for-TV movie based on that book, and a similarly titled
1967 Canadian short film, Do Not Fold, Staple, Spindle or Mutilate.
Standards[edit]
A U.S. Census Bureau clerk (left) prepares punch cards using a
pantograph similar to that developed by Herman Hollerith for the 1890
Census, while a second clerk (right) uses a 1930s key punch to perform
the same task more quickly.
A wall-sized display sample of a punch card for the 1954 U.S. Census of
Agriculture
* ANSI INCITS 21-1967 (R2002), Rectangular Holes in Twelve-Row
Punched Cards (formerly ANSI X3.21-1967 (R1997)) Specifies the size
and location of rectangular holes in twelve-row
3+1/4-inch-wide (83 mm) punched cards.
ANSI X3.11-1990 American National Standard Specifications for General
Purpose Paper Cards for Information Processing
ANSI X3.26-1980 (R1991) Hollerith Punched Card Code
ISO 1681:1973 Information processing - Unpunched paper cards -
Specification
ISO 6586:1980 Data processing - Implementation of the ISO 7- bit and
8- bit coded character sets on punched cards. Defines ISO 7-bit and
8-bit character sets on punched cards as well as the representation of
7-bit and 8-bit combinations on 12-row punched cards. Derived from, and
compatible with, the Hollerith Code, ensuring compatibility with
existing punched card files.
Punched card devices[edit]
Processing of punched cards was handled by a variety of machines,
including:
* Keypunches--machines with a keyboard that punched cards from
operator entered data.
* Unit record equipment--machines that process data on punched cards.
Employed prior to the widespread use of digital computers. Includes
card sorters, tabulating machines and a variety of other machines
* Computer punched card reader--a computer input device used to read
executable computer programs and data from punched cards under
computer control.
* Computer card punch--a computer output device that punches holes in
cards under computer control.
* Voting machines--used into the 21st century
See also[edit]
* Aperture card
* Card image
* Computer programming in the punched card era
* Edge-notched card
* History of computing hardware
* Kimball tag--punched card price tags
* Paper data storage
* Punched card input/output
* Punched tape
* Lace card
Notes[edit]
1. ^ Special characters are non-alphabetic, non-numeric, such as
"&#,$.-/@%*?"
References[edit]
1. ^ ^a ^b Pinker, Steven Arthur (2007). The Stuff of Thought. Viking.
p. 362. (NB. Notes the loss of -ed in pronunciation as it did in
ice cream, mincemeat, and box set, formerly iced cream, minced
meat, and boxed set.)
2. ^ "Know-How" Makes Them Great. Tabulating Machines Division,
Remington Rand Inc. 1941.
3. ^ Cortada, James W. (1993). Before The Computer: IBM, NCR,
Burroughs, & Remington Rand & The Industry They Created, 1865-1965.
Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-63008-3.
4. ^ Brooks, Frederick Phillips; Iverson, Kenneth Eugene (1963).
Automatic Data Processing. Wiley. p. 94. "semiautomatic"
5. ^ "Nightly News Aired on 2012-12-27 - Punch card voting lingers".
NBC News.
6. ^ Razy, Claudius (1913). Etude analytique des petits modeles de
metiers exposes au musee des tissus [Analytical study of small loom
models exhibited at the museum of fabrics] (in French). Lyon,
France: Musee Historique des Tissus. p. 120.
7. ^ Essinger, James (2007-03-29). Jacquard's Web: How a Hand-loom Led
to the Birth of the Information Age. OUP Oxford. pp. 35-40.
ISBN 978-0-19280578-2.
8. ^ "1801: Punched cards control Jacquard loom". computerhistory.org.
Retrieved 2019-01-07.
9. ^ Babbage, Charles (1837-12-26). "On the Mathematical Powers of the
Calculating Engine". The Origins of Digital Computers. pp. 19-54.
doi:10.1007/978-3-642-61812-3_2. ISBN 978-3-642-61814-7.
10. ^ Southgate, Thomas Lea (1881). "On Various Attempts That Have Been
Made to Record Extemporaneous Playing". Journal of the Royal
Musical Association. 8 (1): 189-196. doi:10.1093/jrma/8.1.189.
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Re-performance (PDF) (Thesis). Massachusetts Institute of
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stage, the corresponding playback mechanism, the Melotrope, was
permanently installed inside the same harmonium used for the
recording process, but by 1887 Carpentier had modified both
devices, restricting the range to three octaves, allowing for the
Melotrope to be attached to any style of keyboard instrument, and
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13. ^ "An Electric Tabulating System".
14. ^ Randell, Brian, ed. (1982). The Origins of Digital Computers,
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statistics", issued 1889-01-08
16. ^ "Art of compiling statistics". Retrieved 2020-05-22.
17. ^ da Cruz, Frank (2019-08-28). "Herman Hollerith". Columbia
University Computing History. Columbia University. Retrieved
2020-03-09. "After some initial trials with paper tape, he settled
on punched cards..."
18. ^ ^a ^b Austrian, Geoffrey D. (1982). Herman Hollerith: The
Forgotten Giant of Information Processing. Columbia University
Press. pp. 15, 124, 418-. ISBN 978-0-231-05146-0.
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1967. p. 32.
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131". Justia. 1936.
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Shadow: The Life of Thomas J. Watson. Little, Brown & Company.
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2003-01-23. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
23. ^ Lubar, Steven (1993). InfoCulture: The Smithsonian Book of
Information Age Inventions. Houghton Mifflin. p. 302.
ISBN 978-0-395-57042-5.
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[...] producing savings bonds [...] 1964: $75 savings bond [...]
produce"
25. ^ "Codes and Ciphers Heritage Trust".
26. ^ Luebke, David Martin; Milton, Sybil Halpern (Autumn 1994).
"Locating the victim: An overview of census-taking, tabulation
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History of Computing. IEEE. 16 (3): 25-.
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28. ^ ^a ^b ^c Lubar, Steven (Winter 1992). "Do Not Fold, Spindle Or
Mutilate: A Cultural History Of The Punch Card" (PDF). Journal of
American Culture. 15 (4): 43-55.
doi:10.1111/j.1542-734X.1992.1504_43.x. Archived from the original
(PDF) on 2012-10-02. Retrieved 2011-06-11. pp. 43-55: "Security
checks issued starting in 1936 [...]" (13 pages);
Lubar, Steven (May 1991). "Do not fold, spindle or mutilate: A cultural
history of the punch card". Smithsonian Institution. Archived from the
original on 2006-08-30. (NB. An earlier version of this paper was
presented to the Bureau of the Census's Hollerith Machine Centennial
Celebration on 1990-06-20.)
^ "History of the punch card". Whatis.techtarget.com. Retrieved
2013-10-05.
^ "Justice Department agrees to terminate last provisions of IBM
consent decree in stages ending 5 years from today" (Press release).
Justice Department. 1996-07-02. Retrieved 2021-10-04.
^ ^a ^b Aspray, William, ed. (1990). Computing before Computers. Iowa
State University Press. pp. 142, 151. ISBN 978-0-8138-0047-9.
^ "Punched Cards". miami.edu. University of Miami. Retrieved
2021-12-06. "Once the cards were assembled in order in a deck, the
programmer would usually draw a long diagonal line across the top edges
of the cards, so that if ever one got out of order it would easily be
noticed"
^ IBM 519 Principles of Operation. IBM. 1946. Form 22-3292-5. "An
important function in IBM Accounting is the automatic preparation of
IBM cards."
^ Reference Manual 1401 Data Processing System (PDF). IBM. April
1962. p. 10. A24-1403-5. "The IBM 1402 Card Read-Punch provides the
system with simultaneous punched-card input and output. This unit has
two card feeds."
^ ^a ^b Truedsell, Leon E. (1965). The Development of Punch Card
Tabulation in the Bureau of the Census 1890-1940. US GPO. p. 43.
Includes extensive, detailed, description of Hollerith's first machines
and their use for the 1890 census.
^ The Design of IBM Cards (PDF). IBM. 1956. 22-5526-4.
^ Reference Manual - IBM 82, 83, and 84 Sorters (PDF). IBM. July
1962. p. 25. A24-1034.
^ "Hollerith's Electric Tabulating Machine". Railroad Gazette.
1895-04-19. Retrieved 2015-06-04.
^ U.S. Patent 395,781, U.S. Patent 395,782, U.S. Patent 395,783
^ ^a ^b Hollerith, Herman (April 1889). da Cruz, Frank (ed.). "An
Electric Tabulating System". The Quarterly. School of Mines, Columbia
University. 10 (16): 245.
^ da Cruz, Frank (2019-12-26). "Hollerith 1890 Census Tabulator".
Columbia University Computing History. Columbia University. Retrieved
2020-03-09.
^ "Large-Size U.S. Paper Money". Littleton Coin Company. Littleton
Coin Company. Retrieved 2017-03-16.
^ Bashe, Charles J.; Johnson, Lyle R.; Palmer, John H.; Pugh, Emerson
W. (1986). IBM's Early Computers. Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA: The
MIT Press. p. 5. ISBN 978-0-262-02225-5. (NB. Also see pages 5-14 for
additional information on punched cards.)
^ Comrie, Leslie John (1932). "The application of the Hollerith
tabulating machine to Brown's tables of the moon". Monthly Notices of
the Royal Astronomical Society. 92 (7): 694-707.
Bibcode:1932MNRAS..92..694C. doi:10.1093/mnras/92.7.694.
^ U.S. Patent 1,772,492, Record Sheet for Tabulating Machines, C. D.
Lake, filed 1928-06-20
^ "The IBM Punched Card". IBM. 2012-03-07. Retrieved 2014-04-25.
^ IBM Archive: 1928.
^ Pugh - Building IBM - page 49.
^ IBM Archive: Old/New-Cards.
^ p. 405, "How Computational Chemistry Became Important in the
Pharmaceutical Industry", Donald B. Boyd, chapter 7 in Reviews in
Computational Chemistry, Volume 23, edited by Kenny B. Lipkowitz,
Thomas R. Cundari and Donald B. Boyd, Wiley & Son, 2007,
ISBN 978-0-470-08201-0.
^ ^a ^b ^c Principles of IBM Accounting. IBM. 1953. 224-5527-2.
^ ^a ^b Punched card Data Processing Principles. IBM. 1961. p. 3.
^ ^a ^b Cemach, Harry P. (1951). The Elements of Punched Card
Accounting. Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons Ltd. pp. 9, 47-51, 137-. Machine
illustrations were provided by Power-Samas Accounting Machines and
British Tabulating Machine Co.
^ IBM Operator's Guide (PDF). IBM. July 1959. p. 141. A24-1010.
"Master Card: The first card of a group containing fixed or indicative
information for that group"
^ "Punched Card Codes". Cs.uiowa.edu. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ Rojas, Raul, ed. (2001). Encyclopedia of Computers and Computer
History. Fitzroy Dearborn. p. 656.
^ Pugh, Emerson W. (1995). Building IBM: Shaping and Industry and Its
Technology. MIT Press. pp. 50-51. ISBN 978-0-262-16147-3.
^ ^a ^b ^c Mackenzie, Charles E. (1980). Coded Character Sets,
History and Development (PDF). The Systems Programming Series (1 ed.).
Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc. pp. 7, 38, 88-90.
ISBN 978-0-201-14460-4. LCCN 77-90165. Archived (PDF) from the original
on 2016-05-26. Retrieved 2020-05-12.
^ Winter, Dik T. "80-column Punched Card Codes". Archived from the
original on 2007-04-08. Retrieved 2012-11-06.
^ Jones, Douglas W. "Punched Card Codes". Retrieved 2007-02-20.
^ Principles of Operation, Type 701 and Associated Equipment (PDF).
IBM. 1953. pp. 34-36. 24-6042-1.
^ 704 Electronic Data Processing Machine Manual of Operation (PDF).
IBM. 1955. pp. 39-50. 24-6661-2.
^ Raymond, Eric S., ed. (1991). The New Hacker's Dictionary.
Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA: MIT Press. p. 219.
^ Maxfield, Clive "Max" (2011-10-13). "How it was: Paper tapes and
punched cards". EE Times. Retrieved 2022-07-05.
^ IBM 24 Card Punch, IBM 26 Printing Card Punch Reference Manual
(PDF). October 1965. p. 26. A24-0520-3. "The variable-length card feed
feature on the 24 or 26 allows the processing of 51-, 60-, 66-, and
80-column cards (Figure 20)"
^ "IBM Archive: Port-A-Punch". 03.ibm.com. 2003-01-23. Retrieved
2013-10-05.
^ Winter, Dik T. "96-column Punched Card Code". Archived from the
original on 2007-04-15. Retrieved 2012-11-06.
^ "The Punched Card". Quadibloc.com. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ Winter, Dik T. "90-column Punched Card Code". Archived from the
original on 2005-02-28. Retrieved 2012-11-06.
^ Fisher, Lawrence M. (1998-09-18). "Reynold Johnson, 92, Pioneer In
Computer Hard Disk Drives". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-06-26.
^ "IBM Archives/Business Machines: Fred M. Carroll". 03.ibm.com. IBM.
Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ "IBM Archives: Fred M. Carroll". 03.ibm.com. IBM. 2003-01-23.
Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ "IBM Archives: Carroll Press". 03.ibm.com. IBM. 2003-01-23.
Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ "IBM Archives:1 939 Layout department". 03.ibm.com. IBM.
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^ Cortada, James W. (2019). IBM: The Rise and Fall and Reinvention of
a Global Icon. MIT Press. p. 68. ISBN 978-0-262-03944-4.
^ Tyler, Theodore (1968). The Man Whose Name Wouldn't Fit. Doubleday
Science Fiction.
^ Brown, Betsy (1987-12-06). "Westchester Bookcase". The New York
Times. "Edward Ziegler [...] an editor at the Reader's Digest [...]
wrote a science fiction novel, The Man Whose Name Wouldn't Fit, under
the pen name Theodore Tyler"
^ "Mayalin.com". Mayalin.com. 2009-01-08. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ "Mizzou Alumni Association - Campus Traditions". Mizzou Alumni
Association. Mizzou Alumni Association. Retrieved 2016-04-21.
^ "University of Wisconsin-Madison Buildings". Fpm.wisc.edu.
Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ "Photo of Gamble Hall by gatty790". Panoramio.com. Archived from
the original on 2013-07-15. Retrieved 2013-10-05.
^ Clarke, Arthur C. (May 1946). Rescue Party. Baen Books.
^ Lee, John A. N. "Charles A. Phillips". Computer Pioneers. Institute
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^ "Fold, spindle, or mutilate". "At the bottom of the bill, it said
[...] and Jane, in her anger, [...]"
^ Albertson, Dean (1975). Rebels or Revolutionaries? Student
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^ Disney, Doris Miles (1970). Do Not Fold, Spindle or Mutilate.
Doubleday Crime Club. p. 183.
Further reading[edit]
*
Fierheller, George A. (2014-02-07). Do not Fold, Spindle or Mutilate:
The "hole" story of punched cards (PDF). Markham, Ontario, Canada:
Stewart Publishing & Printing. ISBN 978-1-894183-86-4. Archived (PDF)
from the original on 2022-07-09. Retrieved 2018-04-03. (NB. An
accessible book of recollections (sometimes with errors), with
photographs and descriptions of many unit record machines.)
How to Succeed At Cards (Film). IBM. 1963. (NB. An account of how IBM
Cards are manufactured, with special emphasis on quality control.)
Murray, Francis Joseph (1961). "Chapter 6 Punched Cards".
Mathematical Machines: Digital Computers. Vol. 1. Columbia University
Press. (NB. Includes a description of Samas punched cards and
illustration of an Underwood Samas punched card.)
Solomon, Jr., Martin B.; Lovan, Nora Geraldine (1967). Annotated
Bibliography of Films in Automation, Data Processing, and Computer
Science. University of Kentucky.
Dyson, George (1999-03-01). "The Undead". Wired. Vol. 7, no. 3.
Archived from the original on 2022-07-09. Retrieved 2017-07-04. (NB.
Article about use of punched cards in the 1990s (Cardamation).)
Williams, Robert V. (2002). "Punched Cards: A Brief Tutorial". IEEE
Annals of the History of Computing: Web Extra. IEEE. 24 (2). Archived
from the original on 2018-06-13. Retrieved 2015-03-26.
External links[edit]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Punch card.
* An Emulator for Punched cards
* Cardamation at the Wayback Machine (archived 2011-10-17) - a U.S.
company that supplied punched card equipment and supplies until
2011.
* Collected Information on Punched Card Codes, Atlas Computer
Laboratory, 1960
*
Brian De Palma (Director) (1961). 660124: The Story of an IBM Card
(Film).
Jones, Douglas W. "Punched Cards". Retrieved 2006-10-20. (Collection
shows examples of left, right, and no corner cuts.)
Punched Cards - a collection at Gesellschaft fuer Software mbH
UNIVAC Punch Card Gallery (Shows examples of both left and right
corner cuts.)
VintageTech - a U.S. company that converts punched cards to
conventional media
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