IT’S A CURTA SIMULATOR!

“WTF is a Curta?” you may be asking.

I’ll tell you!

The Curta is a little handheld mechanical calculator introduced in 1948 by Austrian engineer Curt Herzstark (so I guess “Curta” was an easier name than “Herzstarka”). Real-life ones look like THIS (source for pic)…

…and were considered the best portable calculators until the digital ones started coming out in the 1970s.

Its design is based in part off of…(wait for it)…Leibniz’ Step Reckoner. It is able to do addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and also square roots. What made it different from contemporary calculators was, though it employed a stepped drum mechanism like most others, Herzstark was able to create and patent a single drum that did the work of 10+ drums, thus making the Curta super compact.

I wanted to get a real one, but they’re like $400 now, so this simulator was a cool find. If you want to get all up in the Curta’s business but are intimidated by all the arrows/dials (it’s like a slide rule on steroids!), check out this manual.