Computation

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The New Media Museum is not primarily focused on being a “computer museum” or collecting “computing artifacts” per se, but appreciating the nature of new media is intricately intertwined with knowing the special properties of computational media and how they gradually evolved over time. Therefore the museum’s collections do encompass computational artifacts related to mechanical and electronic computational devices that predated the computer, a poster display tied to supporting materials that tell the story of how modern computing developed over the course of the 20th Century and an extensive personal computer collection along with the corresponding operating systems, utilities, application software and peripherals.¹

Early Computation

Toy Abacus with Directions for Instruction — Toy Abacus for Instruction

Antikythera Device Poster — Antikythera Poster

The history of computation is longer than the history of modern computers, and so the New Media Museum has a collection of mechanical and electronic computational devices that predated the computer. More…

Modern Computing

George Stibitz, Bell Labs Relay Computers

John Vincent Atanasoff, The ABC: Atanasoff-Berry Computer

John Brainerd, Development of the ENIAC Project

The Computer Museum in Boston hosted the Pioneer Computer Lecture Series, and posters were created as advertisements for each of the events. Some of those posters were donated to the New Media Museum by Brian Silverman. The page includes links to the original lectures on YouTube that, taken together, tell the story of the development of modern computing. More…

Personal Computing

all-best
The New Media Museum’s personal computing collection includes early 8-bit home computers, gaming consoles, Apple and IBM/Compatible computers along with a comprehensive set of corresponding operating systems, utilities, application software and peripherals. More…

Bookshelf

These are some key books in the collection. More…

The Universal History of Computing: From the Abacus to the Quantum Computer by Georges Ifrah

Computer: A History of the Information Machine 3rd Ed. by Martin Campbell-Kelly, William Aspray, Nathan Ensmenger and Jeffrey R. Yost

Tools for Thought: The History and Future of Mind-Expanding Technology by Howard Rheingold

Collection Notes
1 Some of these resources were originally acquired to support the course ECOMP 7100: Fundamentals of Computers (Lesley University, 2004). More recent resources were acquired for an earlier iteration of the New Media Museum called the NEW Computer Museum.