Curta Type II Handheld Mechanical Calculator

The Curta. To those who are familiar with old mechanical calculating machines, the name brings to mind thoughts of high precision machining, extreme mechanical design, and, to those who've been lucky enough to use one, the wonderful feel of the mechanism in operation. To those unknowing, seeing a Curta for the first time, the impressions range from it being a unusual-looking pencil-sharpener, a pepper-grinder, or some weird kind of high-tech fishing reel. In reality, the Curta calculators, (Both the Type I and Type II) are the result of the mechanical genius of one man, Austrian engineer Curt Herzstark(1/26/1902-10/27/1988), packaged into a very small device that was human powered that made calculation on-to-go easy and fast. No mechanical calculating device was ever made prior to or after the Curta that was as highly reliable, easy to use, required no power, and was easily carried around with the user. Finally, when the first battery-powered four-function handheld electronics arrived on the scene, the Curta calculators were replaced, though many who replaced them with a portable electronic calculator put them away in a safe place, as a prized posession. One could argue that the Curta calculators are the best implementation of a handheld mechanical calculator ever made.

While the Old Calculator Museum primarily focuses on early electronic calculators, when an opportunity to acquire this nice Curta II with its carrying case, it was impossible to pass up.

The Curta calculator is a marvel of mechanical engineering. Into this somewhat odd-looking, but wonderfully comfortable-to-hold device, is packed roughly the mechanical equivalent of today's pocket four-function electronic calculator. The Curta can add, subtract, multiply, and divide, and in the hands of an experienced operator, can do so at surprising speeds. While multiplication and division are not automatically carried out, the process for performing these calculations on the Curta is intuitive and able to be done quickly, as the process involves essentially the same methods that we are taught for multiplication and division in primary school.

Curta calculators were produced beginning in 1947 through the early 1970's. The calculator was the brainchild of Austrian enginner Curt Herzstark, who completed the design work for the calculator just prior to the beginning of World War II, which delayed the calculator going into production until after the war ended. Contina, Ltd., in Mauren, Liechtenstein, began producing the machines from Herzstark's drawings and specifications. Along with his stunning engineering talent, Herzstark was a skilled marketer, having marketed and sold his family company's calculating machines during during his younger years. Herzstart was able to very quickly put together a network of retail outlets all around the world through all of the contacts he had made prior to the war. Curtas were mainly sold at camera shops and business machine suppliers, though they could also be mail-ordered directly from Contina, Ltd.

While Herzstark had completed the plans for his miniature calculator, his family calculating machine company but did not have the precision machine tools needed to actually manufacture it in quantity. The mechanical calculators made at the factory were considerably larger desktop machines, and did not require the level of precision that Herzstark's calculator would require. At about the time his design plans were completed, his father, Samuel XXX Herzstark suddenly passed away, leaving the family business in Curt's hands. While Curt was a great marketer and an amazing engineer, the arduous task of running the entire business weighed fairly heavily on him. To make things even more difficult for him, just after he began getting a handle on running the business, his home country was taken over by the Nazis. Rechenmaschinenwerk Austria Herzstark & Co. was ordered by the Nazis to convert its operations to a munitions manufacturing factory with Curt as the plant's local manager. After the Nazis had apprehended a number of the workers at the factory as being Jewish sympathizers, Herstark himself was arrested on numerous charges of violating Aryan standards and guilt by association because his father was a devout Jew. Herzstark was immediately sent to the notorious Buchenwald concentration camp. When he was arrested, he was working at his family's calculator factory, Rechenmaschinenwerk Austria Herzstark & Co., working on improving and creating designs for a line of mecahnical calculators that company had manufactured since around 1906. At the time of his arrest at the factory, the Nazi officers who arrested him took interest in the calculating machines that were being made there, concluding that perhaps Herzstark may be of some use to them in the war effort. Rechenmaschinenwerk Austria Herzstark & Co. was taken over by the Nazis, who converted it into a factory to produce However, it took time for the word of Herzstark's skills and inventiveness, along with his dreams of the handheld calculator he had designed, got up the command chain high enough to provide Herzstark with an opportunity to leave the concentration camp. which in time led to Herzstark being assigned a project to develop production drawings for this new handheld calculator that he had mentioned to his captors. Due to interest in the potential of this device to provide portable calcuation capabilities to Nazi gunners on the front, as well as for use in logistics and other management aspects of the war, as well as being a prize to be presented to the Führer at the end of the war, Herzstark was moved out of the camp (where he was initially treated as any other prisoner) to a nearby factory that had been co-opted by the Nazis to produce weapons components. He was conscripted to work long and miserable hours in the factory, where working conditions were deplorable. Due to his skills and hard work, along with his enthusiasm for his calculator design, Herzstark was able to convince his captors of the potential value of his handheld calculating device, and was contagious enough that Herzstark was ordered to make production-ready drawings for the calculator, which he dutifully performed - an act that likely saved his life. During his time at the factory, he lived in much better conditions than in the concentration camp, certainly another factor that helped him survive the brutality of the concentration camps. He had completed all of the drawings, from memory, just prior to the Buchenwald concentration camp being liberated by allied forces in 1945.

After the war had ended,

Today, the Curta calculators have developed a cult following, with an avid base of enthusiast collectors,. With the rise of internet auction sites like eBay, Curta calculators are rapidly escalating in value, with a recent prime-condition Curta selling for over $1,800, and averaging around $1,400. Curta calculators have gained a real following in classic road-rally competitions, where electronic calculating devices are not allowed. The Curta's small size, small size, high speed, and ease of use make them almost indispensable for rally navigators to use to calculate the right speeds for drivers to maintain to hit the leg times of rally courses as closely as possible.