Mystery equipment tag ---what was it?

November 3, 2021 2:15 PM

We found this metal tag, glued mysteriously to a notecard with"ANONYMOUS" typed on it, in a deceased relative's things. He was a mathematician who worked on developing computer systems in the early days and through the 80s on various projects. It looks like a tag that identifies a piece of equipment. What is it? Image link here.
posted by zennie to Technology (5 answers total)

Best answer: The current company called Documation is not the previous company named Documation. Here's some info about the Florida company. If you look that company up at the Internet Archive you'll see that they seemed to make a lot of card readers for punch cards.
posted by jessamyn at 2:19 PM on November 3, 2021 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Yep, it's the product plate for the Documation LC50 modular card processor.
posted by mykescipark at 2:20 PM on November 3, 2021 [8 favorites]

Response by poster: Metafilter provides! Thanks so much!
posted by zennie at 2:27 PM on November 3, 2021

Response by poster: Further history: knowing what this is now, it's probably a souvenir from deconstructing old equipment at Northwestern University.
posted by zennie at 2:36 PM on November 3, 2021 [8 favorites]

I loved using punch card decks to submit programs.
posted by lathrop at 2:54 PM on November 3, 2021 [1 favorite]