What administrative crisis spurred Herman Hollerith to develop his electromechanical tabulating system?
Answer
The looming decade-long processing time for the 1890 United States Census data
Herman Hollerith was motivated by a severe bottleneck in processing demographic data for the United States Census. The 1880 Census had taken nearly eight years to compile and process manually. This pace created a critical fear that the 1890 count would take over a decade, resulting in data that would be obsolete before its completion. This impending administrative failure necessitated a mechanized solution for rapid tabulation, driving Hollerith to adapt the existing punch card concept using electricity.
Related Questions
What established industry first used perforated cards to automate complex woven patterns?What administrative crisis spurred Herman Hollerith to develop his electromechanical tabulating system?How did Hollerith's innovation fundamentally advance the function of the punched card over Jacquard's system?What was the approximate time reduction achieved by Hollerith's system for the 1890 US Census processing?What key business, established by Hollerith in 1896, eventually evolved into IBM?What pivotal prerequisite for machine compatibility did Hollerith impose on nationwide census data collection?When did Joseph Marie Jacquard refine the mechanical use of punched cards for loom control?What was the labor shift involved when moving from the 1880 Census process to Hollerith's mechanized system?What characteristic defined later computer input cards that differed from Hollerith's initial census cards?Who is recognized for providing the 'idea of perforated control' versus Hollerith's application to systematic data recording?