Charles Babbage and the Analytically Engine

Good News Everyone! 

The first general purpose programmable computer was designed in 1837 by Charles Babbage, but was never constructed. Babbage's Analytical Engine would have been an entirely mechancial monstrosity that predates it's first electromechanical counterpart by more than 100 years. Babbage's brainchild was, sadly, never to be built. 

The incomplete "Analytical Engine Mill" 

The plans, notes, and tests that Babbage constructed in his lifetime have been on display with the London Science Museum since the early 1900s. In 2010 a group of individuals started to raise funds and attempt to gain access to Babbage's notes with the intent of building their own Analytical engine. Today they announced a great step along the way to the completion of that goal: The London Science Museum has agreed to digitize the Babbage archives, giving access to the Analytical Engine team first, and then to expanding digital access to the general public sometime in 2012. 

Steampunks Rejoice! Soon you will be able to marvel at a mechanical machine that can compute the product of two 20 digit numbers in only 3 minutes, and without the use of electricity. 

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