HP Biographies

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Full Name (family, given): Corrado, Larry
Email: lcorrado@uwc.edu
Location: Wisconsin, USA
Entered: 21 Feb 2003, 9:41 a.m.

During my undergraduate years in Chicago during the early 1960s, calculations for us meant slide rules. My first encounter with electronic calculating was in 1966 at Arizona State University, where I was doing graduate work in physics. My research group had a Friden EC-132 (an RPN machine, BTW), and we were the envy of the whole department. In 1977, at the University of Idaho, I did a bit of programming on an HP (an HP-91 or 97?) In 1978, I bought my own HP-25 for home and an HP-21 for the university (the University of Wisconsin-Manitowoc, where I was professor of physics and computer science). Ever since then, I've watched from the sidelines as calculators evolved, happily using my Woodstocks for immediate calculations and high level programming on microcomputers for programmed computing.

In August, 2002, while looking for slide rules at a second-hand shop, I ran across a dirty HP-22 for $1.49. I bought it, cleaned it, and powered it up. It worked beautifully. I went to the Web to find out its value, found the HPMuseum, and got hooked, you might say.

Since that time, I've been collecting HP and TI machines. Most of my finds have been on ebay. The HP portion of my aggregation is made up mainly of Woodstocks, Voyagers, a few Spices, and some modern machines.

I generally check out the HP Forum daily to see what's going on. I must say it's one of the most civil Web-based discussion groups I've seen. I never cease to be amazed at the level of mutual support, and the huge store of knowledge found in the group.

Edited: 21 Oct 2003, 5:41 p.m.

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