Who was Charles Babbage?

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Manuscript Materials and Exhibits

  • CBI holds a microfilmed copy of the Papers of Charles Babbage. The original papers are in the British Library.
  • The University of Auckland, New Zealand, also has some of Babbage’s materials. CBI has photocopies of their holdings and the inventory to these copies, as well as other Charles Babbage materials held in the Charles Babbage Collection (CBI 54)
  • The Science Museum in London constructed Babbage's Difference Engine No. 2 in 1991. The Science Museum Library and Archives in Wroughton holds the most comprehensive set of original manuscripts and design drawings.

Charles Babbage's Published Works

  • A Comparative View of the Various Institutions for the Assurance of Lives (1826)
  • Table of Logarithms of the Natural Numbers from 1 to 108,000 (1827)
  • Reflections on the Decline of Science in England (1830)
  • On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures (1832)
  • Ninth Bridgewater Treatise (1837)
  • Passages from the Life of a Philosopher (1864)

Publication About Charles Babbage

  • Charles Babbage. Passages from the Life of a Philosopher. (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, Piscataway, NJ, 1994)
  • Babbage, Henry Prevost . Babbage's Calculating Engines: A Collection of Papers. (Los Angeles: Tomash, 1982) Charles Babbage Institute Reprint Series, vol. 2.
  • Bromley, Allan G. "The Evolution of Babbage's Calculating Engines" Annals of the History of Computing, 9 (1987): 113-136.
  • Buxton, H. W. Memoir of the Life and Labours of the Late Charles Babbage Esq., F.R.S. (Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press, 1988) Charles Babbage Institute Reprint Series, vol. 13.
  • Cambell-Kelly, Martin (ed.) The Works of Charles Babbage (11 vols.) (New York: New York University Press, 1989)
  • Dubbey, John Michael. Mathematical Work of Charles Babbage. (Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 1978)
  • Hyman, Anthony. Charles Babbage: Pioneer of the Computer. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983)
  • Moseley, Maboth. Irascible Genius: a Life of Charles Babbage, Inventor. (London: Hutchinson, 1964)
  • Randell, Brian. "From Analytical Engine to Electronic Digital Computer: The Contributions of Ludgate, Torres, and Bush" Annals of the History of Computing, 4 (October 1982): 327.
  • Swade, Doron. Charles Babbage and his Calculating Engines. (London: Science Museum, 1991)
  • Swade, Doron. The Cogwheel Brain: Charles Babbage and the Quest to build the first Computer. (London: Little, Brown, 2001)
  • Van Sinderen, Alfred W. "The Printed Papers of Charles Babbage" Annals of the History of Computing, 2 (April 1980); 169-185.

Publications on Babbage and Ada Lovelace