Our object this week is a wooden frame with small compartments in a twenty bythirty grid. There are metal types with a raised Arabic numeral on theend that fit into the “cells.” Originally called an Arabic Slate, thisstyle of math aid was developed in Paris, France in the 19th century. Onesource from 1910 called it the Paris Method. This particular model, knownas an Arithmetic Type Frame, was developed in 1936 at APH as an instructionalaid for working problems in long division, multiplication, subtraction, andaddition. The supplied lead type was called Philadelphia GreatPrimer Type. In 1959, APH introduced the Texas slate to replace theArithmetic Type Frame.
Photo Captions: First Photo: The eight inch by thirteen inchArithmetic Type Frame had 600 “cells.”
The second image shows you aclose-up of the raised number types.
Micheal A. Hudson
Museum Director
APH
