Pantograph in Box by Lutz Co.

This wooden pantograph consists of four wooden bars held together with metal screw-eyes and pivots. The bars are marked from 1 to 34 and from 1 1/8 to 8. A metal screw and weight balances one end of the bars when they are assembled, while a pivot shoe and pencil and scriber points are at the other ends. Metal screw-eyes are placed in corresponding holes, and then a person moves the pencil-tip while the scriber point traces the picture to be copied. The pencil point goes in the outer screw for enlarging and in the inner screw for reducing.

There is also a black metal bar in the box for this pantograph, but it is not clear that it belongs to the instrument.

Stamped on the cardboard box and its lid is the name of the former owner: ROBERT M. LEONARD. A mark on one end of the lid reads: $3.50. A pencil mark on one edge of one arm reads: 1842.

The Lutz Company was established in the early 1890s in Guttenberg, New Jersey, by German-born Kilian V. Lutz (1859-1916), and sold a range of drawing instruments and slide rules. The instructions indicate that by the time this pantograph was sold, the address of the firm was 65-71st Street in Guttenberg, and the telephone number was UNion 7-1920. The use of letters in the prefix of the phone number suggests a date of before 1963.

Robert Meyer Leonard (1923-1991), who owned this Lutz pantograph, was a graduate of Idaho State University who received a doctorate in pharmacology from the University of Minnesota. After working in Idaho and Utah, he came to Washington, D.C., in 1951 to teach at George Washington University. There he rose to the position of dean of pharmacy. In about 1964, Leonard moved to the National Institutes of Health, where he worked in the division of research grants, retiring in 1985.

Currently not on view