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A 6-page Technical Disclosure, plus 2-page Appendix, and thirteen (13) hand-drawn circuit/logic diagrams. Parity-checking is a paradigm in logic/data-processing circuitry to represent the odd or even count of the eight (8) "0 or 1" data bits, for example, of an 8-bit byte. A ninth bit - the parity bit - is a "1" if the "1" count within the 8-bit byte is 'odd', or is a "0" if the "1" bit count is even. This is known as an "odd" parity-bit generator; an even-bit parity generator would output a "0" bit for this example. This disclosure, authored by JVM, describes a general-case solution for a "2 to N bit-wide" word, employing MRC NOR-OR transistorized logic circuits. Developed in the early 1960's, long before integrated circuits were commonly available, this logic would fit in a tiny corner of an IC chip today

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Dr. Lindquist was approached by this organization earlier in 1961 about the feasibility of MRC designing and building a special OMR-card scoring machine for the League's various tests administered to nursing students. As Technical Project Manager of the MRC Engineering Division, I was assigned the task of drafting a Technical Proposal for their consideration. This 20-page report, plus Appendix, describes the proposed features and performance of such a system. For reasons long forgotten the project never reached fruition, but this document illustrates Dr. Lindquist's desire to 'take on' any reasonable customer for fame and gain! The NLN organization thrives yet today; see URL: http://www.nln.org/

Scope and Contents This folder presents my "MRC Discrimination System for Mark-Sense Scanning, a Technical Disclosure", and eventually leading to two (2) U. S. Patents, granted more than three years after the initial filing date of 6 APRIL 1966, in that the first patent was granted 23 DEC 1969, and the second one granted on 11 AUG 1970. These were the first two of my 14 patents granted during my career with MRC, WLC, and NCS from 1956 to 1996. Prior to this invention, the original 1950's circa MRC Scoring machines had certain weaknesses or limitations in the vacuum-tube design of that era to accurately discriminate between a student's intended, darker mark, and an overly smudgy erasure, leading to scoring errors; or failing to detect an intended 'cheat' double/multiple mark, and giving false credit to the student's answer. This invention, incorporating transistorized circuits and an entirely new approach to the solution, essentially eliminated this difficulty, and greatly increased the accuracy (and...

Scope and Contents This 11-page Technical Disclosure is 'classic Lindquistian' in terms of elaborate mechanical components, such as springs, rollers, plates, plastic sheets, foam rubber, and related apparatus. The Disclosure includes four original 11" x 17" Figures/Drawings, signed by RAE (Robert A. Edberg, Chief Engineer at MRC), and dated from 28 to 31 JAN 67. The descriptive Figures were probably drafted/drawn by Edberg, as they are rather 'too neat' with respect to Lindquist's more informal/cryptic style of sketches normally seen with his Technical Disclosures. My copy of this Lindquist Technical Disclosure contains a cover letter written by Edberg to the MRC Patent Attorney, Mr. Andrew B. Beveridge, dated February 1, 1967, requesting a review of the attached material for patentability (e.g. conduct a prior-art patent search, etc.). Curiously, however, the Edberg letter states that "This will be a personal patent by E. F. Lindquist and consequently you will bill him directly for the work...

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A Review of the "Intellectual Property" which existed on or before October 16, 1966, and including relevant comments on progress from 24 November 1965 to the current date: Prepared by the MRC PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT GROUP, Engineering Division. Iowa City, Iowa, John V. McMillin, Manager, April 7, 1967. Previous Item in this list of UI Accession documents described the technology and issued U. S. Patent related to the MRC 1501 scanner. However, there is a lot more to the story in relation to MRC (as a not-for-profit entity) attempting to forge a design/manufacturing relationship with a major industrial corporation, LITTON Industries, and the LITTON managers who resigned from LITTON to form a new company, IKM Industries, to carry on the development task with MRC. This review of "Intellectual Property", authored by me, was the first step in preparing for litigation and/or settlement of the MRC financial obligations when the MRC-LITTON-IKM relationships were terminated

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Includes a photo of the ACT headquarters, a photo of E. F. Lindquist, and mentions "An optical card scanner developed by the MRC staff can process 90,000 cards an hour". This refers to the above MRC 1501 Card reader, referred to elsewhere in this list. The article contains a brief history of ACT and MRC, among other information

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This important patent covered a hardware/software method to offset a given sheet in the output stack after scanning, so that the sheet could be quickly accessed by human editing clerks for error resolution. USPO Downloaded copy is provided, both the transcribed text and claims, and the images

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Dr. Lindquist's obvious passion for inventions did not cease following his retirement from the presidency of MRC after it was acquired by WLC in 1968. Many people familiar with the Lindquist Center on the UI Campus would probably be quite surprised to learn that he was granted two U. S. patents related to the game of golf! The Assignee in both of these patents was the University of Iowa Research Foundation, Iowa City, IA. In the later patent named above, filed on December 20, 1976, he needed assistance in the design of the electronic and logic circuitry components embodied in this invention. He approached me to request help, but as I was very busy with leading WLC's entry into the Ballot Scanning Business at this juncture, I recommended that he hire one of my highly skilled technicians, Dale Schroeder, to assist him on a 'moonlighting' basis. He followed my suggestion, and as the patent text and drawings clearly show, he submitted a successful application

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My 4-page document includes a copy of the original newspaper clipping containing several photos, and a transcription of the announcement's text

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[Prepared by JVM for a Presentation to WLC Senior Management in New York City in 1968] Shortly, thereafter, several of us were invited to WLC's corporate headquarters at 100 Park Avenue in New York City, NY to give individual presentations on our respective areas of responsibility at MRC. As Engineering Product Manager, it was my job to tell the "Engineering Story"

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A 2-page status summary through the first 3-quarters of the year

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A 6-page document that presents an overview of projects and related activities in 1969. Among other projects, we were designing and building a special high-speed OMR scanner, Model 650-E, for a customer in London, England, and also testing a radically new OMR scanner design dubbed RASCOL for internal use and sale to domestic and foreign customers

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It became a ritual in the fall of each year, following the acquisition of MRC by WLC in the summer of 1968, for the MRC Managers in Iowa City to prepare their respective 'Fall Message' to present to the troops and presumably, to be forwarded to WLC Headquarters for their scrutiny of our progress and accomplishments. My 6-page 1970 Fall Message shows that the Model 650-E was delivered by me to Document Reader Services Ltd., in London, and we were also busy designing special card readers to deploy in WLC 'Mini Centers' in Boston, NYC, Quebec City, Quebec, and other possible locations. The RASCOL scanner design was nearing completion, later defined as the W-301, and a substantial number were subsequently installed in the U. S. and Japan

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Similar in scope to the above 1970 report, this is another summary of the Engineering activity during 1971, and what we hoped to accomplish in the year ahead. My 10-page report mentions that we installed WLC Mini Center scanner hardware in Lake Washington, WA, and Milford, CT, and were providing Engineering/technical support for five Mini Centers. We completed the RASCOL/W-301 OMR Scanner design, and were building 'turn key' OMR systems for Educational Testing Service in Princeton, NJ. Six U. S. Patents were awarded during 1971

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This 4-page report is essentially a continuation of the preceding 10-page 1971 Engineering Report, which were submitted together. JVM NOTE: I have copies of my two lengthy and rather personal handwritten 1974 and 1975 year-end Engineering reports, as submitted to my boss, Burdette P. Hansen, WLC/Iowa City General Manager, but they are too difficult to read to be of any interest to a future MRC/WLC history researcher. Perhaps someday for my own amusement I will transcribe the text, perhaps not. The 1974 report includes an organizational chart for the Engineering Department, and shows a year-end head count of 29 staff, with an annual salary cost of slightly under $300,000! Amazing in terms of today's dollars

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Similar in scope to the1971 report, this is a summary of the Engineering accomplishments during 1972, and what we hoped to accomplish in the year ahead. A 70+ page bound folder, including goals and objectives for each Engineering-Dept. supervisor

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My archival copy is the original newspaper containing the front-page, and 5 additional pages. The article about WLC refers to the Iowa City Division winning this contract from the U. S. Department of Education

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Seventeen Press-Citizen news clippings about the plans, and zoning disputes and controversy, in WLC's announcement to build a new $4 million Facility on annexed farmland west of the ACT building. Nearly all of the clips are from the original newsprint. I was privileged to have a choice office location with a nice window in this facility - which were few and far between in the new design!

Scope and Contents Other JVM Archival documents and reports describe an entirely new concept in OMR scanner design whereby both sides of an answer sheet can be scanned independently on a single pass through the feed mechanism, which I dubbed with the acronym Reverse Action Scan Cycle On/Off Line (RASCOL). Our 'little rascol', as we humorously called it! Brief background: when one of my mechanical engineers, Richard W. George first (cautiously or tentatively) proposed the idea to me, probably thinking I would reject his 'wild idea' out of hand, I instead encouraged him to build a simple prototype mechanism in our machine shop in an attempt to demonstrate the feasibility of the concept. Encouraged by what we observed, I authorized a full-blown development cycle. Mr. George was granted a U. S. Patent on the design. Our first victory in this regard was demonstrating the shop mockup to a group of officials from Educational Testing Service (ETS), the major student testing organization from Princeton, NJ....

Scope and Contents Background: This Iowa-based company, in business yet today, is a major producer of artillery shells and other ordnance for the Armed Services. Back in the early 1960's, they were producing a variety of artillery shells employing the M509 fuse (which sets off the shell). Naturally, every shell coming off of the production line needed to be tested for proper function. Unfortunately, however, at that time the very act of testing each shell occasionally caused the shell to explode (electrical transients generated during the test measurement, etc.), the powerful blast lifting the roof off of the assembly building (a special non-anchored design for this contingency), and maiming or killing workers. In desperation, the executives of the plant approached Robert A. Edberg, Chief Engineer, to see if MRC could design a far safer testing system, based upon new solid-state technology, assuming that MRC had expertise and capability in what was then a new technology. While Dr. Lindquist was...