Slide Rule

Keuffel & Esser Co.
Mannheim
Slide Rule
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57 yrs Company Service
This slide rule was purchased by Mr W Phillips in 1920 who used it until 1954. It was then used by his friend Mr J Jablonski until he retired in 1977, when he presented it to the company.

Dr Jablonski had a very distinguished career. Following a narrow escape from death during the Russian Revolution when he was only 7 he went through school and finished when he graduated with a degree in Engineering when he graduated from Warsaw University in 1937. After being in action during the invasion of Poland in 1939 he managed to escape and join the Free Polish Forces in France at the beginning of 1940 and then came over to England after the fall of France.

He flew operationally as a Signals Officer with the Polish Bomber Squadron flying Wellingtons and was awarded the Virtuti Militari, the Polish equivalent of our VC, for his bravery in rescuing his fellow crew members in a crash, and also gained the Cross of Valour with three bars equivalent of a DFC.

He joined Elliotts in 1953 as a Senior Development Engineer and played a major role in the development of air data instruments and engine instruments. He was a very able and innovative engineer and was a technical authority in a very wide range of engineering disciplines - materials, metallurgy, magnetics, production processes, electro-mechanical instrument design and electronics.

An example of his designs is the True Mass Flowmeter for the Rolls Royce RB199 engine fitted to the Tornado, This instrument has been extremely reliable with good performance.

Dr Jablonski worked in Flight Instruments Division (later Instrument Systems Division) and then moved to FARL, from which he retired in 1978.

The given weight is for the slide rule alone. With display stand, cylinder and slide rule case the weight is 780g.