A harmonograph, not a spirograph

Dan Gonzales

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511
Location
Whittier, CA, USA
A harmonograph, not a spirograph. Turn the volume up a little so you can hear the pen on paper and movement sounds.
http://vimeo.com/21999779">Drawingmachine by Eske Rex</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user1762260">Core77</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>
 
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I had a similar contraption given to me as a kid for Christmas one year. It was a gift from the aunt and uncle who always brought the coolest Christmas presents. :D
 
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Pen-doodle-um!!!

I had one when i was a kid ... the pendulums hung below the corner of a table and you filled 'em with sand or water or whatever ... I'm pretty sure I got mine at Hobo Days (I'll be surprised if anyone knows what that is!) :D
 
Is that a south dakota thing? I seem to remember something like that from my brief stint living in SD...
 
Close! Very near :D

Every year around august, if memory serves, the town of Britt, IA would shut down main street (which happened to be hwy 111, too) and host Hobo Days for a weekend. 5-6 blocks of various street vendors.

Most notable in my memory are the styrofoam lizards on a wire stick that you walked; bird call things you stuck in your mouth and hissed with, the rubber-band powered bird (long before i saw it on TV), the pen-doodle-um, an electronic type of autoharp like instrument thingy ... lessee ... all sortsa crazy stuff.

The place was a big Hobo stop going through the state and we had park there called the Hobo Jungle where they'd make mulligan stew and everyone got a little of that. They'd usually block the street off in front of our house and have BMX bike tricks on ramps and such.

Pretty fond memories of that stuff - i went to each one between the ages of 10 and 13 or 14. Cool time :D
 
Pen-doodle-um!!!

I had one when i was a kid ... the pendulums hung below the corner of a table and you filled 'em with sand or water or whatever ...

Yep, that sounds like the one I had. :thumb: I probably still have the red fiberglass rods that made up the arms and the pendulums stashed around here somewhere. (They just seemed like they might be handy for something someday.)
 
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