The following picture and description appear courtesy of Dr. M. Donald Blaufox, M.D., Ph.D, from his medical historic website: www.mohma.org.
Each month we visit Dr. Blaufox's Museum of Historical Medical Artifacts to take a look back at the medical equipment that cleared the way for what patients encounter in the doctor offices and operating rooms of today. Some equipment may be recognizable, while other inventions featured here have since become obsolete or have had their usefulness discredited.
Description: 7.5” stainless steel piece. Handle is pistol grip type with semicircular gauge calibrated from 0 to 66. A lever opens sprung arms 2” long and curved to meet to measure skinfold thickness. Patent #3008239. A version of this instrument is still being sold. The device was developed in the Aeronautical Research Laboratory at the Univeristy of Kentucky ( Department of Mechanical Engineering). Professor E. B. Penrod, Head of the Mechanical Engineering Department, directed the activities of the laboratory until Dr. Karl O. Lange was appointed laboratory director in 1953. The laboratory, however, continued as a unit of the Mechanical Engineering Department. and the caliper was developed as part of Dr. Lange’s research interest.
