>Hi All.
>
>A friend sent me this picture from 1954 Popular Mechanics (which I'm just putting on one of our websites so you can see it and will remove it shortly):
>
>http://www.timbukone.com/images/temp/homepc.jpg
>
>Its good for a laugh to see how computer technology has changed. But I have a question - I realize its a model but does anyone know what the large steering wheel thing might have been used for?

As is readily evident, it is actually 2 steering wheels.

The inner wheel is used to adjust the flow of electrons, which weren't so well schooled in 1954 and so tended to 'drift' if left to their own devices, producing incorrect arithmetical results, distorting photographs and such.
The larger outer wheel is used to control to protons, for the same reasons.

Not clearly visible in the photo are the "paddles" on each of the wheels which controlled the speed of the electrons or protons. Each tended to lose velocity over time and these were used to restore velocity to the required standard.

FYI, the TV is a Sylvania with the "halo light" feature to reduce eye stress.

The keyboard/output device was spirited from a visit to 1965 by a scientist working on both this project and another top-secret project.

The gentleman is a clone of J. Edgar Hoover and Harry S Truman. This combination was chosen because both regularly used initials in stating their names and it was conjectured that the creation would use only initials for his full name. Alas, nature failed to cooperate and he named himself Herkimer Bottleblower.