This Galton Quincunx is a probability machine that was made in the early 1930s and displayed at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair, also known as the Century of Progress. When the Fair ended, many of the companies showcasing their tools in science, technology, and industry decided to donate these objects to the museum, like this Galton Quincunx.

This probability machine is named after Francis Galton, a polymath from Victorian-era England who coined the commonly used phrase “nature vs. nurture.” Among the many subjects he studied was statistical analysis, variance, and standard deviations. He also designed “bean machines” like this one, to demonstrate normal and skewed distributions.