Beginning
in the 1880s, Remington
faced many challengers in the typewriter market.
In 1880, George Yost’s American Writing Machine Company
introduced the Caligraph No. 1.
An advertisement in the November
19, 1887 issue of Harper’s Weekly showed a Caligraph
model with its double-keyboard (in contrast to Remington’s
shift-key model), a space bar on each side, and an extended front
housing its leverage system.
The word “typewriter,” which had not yet become
universal for the machine, was not used in the ad.
Notice that the price of the 1887 Caligraph was only $85
(1600 in 2002 dollars), a considerable reduction from the $125 of
the earlier Remingtons. Yost’s
company announced 20,000 Caligraphs in daily use in 1887, but
two-and-a-half years later that figure had risen to 100,000
. The same ad in the May 24, 1890 issue bragged of its
“Greatest Speed on Record!!”—129 words per minute
blindfolded.
The same page
of the November 19, 1887 issue
carrying the Caligraph ad also included an ad for a “Hall
Type-Writer.” The
latter was actually an index machine, which was developed as a
less expensive alternative to the typewriter (here, $40, or about
750 in 2002 dollars). Instead
of a keyboard, it had a small bank of letters (the index), not
unlike the numbers on a modern calculator, on which the user would
press a letter and then perform another function to print the
letter. Despite the
ad targeting “Business houses,” the index machine was not
aimed primarily at office work, but those doing occasional typing.
The ad reflected this reality with its claim that the Hall
typewriter was “a favorite with clergymen and literary men,”
and its endorsement by Celia Thaxter, a well-known poet.
By the turn of the century, the triumphant typewriter had
forced the index machine to survive only as a children’s toy.
The
November 3, 1888 issue of Harper’s Weekly revealed the
increasing popularity of the typewriter as well as the diversity
of the machine’s look, which would not be standardized until the
early-twentieth century. In
each of the four columns of an ad page appeared a Hammond
for a different typewriter:
Hammond, World, Crandall, and Remington.
The Hammond (col. 1) had a curved front (hinting at the
ergonomic computer keyboards of the future), initially a unique
letter arrangement (not QWERTY), and a rotating, cylindrical type
wheel (instead of type bars) that anticipated the type ball of the
IBM Selectric of 1960. (“Manifolding”
in the ad text refers to making multiple copies with carbon
paper.)
The
World typewriter (col. 2) was another inexpensive index machine.
The user moved the index pointer to the correct letter, and
then pressed the corresponding key to type it.
The Crandall
(col. 3) also had a curved keyboard, which was
arranged in only two rows (by 1893 it included the regular
three-row QWERTY keyboard). The
New Model Crandall (introduced in 1886 and advertised here) was
one of the most ornately decorated of all typewriters, with
painted roses and gold scrolls and mother-of-pearl inlay.
It used a single-element, rotating type sleeve (similar to
the Hammond type wheel) rather than type bars.
The Remington ad (col. 3-4) highlighted its success at a
typing “Championship of the World.”
One
of the biggest rivals to Remington was the Smith Premier
Typewriter Company (which became Smith-Corona in 1926).
An ad
in the November 15, 1890 issue of Harper’s
Weekly described how the Press of the State of New York had
adopted the Smith Premier to transcribe its telegraph dispatches.
Above that ad is one for a combined typewriting table and
office desk, designed to fit major brands of typewriters (Smith is
not mentioned) and used in “first-class offices,” such as
Harper & Brothers.
Although
the Crandall ad mentioned above claimed its machine provided
“Writing in plain sight,” the Daugherty typewriter of 1891 is
usually credited with being the first model that allowed the
typist to read the text as it was being typed.
Before that time, typewriters used an under-stroke or
up-strike mechanism whereby pressing a letter key forced the type
bar to strike the underside of the platen (the roller around which
the paper rested). In
order to see the typed result, the machine’s carriage had to be
lifted. The solution
was a front-stroke mechanism in which the type bar hit the paper
on the platen from the front.
An ad
for the Daugherty Visible model appeared in
the February 22, 1896 issue proclaiming, “Writing All in
Sight—All the Time.” Its
type bars can be contrasted with those of the Smith Premier, an
under-stroke “blind” typewriter, illustrated in the ad above
the Daugherty.
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1)
November
19, 1887, p. 846, col. 3-4
Caligraph typewriter
2)
May
24, 1890, p. S3, col. 4
illustrated ad, Caligraph typewriter
3)
November
19, 1887, p. 846, col. 3-4
Hall typewriter (index machine)
4)
November
3, 1888, p. 840, col. 1
illustrated ad, Hammond typewriter
5)
November
3, 1888, p. 840, col. 2
illustrated ad, World typewriter
6)
November
3, 1888, p. 840, col. 3
illustrated ad, Crandall typewriter
7)
November
3, 1888, p. 840, col. 3-4
illustrated ad, Remington typewriter
8)
November
15, 1890, p. S3, col. 1-2
illustrated ad, Smith Premium Typewriter
9)
November
15, 1890, p. S3, col. 1-2
illustrated ad, Needham Type-Writing Cabinet and Office Desk
Combined
10)
February
22, 1896, p. 188, col. 1-2
illustrated ad, Daugherty Visible typewriter
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