British typewriters 1914-1916

[GWRCo]

Hi gang!

am trying to source a typical 1stWW period typewriter that would have been in everyday use, such as orderly rooms, etc. Trying to locate one in a working condition, but more to the point, what manufacturers names should i be looking for?

I've seen a couple such as Remington with No: 20 on, but this means absolutely nothing to me!!

Help!!!

tim

[Smithmaps]

Hi gang!

am trying to source a typical 1stWW period typewriter that would have been in everyday use, such as orderly rooms, etc. Trying to locate one in a working condition, but more to the point, what manufacturers names should i be looking for?

I've seen a couple such as Remington with No: 20 on, but this means absolutely nothing to me!!

Help!!!

tim

Hi Tim

This web site might be useful.

Typewriters

Have you tried ebay?

You need serial information on the various types before you buy,

Typewriter Serials

but they are really not expensive.

I have a really nice folding Corona 3, of Great War period, I paid £20 for it recently.

Guy

[Ian Riley]

Tim,

It will not tell you about the actual machines in service but there is a very interesting section on typewriters and their supply (or lack of it) in Battle Tactics of the Western Front by Paddy Griffith pp 180-181. N .B. Not British Fighting Methods by the same author/editor. If you have not read it, it is worth seeing. Apparently the QMG decided that 'correspondence in the field was to be discouraged' and one of the tools used to implement this policy was to severely limit the supply of typewriters. Captain Partridge, running the Stationery Service in France, was soon moaning that he had issued as many as 300 throughout the BEF. Units below brigade level were unlikely to get an official machine. He was much more forthcoming in terms of producing and distributing pamphlets and training publications, a hero of the war.

Presumably there must have been a lot of private purchase and independent 'acquisition'. Griffith says that they cost about a third of the price of a motor cycle.

The Army Printing and Stationery Section (APSS) War Diary (PRO WO 95 81 is the reference given by Griffith) might throw some light on the machines in use.

Ian

[Pete1052]

My late dad was a clerk in a U.S. Army 105 mm howitzer battery in War II and I thank God that he had access to typewriters--all of his letters back home, two or three a week, were typed and are easy to read. Underwood and Remington made good ones during '41-'45. Anyone here tried to buy a typewriter ribbon lately?

[Andrew Upton]

My late dad was a clerk in a U.S. Army 105 mm howitzer battery in War II and I thank God that he had access to typewriters--all of his letters back home, two or three a week, were typed and are easy to read. Underwood and Remington made good ones during '41-'45. Anyone here tried to buy a typewriter ribbon lately?

Plenty on Ebay - I got one for my 1936 typewriter (forget the brand, it's the same type Ian Fleming did his early Bond books on) on there a little while ago, works a treat.

I've also got a nice c.1917 typewriter, forget the brand again, but it needs work (it stops moving on occasionally, and types on the same spot!).

[Pete1052]

Andrew, I'll be damned, I didn't think they were still out there anymore. My dad was one of the fastest typists in the world, he was in the 130-140 words per minute ballpark. In '43 the U.S. Army made him a clerk, they'd never seen anything like him. He went on to a career at the Washington Post. I usually blunder along at about 40 WPM but occasionally I have bursts up to 80-90.

[Andrew Upton]

I think typewriters are great fun - got my Mothers 1970's typewriter to carefully play with when I was young, got the 1936 example in it's original carry case for £10 at a carboot sale opposite our house, and the c.1917 example was "free to a good home" (it's massive weight and not-quite-functioning-correctly status means it currently lanquishes in the bottom of my cupboard until I can find someone qualified to repair/overhaul it - that's a much more difficult question then finding the ribbons... )

[Pete1052]

Typewriter repair is probably a dying trade, the guys who once did it are probably 70 or 80 years old now. Also spare parts are probably a problem, if you want to fix the old one do it now instead of later.

[Muerrisch]

Sorry to tell you all this but a typewriter in 1914-1918 was a woman .... the actual machine was a typing machine.

[NigelS]

'GRUMPY' date='Mar 1 2008, 09:51 AM' post='872066': Sorry to tell you all this but a typewriter in 1914-1918 was a woman .... the actual machine was a typing machine.

Sorry Grumpy, but according to the OED a typewriter in the Great war, at least to the men at the front, was:

3. A machine-gun or sub-machine-gun. slang.

1915 A. D. Gillespie Let. 3 Mar. in Lett. from Flanders (1916) 31 The only typewriter here is the machine-gun—the men's nickname for it. 1930 Sun (Baltimore) 25 Oct. 10/3 When the ‘typewriters’, as machine guns are called, rattle, it is natural for the police to suspect these ‘independents’ even of shooting each other. 1959 ‘J. Christopher’ Scent of White Poppies vii. 101 ‘You associate typewriters with more than one guy.’+ ‘Typewriters?’ Bella asked. ‘Submachine gun. Browning, maybe+firing automatic.’ 1973 P. Evans Bodyguard Man iii. 25 Al Capone['s]+torpedoes+were mean with a Thompson ‘type-writer’.

the non slang definitions give the usage of typewriter for the machine dating back to 1868 in a US patent, indicating that the original machines would probably have been sold as "typewriters" and have been well known as such by WWI; The OED gives its earliest use of "typewriter" for a typist (male or female ) as 1884:

1. A writing-machine having types for the letters of the alphabet, figures, and punctuation-marks, so arranged on separate rods (or on the periphery of a wheel) that as each key of the machine is depressed the corresponding character is imprinted in line on a moving sheet.

1868 C. L. Sholes et al. U.S. Patent 79,265 23 June 4 Thus made, the type-writer is the simplest, most perfectly adapted to its work. 1875 Knight Dict. Mech. s.v., The Sholes type-writer+is about the size of the sewing-machine, and is worked with keys arranged in four banks or rows. 1881 X-Y-Z Guide (N.Y.) Oct. p. iv, Manufacturers of the best Type Writer in the market. 1897 G. Allen Type-writer Girl iii, My type-writer continued to go click, click, click. 1899 Allbutt's Syst. Med. VIII. 25 One typewriter+is worked by means of a handle which is grasped.

2. One who does typewriting, esp. as a regular occupation; = typist 2.

1884 N. York Herald 27 Oct. 7/2 Situation wanted—by lady, rapid stenographer and typewriter. 1887 St. James's Gaz. 22 Dec., Women+beat them [men] altogether as type~writers and ‘dry-goods clerks’. 1895 How to get Married 86 The marriage of the type-writer and her employer is so frequent that it has passed into a joke.

so it's more than likely that by WWI "typewriter" may have been in common usage for both the machine and its operator, although the earliest use of "typist" does date back to 1885.....

Nigel

[Sue Light]

Sorry to tell you all this but a typewriter in 1914-1918 was a woman .... the actual machine was a typing machine.

5 September 1918

Trouville Area: Sent memo to DMS, L of C with reference to application from DDMS Trouville for the issue of a typewriter for use in the A/Principal Matron’s Office ...

WO95/3991

Sue

[Norrette]

a typewriter in 1914-1918 was a woman

Wot, in forward HQ on the front? Still I suppose those diary entry people were a bit girly

[Muerrisch]

Put me down for one of those nice warm typewriters: preferably a cordon bleu chef with blue eyes.

[TonyE]

In the interests of veracity, members should keep their eyes open for the following serial numbered typewriters which this small piece of army bureaucracy proves were actually in the thick of it (all be it in Russia)

Regards

TonyE

[Moonraker]

here's this typewriter museum site

which i found when trying to see if the British Typewriter Museum in Bournemouth was still going strong. I covered its opening c1975 and still have a memento plastic cube containing small typewriter parts. When its founder, Wilfred Beeching died, I believe the local authority took it over, but a Google suggests it is no more, though it did lead to titles of various reference works that it published. I remember one exhibit was a wrist-typewriter used by French officers in the Great War to tap out short messages - probably more legible than ink and paper, but it must have been quite heavy.

Moonraker

[GWRCo]

Guys,

many thanx for the replies, it's greatly appreciated! The sites mentioned have some damn good info on, and i shall be referring to them in my hunt for a period typewriter!

thanks once again!

tim

[Broznitsky]

Does anybody know of a computer font that mimics 1914-1919 typewriter font; particularly a font that might mimic, for example, the "e" key that is misaligned, or the "o" key with the blob in the middle, that make Great War documents so unique?

[Norrette]

Does anybody know of a computer font that mimics 1914-1919 typewriter font; particularly a font that might mimic, for example, the "e" key that is misaligned, or the "o" key with the blob in the middle, that make Great War documents so unique?

Broz,

Something like this ?

OldTypewriter fonts

[Broznitsky]

Excellent, Norette, thank you. I did some Googling and found a couple of other free old-time typewriter fonts.

[Bingo794]

Many years ago (1971 I think) as a member of the local Air Training Corps, the officer in charge managed to get hold of an electric typewriter and consequently threw out the old manual machine. It still worked very well and I thought I would ask him if I could fish it out of the bin.

Being a decent sort, he gave me a lift home with it.

It was and still is, in fine working order.

The kids rediscovered it when we started clearing out for a loft conversion. (medal collecting has been suspended for the short term)

On closer inspection and after cleaning all the spiders webs and dust from it, I noticed that it has the King's cypher for George V. That dates it between 1910 and 1936.

It was donated by a local land owner (Captain Roger Nelthorpe, served WW2) who regularly paid for equipment and trips away for the town Cadet/Scout units. The typewriter allegedly belonged to his father, a Colonel during WW1.

I will have a good look to see if there is a maker or year mark, it is a transportable type and could easily be of military issue.

Maybe someone on here can enlighten me further.

DW

[edwin astill]

here's this typewriter museum site

which i found when trying to see if the British Typewriter Museum in Bournemouth .....but a Google suggests it is no more,

Moonraker

Sorry to hear it is closed. About 25 years ago I spent a wet afternoon there. What else can one do in Bornemouth on a wet afternoon?