Post-Meeting Update; New Videos 10/14

The gathering held over the weekend at Herman Price's place was absolutely incomparable.  Collectors, authors, and general enthusiasts had several days' worth of interaction that proved once again that the core of our hobby is PEOPLE. 

Herman and Connie Price did a fabulous job with the entire affair including food and drink.  I had the good fortune to see many friends who I have not seen in a year; I had extended conversations with my friends Peter Weil, Maddie Allen, Richard Polt and Alan Seaver.  I haven't seen Dennis Clark in a number of years, and we talked a number of times (and are now working on a little research project together.)  So many others were there -- long time collectors like Mike Campbell, Fritz Niemann, Paul Robert, Marty Rice.  And of course, all the way from Australia, Robert Messenger, who I was very thrilled to meet and talk with. 

Robert Messenger has made a great post showing some of the machines and people.

So many people were there and there were so many conversations and presentations that I liked that I cannot mention everyone and everything; I can't even remember how many people I talked with right at the moment!  It was all great.  I do especially want to thank Mark Petersen, J.P. Huard and Katie Kirkland for great company at dinner the first night. 

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Video Updates

•We made a video before I went down to Herman's place.  This was an update on the Visigraph, and it also delves a bit into our philosophy of how new collectors and enthusiasts should initially approach the concept of repair.  Click here to see this video.

•I made a brief post-meeting video update showing some exciting new additions. Click here to see this new video.  (At press time, this video was still processing - 9 PM 10/14.)

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Photos from the Meeting -- Here are a few photos I took at the meeting this last weekend.  All will enlarge when clicked.

Above, Gabe Burbano's wonderful Oliver portable.  The more of these I see, the better I like them!

Above, Mike Campbell's Century.  This machine is just like the Remington Junior, but carries the branding normally associated with the Century 10.  However, this is clearly still the original configuration, right down to having the ribbon spools behind the carriage just like you'd find on the big Smith Premier No. 10.  Also notable is that this unit has a pharmaceutical keyboard.

Herman Price's Burns No. 1 is seen above.  This is an incredibly rare machine that several collectors, including Giulio Fanutti, said was on the "top of the desirable list."  What a fantastic looking machine!  Peter Weil told me that it's believed today that this machine was never put into what we'd think of as "mass production" ...  all surviving examples have differences that suggest no large standardized factory production was achieved, even briefly.   Reminds one of the Smith Premier No. 1 in some ways, doesn't it?

Above, Remington-Sholes Visible, Herman Price collection.  Another very scarce, relatively early (and briefly produced) "standard four bank front strike" typewriter like the Visigraph we've been showing on this site quite a bit lately.  When the enterprise failed, tooling for this machine went to France where it re-entered manufacture as the Japy.  (There's a Japy right next to this machine that you can't see in the photo, by the way.)

Stearns Visible No. 2, Herman Price collection.  Another relatively early visible standard, which is also a pretty scarce machine these days. 

I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to the next get-together, wherever and whenever it is!

R.C. Allen Woodstock Ad / Late US Standards

I recently purchased an advertisement that has triggered, along with a recent video (see our video on interchangeable type) a brief look at late manual, standard typewriters.

•RC ALLEN WOODSTOCK AD

The general history of the Woodstock / R.C. Allen typewriter line carries the fact that, in 1950, R.C. Allen Business Machines (who had bought the business) changed the name on what had been the Woodstock typewriter, and carried right along manufacturing it in its original Woodstock, Illinois factory.

Back in mid-2006 I spotted (on e-Bay) and purchased a curiosity; a typewriter that carried BOTH brand names -- that is to say, it had both the R.C. Allen and the Woodstock names.  You can see the machine below.

The machine you see above is covered in proper timeline sequence, as is usual for my web pages, at my R.C. Allen gallery.  Click here to see that gallery, mirrored on Alan Seaver's site.

This week, I was fortunate to spot and win the advertising folder (tri-fold, printed on one side only) that you see below. 

 

 

This ad both shows the typewriter labeled just as my example is, and also clearly advertises the machine as such -- namely, the "R.C. Allen Woodstock."  Finally, we have at least one piece of ephemera that shows a typewriter we all knew to exist, but for which there was no other evidence other than it, itself.  Unfortunately there's no date on this ad folder.  (Click photo to enlarge.)

 

As we can see from surviving machines, at least one R.C. Allen exists with a lower serial number than my R.C. Allen Woodstock... which seems to say that, at least initially, the Woodstock branding was dropped.  The company may well have thought better and decided a transition period resurrecting the Woodstock name was required.  (Smart... why ditch well over 30 years' worth of brand recognition?) 

 

•RC ALLEN PRODUCTION UPDATE

 

The overall line had a LONG life... and we can tell you now from NOMDA serial number records that it went through 1971.  For comparison, the Woodstock was produced in various models from 1914 through 1950 (36 years) while the R.C. Allen ownership and production era lasted another 21 years, from 1950 through 1971.  Here are the serial numbers for the R.C. Allen Visomatic B, the last model produced (from NOMDA records.)

 

1965          2356M

1966          2370M

1967          2394M

1968          2415M

1969          2420M

1970          2445M

1971          2470M

 

•END OF US PRODUCTION, BUT NOT OF SALES

 

The end of production of this long-lived line is just one of a series of stoppages in a several year span that marked the end of the manual, standard typewriter being built in America.  In 1968, Underwood (actually, Olivetti-Underwood) stopped manufacturing typewriters here; Smith-Corona halted production of its manual standard typewriter in 1970.  As we see, R.C. Allen followed in 1971.  Royal shut down its Hartford, Connecticut plant in 1973 so that later Royal standard manuals were made overseas; it had already been importing some.  Remington had already quit manufacturing standard machines here but these continued to be made overseas and imported.

 

 

Above, Smith-Corona Secretarial 76, manufactured 1970.

 

This wasn't the end of the SALE of manual, standard machines in the United States by a long shot, though. Well established brands such as Olivetti, Olympia, and Facit had manual standards available here well into the 1980's.  International Typewriter Exchange eventually obtained licenses to import both the East German-made Optima standard machine, and the Polish-made Predom machine and sold very many to the US Government. (One of these Predom machines is on the header of this blog - on the left.)  Morse, an import firm, also later continued to import Remington brand machines even after the original company had ceased to exist, with the machines being produced in Italy, in the mid-1980's. 

 

 

Above - PREDOM 1012, manufactured 1986 and imported and sold by ITE.

 

 

 

I'll keep an eye out for more information / ephemera regarding the R.C. Allen Woodstock, and if and when I find any you'll see it here.  I just hope it isn't another seven years!

 

6:20 PM  10/8/2013

 





ABC 2000 Comparison

Up right now at our new YouTube Channel is a fun exercise that we would normally (in the past) have conducted using photos and text on either my site or this blog, and it involves this typewriter. The machine you see above has been shown on my various site pages (Portable Typewriter Reference Site, European Typewriter Project) for many years; it's the Sears Chevron, or perhaps better the Sears Model 5298.  This is a version of what was originally known as the ABC 2000, but this one was made in Portugal. 

Well, a long while back I acquired an actual German-made ABC 2000 variant ... and then forgot about it.  The two were right next to each other, stored, when I noticed them last week and decided to do the comparison point-for-point.  We had the idea that it might be fun to just film it cold, and that's exactly what you will see on the video.  Click below to see the video; it'll open in a new window.

ABC 2000 Comparison (Portuguese / German made variants)

Let us know if you have a particular machine you'd like to see us review, or analyze, in one of our videos.  If we get a number of votes for a particular model (that we have available, that is) we can certainly give our impressions.  We already have a number of such "walk-around" videos in planning.

8:40 PM 10/6/2013

Interchangeable type, and more on Visigraph

We've created and uploaded TWO new videos which will appeal, we think, to many people interested in typewriters -- new or old, standard or portable.

The first is "Visigraph in Detail 3."  This is a continuation of the Visigraph series, showing not only this machine but introducing viewers to construction details and concepts of typewriters in general.  It's our deliberate style in these videos to slow down and show detailed concepts in a simple manner.  Of course, the end in view is that people so inclined will end up viewing these machines as exactly what they are -- machines -- first, and 'collectibles' second.  You can see me in the above photo having just reinserted the type bar assembly (which I discuss in the video) but before taking apart the carriage some more (which is also discussed in the video.) 

The second takes off on a theme we started as 'bonus footage' in another video by showing the Brother Dial-A-Type, and is called "Brother and Smith-Corona Interchangeable Type."  We show the other style of Brother machine that can be found with an interchangeable feature, and then take a quick but thorough look at some Smith-Corona machines of many varied sizes and ages that include interchangeable type.  There's even a surprise machine at the end.

Video links (will open in new tab / window):

Visigraph in Detail - 3

Brother, Smith-Corona Interchangeable Type

New Video 9/14 - Type bar bearings and more

We've put up another video - generally concerning the Visigraph, but exploring the difference between segment mounted type bars and individual type bar bearings.  We compare the Visigraph to some other early machines.

There's bonus footage included, of a machine and device we haven't shown before -- a Brother JP-3 series machine and the rare Dial-A-Type changeable type head.

Click here to see our newest typewriter video.

9/14/2013

Underwood Standard 3 / 4 / 5 sub-model identification

Sometime back, I acquired a rebuild manual for Underwood typewriters that included a rather curious breakdown of different blocks of serial numbers for some of the machines by letters.  I detailed this information on my own serial number listing page; click here to see that page.  The Underwood section is at the bottom of that page.

After having found that information, it's been years since any such thing has reappeared to expand upon or explain this breakdown of groups.  We recently had a breakthrough.

I bought a brochure printed by the Pittsburgh Typewriter and Supply Company about 1918 (the brochure says "Established 1903" and describes the company having been "established 15 years") which lists a number of Underwood machines with both model numbers and letters.

The illustrations will be presented in the order of increasing complexity of features for each range of models, beginning with the regular No. 4. Next, the No. 5 which parallels the No. 4 but adds extra keys; and the No. 3 finally, which is the wide-carriage machine.  I've never seen so many great cuts of Underwood standard machines in one brochure, covering such a wide variance in models.  Underwood fans are sure to "go to town" with these codes and nuanced differences. 

The original descriptions are included in the illustrations.  Click to enlarge.

 

 

 

 

 

What we're pretty clearly seeing here is that this rebuilder (clearly stated as such) is offering a range of ages of Underwood typewriters of each model (3, 4 and 5) and that they have varied features --- with more appearing as time goes on.  The machines are mixed up in the booklet, which is why I've clipped the scans and placed them in order.  So that we can make sense of these things, here's a brief summation of the codes from this booklet.

 

No. 4-J  76 character machine

No. 4-L  adds auto ribbon reverse

No. 4-P  adds back spacer and two-color ribbon selector

No. 4-D  adds lateral paper guide

 

No. 5-F  84 character machine

No. 5-R  adds auto ribbon reverse

No. 5-M  adds back spacer and two-color ribbon selector

No. 5-E   adds lateral paper guide

 

No. 3-T  has all features of 5-M but wide carriages

No. 3-K  has all features of 5-E but wide carriages

 

We can try to zero in on the age range of the machines you've seen using other evidence.  For example, we know they're all post-1900.  Also, note that none of the machines you've just seen (except for the 3-K) has a shift lock key on the right side of the keyboard; they're thus all pre-1915 (or so) when that feature was added... again, except for the 3-K.

 

The OMEF serial list, looking at the No. 5 model, says that back space and bichrome ribbon began on that model at about serial 245,000, or in the 1908-1914 time range.  Looking at tw-db.com we see that these features are listed on the No. 3 as having been added in 1909 - so that's a good solid guess for the No. 5 to have added the back space and two-color ribbon as well.  This then places the 4-P, the 5-M and the 3-T starting in 1909. 

 

The brochure, as noted, is from about 1918.  Right now, it doesn't look as if it matches up properly with the groups from the rebuild manual - the rebuild manual's K groups are placed by serial well after the print date of this brochure.  What we do now have though is a couple of solid pieces of evidence that, internally, Underwood was referring to changes in features by letters suffixed to the model number of the typewriters; it remains to be seen if we will ever be able to find a complete listing of such codes.

 

Let us know, in the comments, if you have anything to add to this code mystery!

 

5:20 PM  9/11/2013

 

 

Will & Dave add a YouTube Channel

We've decided that it would be fun and interesting to try some experimental videos detailing some of the work we do on various things, which naturally includes typewriters. 

The first video, which is a short six minute look at the Visigraph, can be found at the following link:

Visigraph in Detail 1 - new YouTube video

We hope you enjoy this; it's the first time we've done anything like this, and it was kind of fun to do.  So, if it keeps being fun, and if people enjoy them, we'll keep going.

There is now a link to the YouTube channel in the right sidebar of this site.  There will be other videos on there than typewriters, but we'll post here when typewriter videos go up.

9/10/2013