I wrote my first copywriting projects on a typewriter (I should be posting this on GeezerCopywriter.com), and while that late 70′s electric hardly qualified as an antique, I’m like most writers – I get a shiver up and down my spine when I see a really old typewriter.
That’s why antiquetypewriters.com stopped me in my tracks.
For those stuck on the machines writers formerly used to put words to paper, this site represents the motherload. It’s somebody’s antique typewriter collection, lovingly photographed and put on display for all to see.
In an era when novels are being written on cell phones, big, mechanical, clunky typewriters have undergone a transformation.
From the machines which are recognizably “modern” in design to the oddball constructs, typewriters no longer bear the burden of useful tools; they’ve become little mechanical works of art, and I simply can’t look away.
For those who have never done it, writing on a typewriter demands a level of commitment word processors don’t require.
And while I wouldn’t trade my out-of-control text processor addiction for a typewriter (I can stop anytime I want), I admit writing’s current “fire hose” approach to productivity lacks the elegance of thinking first, and writing second.
The kind of thinking forced on us by clunky mechanical beasts who now occupy museums, not desks.
Keep writing, Tom Chandler.
Hey Tom,
I used to have an old Underwood that was exactly that — a desk ornament. Got thrown off the lifeboat during one of my moves (they’re not exactly “compact”) though I wish I still had it today.
I must admit, I only used a typewriter a couple of times, and never for work. My first typewritten report for school was done on a C64 using the Quick Brown Fox word processing software and a dot matrix printer — I had to program the alphabet set in myself.
At university I was on the student newspaper and we brought in new desktop computers (a blazing-fast 486 with an 80-meg hard drive — it was literally the fastest, most powerful computer on campus outside of the UNIX lab) and an HP laser printer. I would still be using WordPerfect today, except all my clients used Word, so I bit the bullet and switched.
Ah, the salad days!
~Graham
PS – Great new site!
~Graham
Graham: Yes, I loved WordPerfect too (though the bug-ridden intermediate versions didn’t impress), and also switched to MS Word for client reasons, and still regret it to this day.
Then again, I’ve largely thrown over bloated word processors in favor of text/programmers editors, though in any case, it’s hard to imagine working on a typewriter today.
Fiction writers have a reputation for alcoholism; I still maintain that was the result of typewriter use before liquid paper and built-in correction functions…
I almost only use typewriters to write articles and creative work. I find that they demand, as you so clearly explained, thought before action. Instead of just writing out 3,000 words to be chopped down to 1,500, I decisively work to build the piece.
And as long as we are talking typewriters here, allow me to gloat at my current pieces: 1942 Remington 5 (used in WWII), Two Olympia Werke A.G.s, a Royal from the 50′s, and a few Smith Coronas from the 60′s to kick around on. Quite frankly, as long as they keep making ribbons for them (and perhaps even if they stop), I’ll keep repairing the old girls and using them.
I’m curious; how do editors and clients react to that?
i’m with you on wp, most things micro$haft are bloated pigs
i think i have a copy of wp on a p-100 somewhere, regret it’s not available for the macs i use today
Wow, just had a vague flashback to when Ctrl-Z (Undo) first came out — or at least when I first learned of it. I think that was on one of the very earliest versions of WP… (1989?)
And, if I remember rightly, you could only go back one step.
Still, I say that is absolutely, bar none, the single best advancement in the history of computer programming. It’s saved me more than once!
~Graham
Now I’m wondering – did the “Ctrl-Z” undo command come into being with the first Macs (or perhaps the Lisa)?
Got my first Mac in 1985. No hard drive, thing was as slow as a Yugo.
Yes, they are beautiful to look at. But I make so many mistakes when composing a piece of copy. And I rewrite so much. I’d go crazy having to use one of those things again.
Have you seen these steampunk Macs: http://www.trendhunter.com/trends/steampunk-mac ?
.-= Dean´s last blog ..Paul: You Don’t Forget A Truly Great Idea =-.
I have to say that starting my career on one of those did teach me the value of outlining ideas and copyflow with a pen and paper before sitting down to write.
It’s a habit I still practice. And I think it does help if you’re looking for a Big Idea – something I don’t often find while slaving over a keyboard.
Yes, I agree with you – a pen and pad are esential for working on ideas. And for some strange reason, the pen’s ink has to be black.
Sometimes though, when I get stuck, I love to sit down at my PC and dash off a load of headlines.
.-= Dean´s last blog ..Paul: You Don’t Forget A Truly Great Idea =-.
@Tom – I did a fairly casual search over the weekend for “undo history” and didn’t find much. Funny how something so basic and vital to today’s computing is not mentioned anywhere! (I mean, it must be somewhere, but apparently it is not easy to find…)
~Graham
Maybe the Ctrl-Z/X/Y (copy/paste/undo) conventions came via the Apples (Lisa & Mac, which may mean it came from the Xerox PARC work), though the concept of “Undo” must have popped up earlier somewhere.
@Tom – Yes, I actually got put on the right track by Bruce Damer at Digibarn. (http://www.digibarn.com/)
Seems that Apple Lisa was the first “popular” computer to have Undo Last Change.
http://www.computerhistory.org/events/lectures/appleint_10281997/appleint_xscript.shtml (It’s long — search the page for “Undo Last Change”.)
The Xerox Star, which preceded it, actually had an undo button, but it was something the hardware designers added that the software designers never used, so it didn’t work.
The history goes deeper than that. I plan to put together either a Wikipedia piece or my own web page outlining the history. Kind of interesting (you know, in a geeky, nerdy kind of way…)
~Graham
I might as well admit to actually working on a Lisa computer for a short time before buying a 128K Mac, which was cool but absolutely wretched.
That was the first time I saw the undo button, though I had no idea if it existed on an engineering workstation somewhere.
Perhaps historians will one day decide that the creation of the “undo” button is what set humanity free in the computer age…
lol – it just occurred to me — at the very least, they could have had a pre-recorded voice that said: “I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t undo that.” every time you hit the button.
Stop it. My sides.
~Graham
They could have, but that recording would have consumed all of the 128K Mac’s memory…