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That's a beauty. I love the way a typewriter feels under the fingers, the sound of the little letter hammers - or whatever they're called hitting the paper.
I learned to type on that exact same typewriter, a Hermes Elite, in a class at the local technical college. 24 of us, all in rows, typing a-s-d-f-g-f and ;-l-k-j-h-j.
My favourite typewriter of all time is the IBM Selectric golfball. What a fantastic invention.
I learned to type (and to a large extent, learned to spell) on a mechanical Underwood, which I just tried to find a picture of and couldn't. It had (as I remember) a very heavy action and you couldn't rush on it. It enforced a rhythmic and highly arched keystroke. Then various computer keyboards. But I think my favorite was the electric Olivetti I used in school. As much as I love the elegance of mechanicals, that thing just had a perfect feel under my fingers.
Man that brings back memories. Typing class was my only "C" in high school. The only reason I passed was because we had a sub that year, and she didn't care how many mistakes there were, as long as you corrected them and turned in the paper in time.
I sent the link to my sister, who's a much better typist and writer. :)
I'm still so happy that I took typing class in tenth grade. It was one of the only useful things that I learned in highschool. The class was almost all girls since at the time, 1980, no one expected that boys would have to type for a living.
Typing class in school for me consisted of finishing all the exercises and then typing all the song lyrics I could remember, some of them zillions of times.
I received an old electric typewriter at a church Christmas gift exchange when I was...13? It was such a powerful and strange machine to someone who considered herself sort of fey and artistic... of course it was also extremely loud even when I wasn't typing, and my parents would shout down for me to go to bed if they heard it at night...
I love manual typewriters. I have 3 old ones, although only one is really in working condition. You can still get ribbons. Olivetti still makes manual typewriters.
What I like best about manual typewriters is that you don't have to start them up and wait for everything to load; you just open the case and you're good to go.
I would love to have a typewriter, but I'm afraid I wouldn't find much use for it. I've tried typing on typewriters, but after a while, the novelty of pounding on the keyboard sort of fades away. After that, a typewriter becomes a tool just like any other, nothing mysterious about it.
I learned to type on a manual typewriter, but I don't remember which one. The pain in the ass part was that I started with a teacher who taught it alphabetically. I had to change schools and that teacher taught QWERTY style. Argh.
photo by splunge
photo by TheophileEscargot
photo by Kronos_to_Earth
photo by ethylene
