No photograph is shown for this exhibition. The museum displays an image only where it can show the object honestly.
About this date
Christopher Latham Sholes, Carlos Glidden and Samuel Soule patented a typewriter in 1868. E. Remington & Sons began selling the Sholes and Glidden in 1873.
About credit
Many typewriter designs preceded Sholes’s. His was the first commercially successful one.
Chapter II
The world before
Life before the Typewriter
Business correspondence was written by hand, with variable legibility.
II
The human achievement
How it came about
The Sholes and Glidden typewriter typed only capitals. The keyboard arrangement, which became QWERTY, was refined to reduce jamming. Mark Twain bought one and later claimed to be the first author to submit a typed manuscript.
III
Understanding the invention
How it works
The Typewriter, explained in two steps.
01
Step 01 of 02
Type bars
Each key swings a metal bar that strikes an inked ribbon on the paper.
Type bars
QWERTY
IV
The transformation
What changed for humanity
Office work
Typists and secretaries became a new profession.
Writing
Authors, journalists and officials produced clean copy.
It standardised written communication, and created a new class of office jobs, especially for women.
V
Before and after
Life before and after The Typewriter
Before
By hand, with individual style.
After
In typeface, with carbon copies.
On larger screens, drag the divider (or use the arrow keys) to give more room to the world before or after.
VI
Its legacy
What came after
MHI 069
The Typewriter
Beyond the collection
The Computer keyboard
Computers kept the QWERTY layout.
Beyond the collection
Word processing
Electronic text replaced typewriters in the 1980s.
VII
Human stories
The people and the moments
Typists as a profession
By 1900 women made up the majority of typists in the United States, one of the early large-scale entries of women into office jobs.
Where accounts differ, this museum follows the documented record and says so.
