What's new

Typewriters and Type-ins

bderby

bderby

No, I will not tell you what "merde" means!
Joined
Jul 11, 2009
Messages
7,896
I was reading this thread by Heather and lots of people were asking about her typewriters and it made me think of this blog post I read the other day about a type-in.

I had never heard of them before, but basically it is where you go and type on typewriters. I think it actually sounds fun. I remember taking two years of typing in high school and learning how to correct mistakes with those little white corrector strips. It is so far removed from how we work now on computers, but it was a very interesting article.

Anyone ever heard of these or been to one?
 
I took 6 years of typing, starting on a manual typewriter and used this little thing:
il_570xN.429908944_9v9a.jpg

and when I got to highschool we had electric ones, that had a correction tape built into the typing tape.
The class was no talking, and just the sound of typing...that was the hardest part for me, no talking
Then in the Air Force we had these cool ones, that we could pop the ball out for different fonts:
220px-Selectric_II.jpg
 
OMG I had forgotten all about those little eraser brush thingies! I wish I had a picture of the pink(!) Royal I had in my room growing up. I'll have to ask if my mom has it somewhere so she can snap one for me.

That said, I have no desire to go back. My pinkies are too short and weak to push typewriter keys all the way down, so I learned to type without my pinkies. It took me YEARS AND YEARS of computer typing to train myself to use my pinkies at all and they're still not in use as much as they should be.
 
I got a typewriter for High School graduation! Yep, I was sent off to college in style, hehe. I recall always having White-Out on hand. Do you remember using the White-Out the blowing and waiting for it to dry before you could continue to type? :giggle.

Am I showing my age?
 
I learned to type on a computer my senior year of HS, but it was the first year that we had computers in the school. I, too, got an electric typewriter for graduation and was thrilled! Showing my age, as well haha.

I am teaching a pre-vocational type program this year where the students learn skills in 5 different areas from construction to business to consumer/service. In the business area, part of the program is skills on a typewriter. Not sure why it's included in the program, but it's fun to watch the kids try to figure out how to work it and all but one of them hate it!
 
oh man! i would so go to one of these! obvious? i'm sure we've got something here in austin. i need to peek around a bit.
 
My Mom used to do typing for the library and school in our town and some random people, so we always had a typewriter and were allowed to play with it. It was a big day when they made a typewriter with the correction tape built in! I think I'd still love to type and my kids would get a kick out of it, but I don't really want to store one. :)
 
This sounds like the most PERFECT nerdy thing I would LOVE to attend. How fun! Never heard of one before.
 
The type writers we used in high school kind of looked like the one Anne posted. I didn't enjoy typing class - but it probably the most useful thing I learned!
I think we only recently got rid of the one I used up until we got a really basic word processor.

Heather, I thought of you the other day when I saw this poster on Mental Floss!

e8ec72d6c249242f43ac259cb833cf18.jpg
 
talktoheather said:
oh man! i would so go to one of these! obvious? i'm sure we've got something here in austin. i need to peek around a bit.
Click to expand...

I immediately thought of you, Heather, when I read the post, because I figured it would be right up your alley!
 
I can remember when electric typewriters came out with self correcting tape and I no longer needed white-out.
 
My parents bought us a typewriter from an estate auction. We loved that thing! We played with it for years until the keys stuck together so bad, you really couldn't type probably. They bought us another one, because it kept us so busy writing stories and lists and imaginative things.

At my second to last job we had an electric typewriter. Whenever we had to correct W-4's we used it. It's weird, but we weren't allowed to use the computer for that, had to be the typewriter.
 
i hated typing class in HS. i think it had to do with my pinkies being weak and not able to reach too! & i always cheated and peeked at my fingers. don't think i did better than a C in that class.

i got sent to college with a fancy word processor. they were the new thing, and no need for white out!
 
Because I am clearly very old, I actually learned to type on a manual typewriter. There was a room full of 16 manual typewriters - one of them was old enough to have the numbers and letters rubbed off. Our teacher told us that each year the person who chose that typewriter ended up with the best grade in the class because they couldn't cheat and look at the letters. I chose that typewriter, and I'm totally fast. LOL
 
Back
Top