I had so much fun looking them up when I got it home last night. I have always wanted one and this one just fell into my lap for a cool $10.10. My favorite thrift store "V.V." has a nasty habit of writing the price directly on everything with a grease pencil, note the price on the top right:
I think this a good omen and will serve as an excellent totem for this blossoming writer.As an ardent admirer of old things especially of this vintage and I am just way too excited. I straitened out the ink tape that was all tangled last night and even hammered out a few sentences. It works perfectly, no dings, no scratches. Isn't it just the darlinest thing?
While reading up on them I learned that they have no "1" key, you just use the lower case "l", no telling how long it would have taken me to figure that out once I discovered it. I've notices the exclaim point is conspicuously absent. What is that about? I feel I overuse it myself, maybe that would solve that problem... Also I learned that the keys are glass; little glass circles cover the white on black buttons. Older non-portable models had beveled glass sides allowing a view inside the machine to marvel at its wondrous inner workings. Kind of like the clear desktop Mac of its day! This little portable model is more like the laptop of its day. It boasts such "user friendly" features as a glare reducing matte finish, it is stripped down to reduce bulk and weight having no noise dampening padding.When I was little my Mom had her mother's 1960s mini type writer in a closet downstairs. It was pea green and had its own charm, but it was not near as cute as this one. I loved looking at all it's long keys, just like these:
I enjoyed all manner of tinkering, no torturing that poor little type writer. Kids are Hell on things, they can't help it. Note to self; if I ever have children I must try to remember that. I noted with satisfaction how efficiently the keys would tap the type onto the paper when struck one at a time, and how they would run into each other if you were clumsy and pushed two at once.Here's a picture and link to a website that sells these and has some good information on them.
http://mytypewriter.com/royalarrowportableof1941.aspx
I wonder how something so cool ends up being given away to the thrift store? Well, their loss is my gain, don't look a gift horse in the mouth and all. I have to guess it belonged to an "old person" who died and their kids had to go through and clean out their house and just threw lots of stuff out.I'd love to know about this machine's former life and what it was used for. Did it write boring business stuff, novels or mm...short stories? One can only hope. I like to think that it belonged to a real writer, that is to say, one who writes. I don't care if the writer was published or "successful" in any conventional sense. But I hope it was an instrument of a true wordsmith. I hope it helped someone create.
I love things from this era. I have a couple of gorgeous Singer sewing machines that remind me of this that I adore using. I am also a glutton for furniture of this period. Maybe hours of wandering through my Grandparent's house during nap time fostered in me a love of all things '40s?
Well I'm off to tinker and play with my toy. I can hardly "type"; I only took one class for it in school and I'm a terrible cheat, looking down at my hands frequently.
Time to buckle down and see how I do!
Of course typing on this keo boarfd is way easier than on the twenty pounf monster above. See how bad I typw when I donbtr look down
>? I;ve got my work cut out dor me1!
