Industrial+Impact+of+Typewriters

=Industrial Impact of Typewriters= toc

Methods of Copying
Prior to the typewriter, hand written text was generally copied by hand. Because writing in long-hand was often too slow to keep up with dictation, shorthand was created, which later had to be transcribed back to the full text. If the office boys who performed this stenography were to create an exact copy of a hand written page for record keeping purposes, he would have to wet the page with “evil-smelling felt cloths” soaked in solvents and quickly press it against the record book, effectively smearing the original beyond legibility.

Ditto Machine
The ditto machine was invented in 1923 and was far superior to simply using carbon paper. Creating a ditto required the use of a new machine, the spirit duplicator. Spirit duplicators used no ink; instead a solvent dissolved a pigmented wax from a drum within the machine. The greatest benefit of the ditto machine was that, unlike using carbon paper, once an original was created a countless number of copies could be made.

Xerographic Copiers
Text copying technology was further improved by the invention of the xerographic copy machine, however it’s use is outside of the scope of this research.

The Evolution of Paperwork
People hand wrote letters as the typical means of communication. However, handwritten letters were difficult to read. When the typewriter was invented, it made this communication process easier to understand. However, the typewriter was not always practical; it was too slow and cost too much ($100, whereas the pen costs ~$0.05). The Sholes & Glidden Typewriter was the first typewriter to be faster than writing by hand. Significant savings in time can be made; justifying the additional cost businesses would have to spend. In all, the typewriter became a worthy investment for businesses. With the innovation of a practical typewriter, required skilled professionals. In 1895, typewriters were implemented into business schools across America[3]. Typist schools also begin to emerge during this time as a separate training. Once the basis of the practical typewriter was established, other standards were also made to help the typist. Typists were unable to see the words as they were printed by up-strike typewriters. The Front-Strike Typewriters allow typists to see the words as they are printed. Another improvement was in the traditional copy method. It involved soaking a per-written page with a solvent and transferring it to another page, which was extremely illegible. The innovation of the carbon paper helped solve this problem of illegible copying. The carbon paper allows multiple copies of each document to be written simultaneously. With the invention of the carbon paper came the Ditto Machine, invented in 1923. The size and bulkiness of the typewriters was also another major problem. During World War II a briefcase-sized mechanical typewriter is invented and implemented, making the typewriter easier to transport. Typists became very fast and efficient. However, the mechanical typewriters jammed often. Electric typewriters are invented, which utilized “typeball.” These type-balls did not jam and allowed for quick font, language, and symbol changes.

Community Service Evolution
Community service strongly resembled the fountain pen repair industry. In the fountain pen industry, anyone who required service for their pens had to ability to call a serviceman who would come to their doorstep in a matter of minutes. There the worker would fix whatever problems that the user was having with the pen. Afterward, the worker would charge the person, check back to the repair headquarters and go to the next stop. This process was almost exactly the same as the typewriter repair service, but the typewriter serviceman required more tools and materials for the broken typewriters.

Ink Ribbons
Usually called "Typewriter ribbons", these tiny rolls of tape would contain a thin coating of ink which would spool in the typewriter. When a key on the typewriter is pressed, it would punch down the character onto the tape into the paper, which would imprint the character in ink on the paper. These rolls of ink had to be changed out regularly to be able to type. In the early years, these ribbons would come in metal tins which actually became collectibles. Eventually ink came in different colors, which lead to the different color ink ribbons used in the typewriting industry. Ribbons were also made from different materials to help with removing ink from the paper for corrections until the correctional tape was invented.

Correctional applications
The first typewriter wasn't able to correct errors with a backspace button, but when the typewriter evolved so did the ability to mend mistakes. Liquid paper is one of the more recognizable brands when it comes to correctional products. An early product was a correctional tape that would literally stamp a block of white over the mistake. This was interesting because sometimes the color of the tape wouldn't be the same as the paper, or the tape would be the same color as the ink ribbon which lead to some confusion. Another product was a bottle of white fluid that could be applied over the mistakes, and of course typed over. This is probably the most common Liquid Paper product today, and is commonly known as "White Out". There are also correctional pens that would dispense correction fluid in a way a pen would dispense ink. This would give more control to the user when fixing mistakes.

A more traditional way of erasing involved using a special eraser which was made of a large wheel of rubber on one end, and had brush bristles on the other end. Typists would rub the errors away with the rubber wheel, and then brush the remains off the paper with the brush. Sometimes if the eraser particles remained on the paper, it would cause the typewriter to jam or misplace characters.

Carbon paper
Typing the same page over and over used to be a tedious practice for common typists. Eventually a piece of paper was covered with wax, which would help make one or several copies of an original document. A sheet of carbonic paper, as it was originally called, was placed between the original document and another sheet over paper. As the original document was written, the carbon paper would press down on the paper behind it. Several copies simultaneously meant using several pieces of carbon paper as well. The wax sheeted paper could be reused until the layer of wax became too thin, in which a new sheet would be needed.

Font customization
As the typewriter evolved, so did its process of typing. Original designs of the typewriter would force typing to one style and font. However, as time went on different forms of customization would provide the ability to type in different fonts and styles. A type-ball was used in later typewriters which could be replaced with different fonts like Arial, Courier, Times New Roman, and other common fonts. Different styles would include but weren't limited to bold, underlined, and italicized fonts. Although these innovations lead to a wider array of options, these balls had to be swapped every time that these options wanted to be used.

Personal keyboards
The QWERTY system that was originally developed for the typewriter in 1874 was adapted to the keyboard for personal computers. Although the qwerty system wasn't the fastest system out there, it soon became one of the most popular. This was due to its placement of common letters in easy to reach locations.