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Underwood English typewriter
- Accession Number
- 2016-5-4
- Source
- Archival Accessions
- Accession Number
- 2016-5-4
- Material Format
- object
- Physical Description
- 1 artifact
- Date
- [between 1890 and 1910]
- Scope and Content
- Accession consists of an Underwood English typewriter made before 1910. It is metal with various parts and was sold at the City Typewriter Company on Adelaide St. in Toronto.
- Administrative History
- The Underwood typewriter was invented by the American Franz X. Wagner in the late 1890s. Wagner showed his model to the manufacturer of inks and typewriter ribbons, John Underwood. The Underwood typewriter was the forerunner to the modern typewriter, with its mechanics and appearance being almost identical to those seen today. Its success lay in one major advancement. This was a design that allowed typists to view what they were writing. Previous models had the paper and writing enclosed because the workings of the machine prevented visibility. The machine also sped up the type bar so that typing could be done with a lighter touch. It also had two shift keys giving capital letters and lowercase, and a tabulator key, which prevented rapid travel of the carriage (the top part of the typewriter). The machine was a success and the company had to move twice to expand, changing its name in the process from the Wagner Typewriter Company to the Underwood Typewriter Company. By 1939, five million Underwood machines had been produced and marketed all around the world.
- Underwood Typewriter Company started to introduce addition and subtraction buttons around 1910, this typewriter does not have those buttons so it was likely made before 1910.
- Source
- Archival Accessions