Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Please explain to Mr. Harrington that you can make a note form printer at short notice, and that (working print a type wheel) it must print faster & much better than can possibly be done by the levers or arms plan of Sholes. My idea is that it is a decided object for us to have the control of the Sholes machine, provided it costs little or nothing--but if not, not.--and of course, relying upon your inventive head to work us through when and as may be necessary. -- D. H. Craig to Edison, a letter dated January 31, 1871.

In September, 1870, Mr. Christopher Latham Sholes visited New York to meet Mr. Daniel Hutchins Craig and Mr. George Harrington. He demonstrated his Type-Writer, but it was severely criticized by one of Mr. Harrington's partners, Mr. Thomas Alva Edison. Thus Mr. Craig decided to have Mr. Sholes and Mr. Edison to compete for a "note form printer". As Mr. Edison could not complete his type-wheel "universal printer" by the end of September, 1871, Messrs. Craig and Harrington decided to adopt Mr. Sholes' Type-Writer (cf. Koichi Yasuoka and Motoko Yasuoka: "On the Prehistory of QWERTY", ZINBUN, No.42 (March 2011), pp.161-174).

Friday, April 22, 2011

QWERTY
The keyboard on the first practical typewriter, while simpler, was identcal in arrangement to the keyboard on a twenty-first century laptop. A girl learning touch typing in 1880 took much the same course as an aspiring typist today. -- Joseph R. Conlin: The American Past, Vol.2, 9th edition, Wadsworth Cengage Learning, Boston (2011).
Original QWERTY keyboard

No. The first type­writer had QWERTY key­board, but its ar­range­ment was dif­fer­ent in keys M, C, and X, from QWERTY now­a­days. So, in the 1880's, the fingerings of typings were much different from today. For example, Mr. William Ozmun Wyckoff of Ithaca, New York, taught his six-finger typing method to his shorthand pupils at Phonographic Institute, just as follows:


1122
this
LRRL

3311212
machine
RLLRRRL

231
was
LLL

3312
made
RLLL
After the keys M, C, and X were moved to the places as seen today, Mrs. Elizabeth Margaret Vater Longley started to teach her eight-finger typing method at her own school, the Cincinnati Shorthand and Type-Writer Institute:

1123
this
LRRL

1421213
machine
RLLRRRL

343
was
LLL

1423
made
RLLL
Mr. Frank Edward McGurrin of Salt Lake City typed the same sentence as follows:

1123
this
LRRL

2411212
machine
RLLRRRL

343
was
LLL

2412
made
RLLL
They used their contemporary typing methods at that time, which were different from today, as I mentioned before.

Monday, April 18, 2011

A big step toward adoption of the QWERTY keyboard as the industry standard came in a typing contest held in Cincinnati in 1888, where Frank McGurrin (who used a QWERTY keyboard) won a decisive victory over Louis Taub (who used an alternative keyboard). McGurrin's victory had more to do with the fact that he was one of the first "touch typists" (whereas Taub used the "hunt-and-peck" method). -- Bruno Dyck, Mitchell J. Neubert: Management: Current Practices and New Directions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing, Boston (2010).

His name was Louis Traub, not Taub, and he was an eight-finger typist on Caligraph No.2 as I mentioned before. Furthermore, Mr. Frank Edward McGurrin was beaten by Miss Mae E. Orr, who was a two-finger hunt-and-peck typist, in another typing contest held in Toronto on August 13, 1888 (cf. "Canadian Shorthand Society", The Cosmopolitan Shorthander, Vol.9, No.8 (September 1888), pp.210-215). Well, how Mr. McGurrin's defeat had more or less to do with the fact?

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

But the unique and lasting feature of the Sholes & Glidden was the QWERTYUIOP keyboard layout which is in worldwide use today in spite of being an illogical arrangement adopted merely in order to avoid adjacent typebars clashing. -- Duncan James: Old Typewriters, Shire Publications, Princes Risborough (1993).

Adjacent typebars? Well, in fact, any two typebars of QWERTYUIOP were not adjacent in the typebar basket of Sholes & Glidden Type-Writer. There was a typebar for numeral 2 between Q and W. Numerals 3 and 4 between W and E. 5 between E and R. 6 between R and T. 7 between T and Y. 8 between Y and U. 9 between U and I. "-" between I and O. And "," between O and P. Any rearrangement of QWERTYUIOP could avoid their typebars to be placed adjacently. Mr. James, you cannot explain how QWERTYUIOP was made, telling "merely in order to avoid adjacent typebars clashing" (cf. Koichi Yasuoka and Motoko Yasuoka: "On the Prehistory of QWERTY", ZINBUN, No.42 (March 2011), pp.161-174).

Typebar basket of Sholes & Glidden Type-Writer (top view)