My wife (a teacher) said her friend (another teacher) stumbled across an old typewriter in a school storage closet. How it was still there no one knows. I asked her to get a pic of it to see what it was (I'm assuming an IBM Selectric) but we'll see. That got me to thinking: how many of you 80+ wpm speed demons learned on manual typewriters? I did, though I don't think I can still burn out at 80 anymore. Probably 60-65.
I started hunting and pecking in early jr. high for fun, then took typing in 8th grade. We used the manual typewriters that had no labels on the keys -- I don't know if the electrics used in HS were the same. Anyway, my 8th grade typing teacher paid me and a buddy to come up the day before school and set out all the typewriters. In HS I never took the class but I used the class machines a couple of times to type some stuff up. I was in debate and we had to type a BUNCH of stuff. That's pretty much where I got my typing skills. Those skills got me a lot of work as an office temp during summers both in HS and shortly after.
At home, we had a portable manual. Kind of a cool typewriter you could carry around -- sort of the size of the first gen portable computers, though much lighter. But by my sophomore year, I had a computer. Even though my parents bought me an electric at some point, I found it easier to type stuff up on Apple Writer on the II+ and find a printer somewhere. Eventually, I bought a dot matrix for the Apple.
Only used a Selectric sparingly, though I was told by those who used them regularly that they were the Cadillac of typewriters.
So what's your typing/typewriter story?
I started hunting and pecking in early jr. high for fun, then took typing in 8th grade. We used the manual typewriters that had no labels on the keys -- I don't know if the electrics used in HS were the same. Anyway, my 8th grade typing teacher paid me and a buddy to come up the day before school and set out all the typewriters. In HS I never took the class but I used the class machines a couple of times to type some stuff up. I was in debate and we had to type a BUNCH of stuff. That's pretty much where I got my typing skills. Those skills got me a lot of work as an office temp during summers both in HS and shortly after.
At home, we had a portable manual. Kind of a cool typewriter you could carry around -- sort of the size of the first gen portable computers, though much lighter. But by my sophomore year, I had a computer. Even though my parents bought me an electric at some point, I found it easier to type stuff up on Apple Writer on the II+ and find a printer somewhere. Eventually, I bought a dot matrix for the Apple.
Only used a Selectric sparingly, though I was told by those who used them regularly that they were the Cadillac of typewriters.
So what's your typing/typewriter story?