Oliver & Underwood Typewriters

The Oliver Typewriter No. 3

(source: sljohnson.net)
THE OLIVER TYPEWRITER was the creation of Rev. Thomas Oliver, born in Woodstock, Canada in 1852. He was reported to be a committed Methodist, as a young man he answered the call and served as minister in Epworth, Iowa for a time. According to lore, he designed his writing machine without ever seeing any of typewriters available at that time. The prototype for this unique machine is rumored to have been made of strips of tin cans, the first of his several typewriter patent, US Patent No. 450,107 from 7 April 1891, shows some support for that rumor.

The Oliver Typewriter Company began operating as a corporation in 1895. In 1926 the company stopped production and the board decided to liquidate the company. They retained one employee, Chester Nelson, to oversee the liquidation of the Oliver. Production was then resumed in England by the British Oliver Typewriter Company, and later they sold Oliver branded machines developed by other firms.

The general design of the Oliver Typewriter remained mostly unchanged for most of its early history. Production of the Oliver No. 1 began in the fall 1894. The Oliver No. 2 was introduced in 1896. The Models No. 3, No. 5, No. 7, No. 9, and No. 11 were introduced in about 1902, 1907, 1914, 1915, and 1922, respectively. Oliver finished their machines in varying shades of olive green enamel or full nickel, with a white or black keyboard depending on the customers preferences. If customers did not specify the finish and keyboard color they wanted, the company would use its own judgment in filling orders, which appeared to be the olive green enamel and white keyboard. The last model produced in the United States was the Model No. 11, this model lost the familiar handles and color. Oliver may have offered other color variants however no documentation has been found. What is known is that some remanufacturing companies refinished some Olivers in various colors; gray, maroon, black, etc...some machines may even have had new decals added.

Underwood Typewriter 1920's

(source: mytypewriter.com)
The design that launched millions of typewriters! When it appeared on the market shortly before 1900, the Underwood No. 5 immediately became the design standard for all typewriters to come, all the way up until the 1960s when the IBM Selectric came out. This is the most successful typewriter design in history, and by 1920 almost every typewriter in production was using some imitation of the Underwood No. 5 design. The production of the Underwood Models 3, 4, and 5 lasted until early 1932. The difference among the three models are subtle: The No. 3 is a wide-carriage machine, the No. 4 types 76 characters, and the No. 5 types 84 characters. The No. 5 was the quintessential Underwood. Millions of these machines were used by secretaries, journalists, government officials, and writers throughout the first half of the twentieth century. The classic desktop.

More History on the Typewriter
(source: About.com)

Christopher Sholes

Christopher Sholes was an American mechanical engineer, born on February 14, 1819 in Mooresburg, Pennsylvania, and died on February 17, 1890 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He invented the first practical modern typewriter in 1866, with the financial and technical support of his business partners Samuel Soule and Carlos Glidden. Five years, dozens of experiments, and two patents later, Sholes and his associates produced an improved model similar to today's typewriters.

Typewriter Trivia

• George K. Anderson of Memphis, Tennessee patented the typewriter ribbon on 9/14/1886.
• The first electric typewriter was the Blickensderfer.
• In 1944, IBM designs the first typewriter with proportional spacing.
• Pellegrine Tarri made an early typewriter that worked in 1801 and invented carbon paper in 1808.
• In 1829, William Austin Burt invents the typographer, a predecessor to the typewriter.
• Mark Twain enjoyed and made use of new inventions, he was the first author to submit a typewritten manuscript to his publisher.

In Honor of Mother's Day, we'd love to hear a story about your mother using a typewriter or any memory of the early typewriters...