Farewell to a typewriter

The year was about 1987. Larry was running a downtown shop, thinking that he could make a living from computer repairs. He became the authorized dealer and repairman for Commodore computers.

Neither of those ideas worked out. None of us foresaw that people and businesses wouldn’t have their computers repaired; they would trash them as obsolete and buy new ones. Nor was it clear that Commodore, like many others of that era, would soon be driven out of business by Microsoft.

Larry was a genius. If it was possible to repair anything on a computer – even the ones running M$-DOS or Windows – he could do it. But he was on the whole not a great businessman.

Larry persevered, he and his shop growing increasingly decrepit as the years passed. Stuff that might somehow be useful piled on the shelves, and later overflowed onto the floor so that eventually one could barely walk through the store.

I loved his shop and would go in every chance I got. I bought, sold, and traded various items with him, including one – my Lotus SmartSuite software – that I still use every day. One day, I saw the typewriter, sitting in a corner with boxes piled around it.

“What’s that?” I asked. “That,” he said “is a Royal long-carriage manual typewriter, in excellent condition.” He added: “Ten dollars and it’s yours.” He had taken it as partial trade-in from someone buying a computer, because that’s how Larry operated.

And so it came to pass. It was indeed a handsome machine, in its day (circa 1950) a top-of-the-line piece of business equipment. It was smooth and elegant to use, like playing an Aeolian-Skinner or driving an old Cadillac or Lincoln, the kind that had fins on the back. Later, I found a typing table from the same era that fit it perfectly, and I would use the typewriter from time to time for letters on church letterhead, typing addresses on envelopes, and making file folder labels.

But its days were numbered. The stationary store that sold ribbons closed. I bought two in their going-out-of-business sale, and soon became chary of overusing the machine, not sure what I would do when the ribbons ran dry. Larry finally gave up and closed, too.

I have moved it. Twice. It is not a trivial undertaking; the typewriter weighs in at about fifty pounds, the typing table about the same. Not a piece of plastic in the whole thing: heavy, solid steel, made to last.


It passed the “spark joy” test last year when I applied KonMarie methods to everything in my possession. Just looking at it brings memories of a far-distant era. But I have found that once is not enough for the “spark joy” sorting of possessions, not if a move lies in the not-too-distant future. I must cut away more of them, and have done so, disposing of about half of my organ music, another third of my books, and much else. It is not enough to part with everything that fails to spark joy; one must also part with things one loves, increasingly so as the years go by. Ask anyone who has moved from a house to assisted living or a nursing home.

And there was that typewriter. It has sat in the corner of my office, snug under its dust cover, for nigh on twenty years. I do not think that I have used it even once. It has got to go.

If you are uncertain whether to keep it, ask your heart. (Marie Kondo)

I removed the cover, rolled in a sheet of paper, and started typing. The ribbon is a little faint after all these years, but it improved as I got past the part that had been exposed. It works perfectly, and still brings that spark of joy. But as Marie suggests, I asked my heart and got the answer: “It is all right to let it go.”

Today I loaded it in my Prius and took it to the Mennonite thrift shop. The lady receiving donations was delighted; she commented “This is really nice.” I saw a similar machine on eBay for about $130, without the matching typing table and in considerably worse condition. It is my hope that the Mennonites will get some money from it for their good works, and that the machine will find a new home where it will be loved and perhaps used. It would like that, for it was built for hard work, eight hours a day of typing. Keeping a business office going. Writing novels. That sort of thing, not sitting in a corner under a dust cover.

What I have done by moving it twice and keeping it for thirty-plus years is this: I gave it a shelter, keeping it safe from that day in the 1980’s when it was a piece of heavy, obsolete junk to a time when it is now a “vintage” machine, sought by collectors.

Go in peace, my friend. Find a place of honor and bring joy to someone new.