Acquisitions

After my first foray into classroom typewriter use, I decided to ramp up the search for more machines. Now, if you are looking for typewriters, there are some things you should know:

You can sometimes find them at garage sales. The problem here is the word sometimes. It takes a lot of legwork (or carwork) to get from sale to sale, and it's always a dice roll on whether the machines will be functional and affordable.

You can often find them in antique shops. The problem here is price. Like much antique store inventory, sellers of typewriters often have an inflated sense of their machines' dollar value. To someone looking for a nice shelf accent in their den, a small, seized-up, pre-war portable might be worth $50-60 or more if it's nice and shiny (or has an agreeable patina). To someone looking to source a classroom set (or as near as possible) on a very limited budget, few machines (if any) are worth that much money. To your average typewriter collector, a non-working machine probably will not be worth that price. Most of the extant machines are such because so many were made. Typewriters are the home/office computers of the past, and portable typewriters the laptop/notebook computers. While I'm sure IBM Thinkpads will populate the displays of antique stores in 2040, they will not likely command a high price. They are simply too numerous to be rare.

You can sometimes find them in thrift shops. In a 20 mile radius of my home, I know of three thrift shops that each have at least two typewriters in stock and a few more that have one. The problem here is type (no pun intended). The daisy wheel typewriters of the eighties and early nineties (many of which were basic word processing computers) are easy and cheap to find, and the non-digital, electric typewriters of the 60s-80s are close behind. These are usually cheap (probably because they look more like obsolete computer gear than something that can be sold as retro, vintage, or mid-century), but they are not manual. I am looking for manual typewriters, non-electric machines that translate downward force from a fingertip directly into a whacking typeslug putting a letter on the page.

You can find them on Craigslist. This is where I am having luck so far (and seems to be a major source in general). Within a 40 mile radius, there are 40+ typewriters that fit my criteria (aside from price).

Of course, in addition to these sources, you can find old typewriters in many places (your relatives' basements and attics, for example). These are simply the places where I have been able to find them most consistently. You can also buy them on eBay, but shipping a typewriter is both highly expensive and highly risky.

I found my first new acquisition at a thrift store in my own town. For a small price, I picked up a Royal Safari (1964) in what I call coffin-lining blue. It's a beautiful little machine. It's a simple story, so I'll leave it at that.

The second acquisition, a Royal HH, deserves its own post.