The end of my typewriter era

As some of you know, for about four years I became quite obsessed with old typewriters, and in a mad frenzy acquired more than 50 of these wonderful old machines. A couple even dated back to the 19th Century.

In my enthusiasm, I put on displays of typewriters at three local colleges. The displays featured the same models that several famous authors used to write well-known books. After I'd install the displays, I'd stand at a distance and wait for throngs of students to crowd around.

It never happened. The typewriters barely drew a glance although a few teachers remarked on the displays. "I had one of those once," one old prof observed. Another said that he wrote his dissertation on an IBM Selectric like the one I had on display. He was impressed that Hunter Thompson had used the same model to write about Fear and Loathing.

So, after my displays flunked out on campuses, the typewriters stayed in my basement. I'd pull out a couple of the more interesting ones if a visitor showed so much as a glimmer of interest. The glimmer flickered out after the first three or four minutes of my basic typewriter dissertation.

On-line there's a pretty enthusiastic typewriter collecting community. They share advice about jammed keys, frayed ribbons and swap stories and occasionally typewriter.

A few months back the New York Times featured a story about young people getting interested in the machines. It didn't match my experience although I did heft a typewriter to an on-line organized "Meet up" group. Two of us showed up, had coffee and left never to meet again.

Mostly I became a neighborhood repository for unwanted and abandoned typewriters. "Hey, I hear you collect typewriters. I have this old one that belonged to my Mom. Are you interested?" I would follow a series of probing questions about model year, brand, condition etc. Silly me. In return I'd get: "Well, you know, it's just an old typewriter."

I'd take in a few of these orphans but then I started running out of space, so I'd donate the better ones to charity auctions until I pared back my collection to 45 or so. Selling them on-line had two drawbacks. One was the hassle of shipping them. The other was that jewelers were known to buy them to harvest their keys for bracelets. Kind of like poaching elephants for their tusks.

Then one day I noticed at Powell's Technical Bookstore downtown that someone had stashed some old typewriters and adding machines (I had three or four of those too) up on the tops of prominent book shelves. The clerk told me that the owner, Michael Powell, collected typewriters. I happen to have an ex-wife who knows Powell and through her I got a phone number and an introduction.

I figured that it was better that my typewriters be on display at Powell's than stashed away in my basement. On the phone Powell and I talked vaguely about compensation (book credit at the store) but I mostly wanted the reading public to see the assortment of Royals, Underwoods, Remingtons, Olivers, Hermes and Olympias (to name a few brands).

It took a while (Powell is mostly retired now and travels a lot) but finally, last month, a panel truck from Powell's backed into the driveway and the driver and I loaded up 40 typewriters, three adding machines and various typewriter paraphernalia.

I kept three typewriters back, just for old time's sake. They are shown here. The Olivetti Lettera 22 was the machine that got me started collecting in the first place. It as a nostalgia thing. I'd had one in the Peace Corps in Kenya 45 years ago. It was a balky little typer but I loved the way it looked. Very Italian. It is commonly found in teal. My tan one with its red shift key is pretty rare. Or at least I like to think so. Don't get me started....

There was no way I was going to let go of my folding Corona in its leather, velvet-lined traveling case. Besides, Agatha Christie and Ernie Pyle both hammered away on these little machines.

Finally, I kept an Underwood Universal mostly because I had two of them. I figured Powell's could get by on one. I particularly like the ribbon spool covers with their cut-out logos.

I also saved back my collection of ribbon tins. Some of them bear masterpieces of Art Deco graphics.

In the two weeks the typewriters have been gone, I haven't missed them. I figure they are in good hands At some point I'll call Michael Powell just to make sure, to see whether he's been to see them and whether he'd like me to tell him about what he has a treasure trove of typing history he has.

Oh, and I might ask about that credit at the bookstore.

Terence O'Donnell's gift: eons in a paragraph

Powell’s Books had Terence O’Donnell’s brief history of Oregon, “That Balance so Rare” on sale for $7.98. I couldn’t pass it up even though I have a copy. This one will be a gift.

Indeed the little book is a gift to the entire state.

The first paragraph alone is gift enough. The rest of “That Balance so Rare” flows from it.

I urge you to read the following aloud to hear the poetry in the prose.

“The great cataclysmic events were over: exploding mountains, lava floods, draining seas, the massive, dragging glaciers — all this cosmic tumult, breaking up the land and reforming it eon after eon, had finally spent itself. Rivers, rain, wind, and pounding surf continued to age the earth’s face, but in general, what we now call Oregon is what finally came to rest ten thousand years ago. “

How can you stop? You don't....

“Then, as now, the Pacific drove in to crash against the high-cliffed coast while ocean clouds drifted east to drench with rain the seaward slopes of what we have come to call the Coast Range. Beyond the mountains, the long valley lay with its meander of river — though here there is a difference then and now: it is believed before humans came, the valley floor was forest rather than the present open plain….From the estuaries and rain forest of the coast to the valley — lush and almost tropical — to the interior with its distances and skies and tingling, sage-scented air, it was a landscape of ravishing variety, as it is today.”

I had the privilege of knowing Terence in the last years of his life. I would invite him, a rumpled figure with a cane, to my classes where he charmed, cajoled and inspired, just as his writing did — and does.

What a blessing to have these lyrical words.