On this
day last week, Tuesday, September 8th, I was out and about with a list of
tasks, including having a look at that Smith
Premier Junior portable with the Egyptian-French keyboard in an antique store in Fyshwick. Also on my list of things
to do that day was to get a haircut at Curtin. It was a lovely sunny day but
one marred by a chilly wind (not ideal for trimming the locks!).
As I ducked
into an alcove at Curtin to avoid the cold blast, I pumped into Malcolm Farr, the renowned Australian political
journalist I last worked with on the Brisbane Sun
30 years ago. I hadn’t seen him since. While we chatted, I noticed another fellow,
standing a few feet away, was taking particular interest in the Australian Typewriter Museum sweatshirt
I was wearing to keep me warm in the breeze. When Malcolm went off to get his shopping,
this other chap told me about his Underwood
5.
Two days later, I received an email from a man called David, who said, and I quote
verbatim: “I saw a handsome gent at
the Curtin shops a few days ago wearing an Australian
Typewriter Museum tee-shirt. The tee-shirt reminded me that I have an old Torpedo portable in the garage. It has
serial number #134903, and has a German (German/Swiss?) language keyboard.
According to [Alan Seaver’s] machines_of_loving_grace.com,
it is a Model 15, made in 1931. The
case is a bit rough, but the machine itself seems to be in good condition.
A plate on the paper support identifies a dealer in Anvers, that is Antwerp, and a transfer on the side
identifies an establishment in Geneva.
If your museum could use it, I'd be happy to donate it - and deliver it.”
I naturally
assumed this was from the fellow with the Underwood 5. However, David said, “No
– [the Torpedo is] the only typewriter [I have], but I do have an accumulation
of early Macs that I am hoping to thin down in the near future.”
Now, not
being a columnist in The Canberra Times
any longer, I seldom get these sorts of offers these days. So I quickly jump on
them when I do.
David
turned up yesterday and I was astonished by what he gave me. All the more so when he told me that he had found this absolutely magnificent machine dumped in a mini-skip in Curtin. So I guess we will never know anything of its history - except that it was one of the very first Model 15 Torpedos ever made.
The Torpedo 15 looks
very much like a Royal of the
period, and of course it was made just before Remington took a controlling interest in the Weilwerke company of Rödelheim at Frankfurt am Main. But the most
outstanding feature of this Torpedo Model 15 is its unpainted metal
frontispiece. I’ve never seen another typewriter like it. I was also taken by what I found to be an efficient shift lock mechanism, and by the carriage lever (which is similar to the one on the Model 14 and the first Imperial portable - made by Torpedo - as well as the Model 17, but ditched for the Model 15a, below, and Model 16). The leftside carriage knob was introduced to the 16.
The Model 15a, above, the Model 15 below
A check
of the Typewriter Database indicates
that this Torpedo 15 was made right at the start of the Model 15’s first year
of production, in 1931. The database serial numbers start at 134751, and this one
comes just 152 machines later.
The Torpedo 15 was designed for Weilwerke by Englishman Herbert Etheridge (1885-1940), who either
side of World War I had worked for William
James Richardson in turning the Bar-Lock
into a British-made frontstroke standard in Nottingham. In 1919 Etheridge wrote the Dictionary
of Typewriting and in the mid-1920s went off to work for Weilwerke in Rödelheim. His most
notable achievement there was to introduce segment shift to the portable. According
to Ernst Martin and Leonhard Dingwerth, this was a first for a German portable.
Etheridge patented his Torpedo 15 design in Germany in
February 1930. He ended his career working for Imperial in Leicester.
For
compactness, Etheridge also designed
this paper rest and stop mechanism for the Torpedo 15.
Martin points
out Etheridge employed his “new” lever mechanism on the Torpedo 15:
Below, from Dingwerth, a later version of the Model 15, with a changed carriage lever and no unpainted frontispiece, but the same shift lock mechanism.
Congratulations on the great Torpedo! Keep on advertising!
ReplyDeleteVery nice! The shape reminds me of my Triumph Durabel.
ReplyDeleteStunning machine - what great good luck. I'd like to see a picture of your Australian Typewriter Museum sweatshirt - it sounds like it may have magical, magnetic powers.
ReplyDeleteTruly fabulous!
ReplyDeleteWhat sort of monster could dump such an object in the skip?