Green Machines: A Royal Signet and Portable of 1932

It occurred to me that I have never shown our Depression era Royal Signet.  This machine stands in stark contrast to its more expensive sibling, the Royal Portable.

We like the Signet quite a bit.  It is light enough for MEK to carry and has a style of its own.  I love the gold keys and the clean symmetry of the stripped down keyboard.

I outbid a key chopper on ebay to get this machine.  It had been used by at least two generations in a family and came clean and well kept.  I love it when a typewriter has spent its entire life in living areas.  No basement funk!

You may have read elsewhere that the Signet is very basic.  Take a look at the margin setting system and you will find out what "basic" means.  Example:  the back of the paper table and space bar are not painted.

Not much to see here.  However, it seems elegant compared to the long spring that runs the carriage on a stripped Olympia from the same era.

These 1932 Royals have one thing in common besides the family name:  sans serif typefaces.  Keylime sports the optional Vogue typeface.  The Signet is equipped with a specially designed italic typeface in caps only.  The latter is quite good for typing on aluminum foil sandwiched between sheets of paper.  Who needs a shift mechanism, anyway?

Thanks to Ted at Munk.org, I finally have an original ad that shows both machines.  The Signet is the result of some dramatic cost cutting with an original price of $23.50 as compared to $45.00 for the Portable.  I've never seen any information on the topic of the price of Vogue as an option.  Did it cost more?  Who knows.  They still appear to be scarce.  Adjusted for inflation, $45 in 1932 would have the value of $750 today.

Thanks for stopping by and visiting our green Royals.  They have been enjoying a long turn outside their cases.  Before you leave, be sure to pull up a seat and have a slice of Keylime's pie!

Yes, the pie MEK picked up from Sweet Perfection Bakery was far better than that sorry pun.  Rumor has it that the proprietor's son is sweet on the gingercat.

Yet another word about the dread COPYRIGHT:  The images and words on this blog (minus the ad borrowed from Ted) are the sole intellectual property of Dwayne F.  Use must be attributed and no commercial use is allowed without express written permission.  Yeah, these photos aren't that special.  They should be easy enough for you to take after you bake a keylime pie from scratch.  I won't bother with repeating the vague threats involving mutant, flying Oliver 99 typewriters doling out revenge on copyright infringers.  No, that would be immature.  However, I feel it necessary to remind the reader that the official mascot of the Typosphere is the mighty Rhino.  We haz us a bigun, and I ain't sure whether the copyright theft induced rage can be put back in the bottle of mean that is our typing companion.

Fresh from the backyard studio!  More to come on this wild beast in the month of October...

 

A Sleepy Bear Tail

OK, you may have trouble believing this story.  While we were comfortably sleeping in a National Forest Service campground, our next door neighbor was having a late night encounter with a warm and fuzzy friend.  Read on if you dare.

This image is yet another gift from "The Kingdom of Nature".  I was disappointed that "The Happy Zoo Book" contained lions and tigers, but  no bears.  What kind of kids book is that, anyway?

Here is one of the family campsites.  We are perhaps fortunate that our tents were not shaped like sleeping bears.

There are few better places to typecast from than this.  The bear story just made a great vacation better!

Rhinos Illustrated in "The Kingdom of Nature"

This is part 2 of the series on illustrations from "The Kingdom of Nature; An Illustrated Museum of the Animal World".  Just click on the label at the end for the rest of the series.

This post is just for the members of the Typosphere.  There is a special rhino obsession that accompanies an annual typing event, the NANOWRIMO (National Novel Writing Month).  To see rhino mascots at their best, visit
http://danteswardrobe.blogspot.com/2012/04/wherein-rhinoceros-typed.html

Our guest typewriter for this post is mysterious as it has not yet been blogged.  Some may recognize its unique typeface.  We also have a guest writer:  Hannah F. of thoughtsatfullspeed.blogspot.com.

Basic rhino anatomy.

The horse just doesn't get that the rhino wants to play.  Awww!

When pressed, the mighty rhino will defend himself.

But mostly, the rhino is a friend to all animals.

The Kingdom of Wacky and Wonderful Illustration

At a recent antique show, I scored a slightly beat up and thoroughly awesome copy of The Kingdom of Nature; An Illustrated History of the Animal World by Mrs. Frank Leslie and copyrighted in 1888.  The preface advertises a content of almost 1,000 illustrations.  Many of them are just amazing in a distinctly late 19th century way.  Here are a few samples to start with.  A series will follow here and on my secondary blog, http://digitalmemoryhole.blogspot.com/

The price for this gem?  $5.00.  One of the high points of living in the dawn of digital books is that the real ones are being dumped on the cheap.  The sad part is that many will never find a home and will end up in a landfill somewhere.  It appears that this book has not been digitized.  I hope you enjoy the images here and to follow.

The Oliver 9 decided to contribute a short review seen further below.

Times were tough in the "Predamite Period" described at the beginning of the book.

The Mighty Oliver 9 is back!  With assistance from the faithful gingercat.  He gets grumpy without exercise.

Fortunately, evolution kicked in.  I wonder if he knew how to use a typewriter?

It's all good until he runs out of femurs for his feline friend.

This calligraphic type style should be mandated by law.

This is a hefty and substantial tome.  Cover to cover, it is pushing 2 inches thick with 440 pages of slight puffery that is typical of the era.  I have read far worse in turn of the last century technology history reviews.  If the title page is any indication, this is probably the best book ever written!  Or something like that.

Yep, best book ever!