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Interesting sales receipt for a S-C typewriter (sold at Sears) in 1953.
Paper and machine are running this week on Shop Goodwill.
Sale included a 10% discount, a $ 20 down-payment and no carrying-costs.
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Machine and its case looks to be in really nice shape...unfortunately the machine lost its back-panel sometime during its service life.
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Pete E. wrote:
Machine and its case looks to be in really nice shape...unfortunately the machine lost its back-panel sometime during its service life.
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This machine has a 4-series body and never had a back panel. The paper table and carriage return arm are also 4-series. It looks like one of those odd transition S-C's you some times see with the 5-series keys and paint on 4-series body. If that is a serial number on the receipt, that would be weird too, as I don't know what that 4AR prefix would denote. This may have been a 4-series factory rebuild with updated parts, or some sort of Sears specific machine. If I had to, I would guess the former.
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Maybe the 4AR was a mistake and it really should have been a 4A2...when written on the sales receipt ???
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Pete E. wrote:
Maybe the 4AR was a mistake and it really should have been a 4A2...when written on the sales receipt ???
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I think the 4AR is the correct serial prefix. I just don't know what it denotes and I don't think this prefix is currently referenced in any serial lists. This combo of parts/color/body style is uncommon. I have seen it online a few times and there is another example of a 4AR in the Typewriter Database, which also combines a 4-series body with 5-series keys here.
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I found a Reddit thread where someone was trying to figure out what was up with these odd 4/5-series crossover models here. In the thread, someone posted this ad from a 1950's Sears catalog showing a 4-series-body/ 5-series-key Smith Corona typewriter. The ad mentions selling discontinued models; so, another explanation could be that Smith-Corona used discontinued parts from the 4-series combined with some updates from the 5-series specifically for an affordable Sears model.
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Okay, I just found where most of the 4AR typewriters are in the Typewriter Database. They are posted under Smith Corona Tabulator, here. They are not as uncommon as I thought. I think 'Tabulator' is also what the model name is on the paper table of the one in the Sears ad I posted above, though it is hard to read. It appears some of the 4ARs were branded Sterling, some with no model branding, and some with Tabulator. I am not sure whether or not they are all Sears, but the Tabulator ones definitely are, because Sears used that name for other models, too.
