I started out looking for a few specific typeface typewriters to fill a certain hobby need. But after scrutinizing the listings on e-bay, I have really become hooked on the typewriter case design, colors, size, and shape. But really enjoyed the Smith-Corona line. A little timeline study and you can see the small increment changes in the models and cases as they moved from manual to electric, and then electric with removable type, electric with manual carriage return, then electric with the "Power Return" key, etc. etc. really neat stuff.

Repartee wrote:

TypewriterKing wrote:

Maybe it needs to be a different sort of museum. It could be one where instead of extremely rare pieces NOBODY touches, it could have not-so-valuable ones that EVERYBODY tries out and gets to have fun with. Maybe some typewriters there's still plenty of for spare parts for after people try them out.

Yes, of course: a proper typewriter museum would have working machines for people to try. Hands-on exhibits are not unheard of in science museums either. The best typewriter museum would not be a museum: it would be a typewriter exchange with scores of different machines all of them checked and at least minimally usable. You could try them all and when you found one you liked take it home with you!

Amen, brother, Amen!!
 

First of all, I should admit I have some kind of problem  after hitting the three-figure-mark and not stopping there... But I can give it up anytime I want, right? RIGHT?!

thetypewriterman wrote:

Sadly, very sadly, any typewriter on display in a museum which the general public would be able to use would end up being destroyed.  I can say this from first-hand experience having actually worked for a museum in a previous life !  Maybe the public have more respect for this sort of thing in other countries, but in the UK anything that is on open display tends to get destroyed in a most malicious way.  Usually uncontrolled (uncontrollable ?) children - but not always..........!

I´ve thought about that as well. I´ve been considering making temporary expositions, letting people try some typewriters which can endure some punishment and always being around to check if something goes wrong. A stable museum is much harder to manage for just one person.

So far I have experience with another kind of expositions: Playmobil. The experience has been mostly good, and sometimes I´ve been awed at how kind people can be. Thing is the starting point is horrible: in Spain if something is not nailed, glued AND welded to the floor some (insert insult here) will take it away and then brag about it. But sometimes it´s the opposite and when a little Playmo figure falls off people put it back in place!
 

I have 3 today, but I've owned probably about 10 in my lifetime. Because I move so much (and am a hoarder), I get pressured in to giving away the typewriters I can't use/fix. I'm not sure that makes me a beginner or a junior, because I typically only keep portable/manuals and get rid of my electrics.

Uwe wrote:

thetypewriterman wrote:

Maybe the public have more respect for this sort of thing in other countries, but in the UK anything that is on open display tends to get destroyed in a most malicious way.  

I suspect it's an international thing. A friend of mine works in a museum, and one of his main jobs is to repair all of the damage that is done to the displays, and these are not interactive items but ones that are roped off and in theory should never be touched. Some of the stories he's told me are just incredible and you have to wonder how these people make it through a day without succumbing to Darwin's laws of evolution. 
 

Evolution or Devolution.  I remember an old movie, "Inherit the Wind," where one of the characters, who encountered a mob scene in a small town (this was a loose re-enactment of the Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925), said, "Darwin's theory is all wrong--man's still an ape."