Aucb.644
fa.editor-p
utcsrgv!utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!C70:editor-people
Mon Mar 8 22:37:48 1982
Sholes keyboard -- the last word
>From Guy.Steele@CMU-10A Mon Mar 8 16:23:31 1982
Q: "Why aren't the keys on a typewriter in alphabetical order?"
(Sunnie Lawrence, of Chino, California, wins a prize for this question.)
A: While Christopher L. Sholes was developing the first successful
typewriter in 1868, he originally tried arranging the keys in
alphabetical order. The long typebars in this early model fell back
into place through the pull of gravity. If a typist tried typing too
fast, the bars became tangled with each other. As a solution to this
key-jamming problem, Sholes rearranged the keys so that the letters
most often typed were as far apart from one another as possible. The
pattern that resulted from this arrangement is still that of the
standard typewriter keyboard.
(You can win an official JOHNNY WONDER Fun Flyer if your question is
selected. Send your name and age to JOHNNY WONDER, c/o this newspaper,
P.O.Box 1258, Santa Cruz, CA 95061.)
----------------------------------------------------------------
What better authority could you ask for than JOHNNY WONDER?
--Guy
[editor's note: This seems like a good place to end the discussion
of the history of the Sholes keyboard. I will continue to
publish (reasonable) messages relating to editing with the
Sholes keyboard, but further messages about its history per
se will probably be filtered. /jq ]
-----------------------------------------------------------------
gopher://quux.org/ conversion by John Goerzen <
[email protected]>
of
http://communication.ucsd.edu/A-News/
This Usenet Oldnews Archive
article may be copied and distributed freely, provided:
1. There is no money collected for the text(s) of the articles.
2. The following notice remains appended to each copy:
The Usenet Oldnews Archive: Compilation Copyright (C) 1981, 1996
Bruce Jones, Henry Spencer, David Wiseman.
