Thursday, September 13, 2012

IBM Selectric II (1971)



On the other side of this cover page, the date "1971" appears.
Ruth must have painted the room white at some point...
This could be the start of a subset of typewriter collecting. :-)

19 comments:

  1. Beautiful photographs and a neat machine! I love that bookface font, you need to use it in more typecasts. I truly envy you the space you have to breathe in (:

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm with Ted -- the Bookface Academy 12 is a beaut.

    The typewriter does very nice work.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Very nice typewriter. Congratulations! One of the nicest things about the typewriter is that you have several elements for it. My second typewriter was a Selectric-II (same color as yours). I loved it, but never found any extra elements for it until after I gave it away when I got a PC. Thanks for the post and all the great photos.

    You have quite a variation of instruments also. That is so very special. I do not know many people (if any) who play such a variety. I really enjoy listening to the harp. As far as playing, I have more than enough with just a trumpet.

    ReplyDelete
  4. The next time I think of the Oliver 9 as being a hulking, tank-like beast, I will try to remember that two of them would fit in that Selectric! I'm glad you got a good one. I contemplate Selectrics because of the font options, but then think of the space.

    ReplyDelete
  5. This is exactly like the one I grew up with except the color (ours was black). My mom had her own stenography service in the early 70's and when it folded we kept one selectric for her to take in typing on the side and for our schoolwork. She hated manual typewriters, by the way.
    That is a nice one for sure. I sent all my spare elements to another typospherian.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I want a writing space like yours. Lovely typer; I'm partial to the tiny courier font, even though it is tiny.

    Wow, you are very musically gifted! I wonder how a shamisen and an accordion would sound together? Haha. I'd love to hear you play sometime. Do you ever do any gigs in my neck o' the woods?

    ReplyDelete
  7. Now I have to find a Bookface ball! Thanks for sharing - I love the Selectric love in the Typosphere going on now!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I am glad to see that hulking beast made it safely to you. Sounds like it works great!
    Everyone is saying 'typewriter this' or 'Selectric that'...here, I'm trying to figure out what the pattern is on your pajama pants! Most of mine are Star Wars...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
  9. Ken, it's funny how folks in the Typosphere seem to run on parallel tracks with typewriters. Take the recent synchronistic example of Ledeaux and I obtaining Royal Arrows at the same time.

    As for my "pajama pants", this is actually a sarong! This particular one has a pattern of flames. (Biting tongue.)

    Did you know that 2/3rds of the world's male population wears non-bifurcated clothing, or in other words, they don't wear pants? (This is something that James always says...)

    We wear sarongs here in The Woods (not in public -- we're not quite THAT weird...YET!) during the warmer months. They are extremely cool and comfortable. I wish that I had the cojones to wear them in public, but their biggest drawback is that sarongs don't have pockets.

    ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Where do you shop for sarongs?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Most of our material for sarongs comes from fabric stores. We use black & white batik, 48-inch wide, and cut 2-and-a-quarter yard lengths.

      Delete
  11. what smart typing this machine makes; I like it a lot.

    ReplyDelete
  12. I am envious - I miss my Selectric. Mine died in a house move (and that was after being professionally packed and handled). I am wary about buying one here in the UK via Ebay... people never pack properly here (even if asked nicely)!

    John

    ReplyDelete
  13. You can do without the correcting feature in your Selectric if you get yourself a piece of Scotch tape and keep it handy. Whenever you make a mistake, simply backspace to the misstyped character, place the Scotch tape in front of the typewriter ribbon, and hit the wrong character again. Then you only pull from the Scotch tape to remove it, and voila! The wrong character lifts off the paper just as well as with the correcting feature.

    Nice to see you finally got your Selectric, and that it arrived in good condition!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Miguel, what a great tip! I'll definitely give it a try. It makes perfect sense that Scotch tape would remove the carbon imprint.

      Delete
  14. Type 'N Write in Victoria BC Canada (Vancouver Island). There are still a lot of IBM Selectric II's with the correction feature built in. Ribbons and correction tapes available as well. Many people bring them in to be serviced - no problem. Approximately 2,875 pieces, and about 200 adjustments to make them "purrrrr". They don't like the cold either (true). Some parts need oil and other parts need lubricant. Many elements are still available there too. Phone number is 250-381-4514

    ReplyDelete
  15. I expect you have found out by now that the name of the Bookface font is not "Academy", but, in fact, "Academic".

    Anyway, I tried to post this comment to my favorite bicycle blog, and it was not accepted, too off topic, I guess. Anyway, perhaps you will allow it, and perhaps, enjoy it! This is how my post to the bicycle blog began:

    "[I do have a mechanical question after all this preamble.]

    I also dream of the new typing season. Actually you can type any time, probably more in the off-season for bicycling. I have recently improved my journaling using typewriters–my handwriting is prone to mistakes and crossouts, and also slow; I’m trying to improve my handwriting as well. I find that typing directly on my full size calendar pages from Day-Timer just lights up my brain in an exciting way: you have to think ahead and know where the sentence is going, because you can’t just delete whole sentences in a very easy way. Thinking turns out to be good, after all!

    I have three typewriters at the moment, for different locations: 1. An IBM Wheelwriter by Lexmark, c. 1984; 2. An IBM Correcting Selectric III, c. 1979; and 3. An Olivetti Lettera 22.

    A few weeks ago, with no indication of impending failure, and no sound (except that I had hit return for a new paragraph), the Selectric suddenly went “Ker-flooey”, and started typing nonsense. Turns out, the flat metal wire used to rotate the typing ball was was a bit kinky and had derailed off its pulley. So right now, that typewriter is away on the typewriter repairman’s bench, for a good going over.

    What fascinated me about the Selectric was what I found out about it’s digital-to-analog operating system (in Wikipedia), and its related “whiffletree” mechanism, and I wonder if a whiffletree is ever used in bicycles. As you’ve previously mentioned, it’s great to be able to SEE the mechanical principles going on with your own eyes. There is a great explanatory video about how the typing ball is tilted and rotated by these whiffletrees: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Selectric_typewriter#Selectric_mechanism ."

    So anyway, thanks for reading, and / or posting these comments. I'm a big typewriter fan!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Just got a Correcting Selectric II last week in Chicago at a Salvation Army store for $7.53 of all prices. Finally today I've had time to clean it up, and learn its features. Very nice, surprisingly.
    When I worked in an office in Chicago years ago, I had to use one, and got totally frustrated because it was so different from what I knew - a standard manual.
    Anyway good luck with yours, and keep writing!

    ReplyDelete