good ole machines dont die.

I met someone today in my old store to liberate some steel shelving.
Look what I found today and the other day buried deep in the bowels of the building(back end of basement, somewhere I havent gone for 30 years)
I found the mitre box along with a bag of old tools last week. The tools were cheapo screwdrivers and pliers, tossed them.

I have an old Smith Corona hiding someplace in the attic.

Pretty cool that the ribbon is still good.
Now what are you going to do with it ??

give it away like I did with most of the old stuff I found down there.I just didnt have the heart to toss it out like I disposed of all the old registers(not the old NCR, someone wanted that one)

The original wireless keyboard?

Wireless Vaughn? I was looking for the USB port.

Im frightened I might find someone buried down there. Nothing has been touched back there for over 30 years, and then probably been left there since the early 60s or late 50s.
My girls who worked there never wanted to go down in the back basement, , (we used to keep extra bags and whatever)they told me Freddy lives there. At first, I didnt have a clue what they were talking about, but they explained it to me.

I git senteemental over old typers. I learned to type on one older than that. Still have my Olivetti portable that I carried to sporting events when I was in high school.

Hi,

Glenn is not permitted to read this.

When I was in high school I worked in a typewriter repair shop for a year. Being at the bottom of the Totem Pole of importance in the shop (there was the owner, the sales lady and me) I got the job of cleaning, repairing, tuning, etc. all of the High School typing class typewriters.

Have you even thought of cleaning and repairing over a hundred Royal typewriters that were used the previous nine months by high school students? Well they were quite similar to the one in the picture.

I doubt if I weighed 90 (no there is not a 1 in front of that number) pounds. I would go up to the second floor (no elevator) where all of the typing classes were held. I would hook the bottom of one machine on my hip, grab another one by the front of the frame with the hand on that side. Then I would hook up another on the other hip and pick up the fourth machine by the frame. I would carry these down stairs and put them in the trunk of the car. Then I would repeat the process until the trunk and the back seat floor were full.

Then I would haul them into the shop...put them up on shelves and go to work on them one-at-a-time. Dismantel the machine. Put it in the whatever solution to soak. Scrub it with brushes. Dry it. Put the parts on my bench and re-assemble using new rubber and other parts as needed.

Doesn't that sound like a lot more fun than playing baseball with your friends? Well actually, yes. WWII had started. I used the money to buy gasoline. I went out dancing seven nights a week with all of the gals my baseball friends were too tired to handle. The guys did their homework and had to sleep "to be ready for school tomorrow."

Lucky for me, my parents gave me an IQ high enough that I didn't have to study to get a high school diploma. Of course I had a very rude awakening when I hit chemistry, physics, analytical geometry, neurology, etc., etc. in pre-med.

I grew up during WWII...well I grew up a little. I was still totally not-with-it yet. What my future wife saw in me I will never understand.

Anyway here I am a hundred years later, an old man. Myrna says I was a child most of my life and then became an old man skipping mature adulthood.

Sorry for the babbling...you know how it is with us old guys and our stories.

Enjoy,

Jim

You don't sound like an old man to me Jim, you sound like a wise man.
some people grow old, some others like you grow wise.

Jim, +1 on what Toni said. Great story. Thanks.

jim if you want to fly out here and take this one home, its yours