Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Typewriter Ephemera: Remington Junior/ No. 3 User Manual (German)

It is not often that I censor myself for the blog. Anything I think up and type is immediately scanned and posted - after all, typing is hard (and occasionally deafening!) work. Other than the letters I send to fellow typospherians who kindly write to me, pretty much everything I compose on a typewriter ends up here as a typecast. 

This weekend, though, after having spent several hours composing a lengthy essay about my thoughts on copyright infringement and fair use, especially as pertains to a recent incident involving this blog, I re-read my work and thought better of it. Too long, largely unnecessary, and not as positive in spirit as I would like to keep this space. 

So I shall keep that to myself for now and share with you a partial scan of the manual that came with my Remington Junior (hopefully, this qualifies as fair use!). 

 
This manual is actually intended for a Remington Portable No. 3, which my Remington Junior is a variant of, only with fewer features. Although I don't speak German and understand little of it, I absolutely love the old-timey illustration style, which for some reason call to mind the old Home Economics textbooks I looked through as a child.  

 
My own Remington Junior has the decal on the paper table, and the keys are black with white lettering. This No. 3 is exactly like the one I left behind at the flea market a couple of weeks ago (she says, with a twinge of regret). 

 
I did briefly consider getting the No. 3, if only to make up for "deficiencies" in my Junior like the lack of a right-hand carriage release lever, but it hardly seemed worth the trouble of keeping a virtually duplicate machine just for that.  

 
I find the Remington Portables in general to be quite well-made and very nice to write with. I have a No. 1 I have been neglecting for a while, ever since Georg gave it to me last summer, but that is only because I am considering a paint job for it and would like to finish that before showing it off.  

 
Most of these pictures depict a Swiss-German keyboard, a remarkable level of personalization for a machine that was bought in Zurich. 

 
The shop where this was purchased, Anton Waltisbühl & Co. in Zurich, seems to have been a major distributor for Remington Portables in Switzerland. Eight out of ten - that I have seen, including the flea market find - bear the label.

 
I like that even for the German manual, they retain their original English motto for the typing sample: "To save time is to lengthen life", it reads. 

13 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing this. I don't read German either, but it's still fun to look at.
    I should scan in some of my more unusual manuals.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Devin, that could prove very useful for the wiki! Georg has a collection of pdfs over on typerwiters.ch which could usefully end up on the wiki also. If you think about it, the hardware will always last longer than the instruction manuals unless there's some 'library in the sky'.

      Delete
  2. Was an interesting read. Thanks for sharing.
    It is interesting that the first paragraph of page 4 contains 3 grammar mistakes, at least from today's view.

    ReplyDelete
  3. A neatly produced user's guide.

    I enjoy your new background.

    I do hope you will get some satifaction from that copyright infringement issue. Something is at least morally due to you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I hope to put up a proper update shortly - addressing the issue head-on and then that will be that. I think.

      On a cheerier note, glad you like the background! Raymond Savignac's signature appears on the corner of the image, so this is proper attribution and fair use... obviously I am now thinking way too much about these matters now :-)

      Delete
  4. Thanks for posting the manual. At least I know now that "space bar" is "zwischenraumtaste." ( :

    Sorry to hear about that copyright issue.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sounds like the typosphere needs a copyright legal team. Between you and Robert, not to mention all the budding authors and poets. Send me to law school and I'll do it! ;-]

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. What is happening with Robert? I wasn't aware of anything...
      I'm not naturally a litigious person, so all of this makes me quite nervous even if I am the wronged party. Sigh.

      Delete
  6. Nice. I need to take some time one evening and see how much German I forgot. I need a refresher. Amazing when not using a language, or anything, it gets forgotten.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Bill, I've already written the prologue for "bilingual", the new series of german typecasts with english translation - there's help for your German! :)

      Delete
  7. How shiny and new typewriters look in the manuals. Makes one imagine using a brand spanking new machine for the first time - I suppose that's something few of us will ever have experienced.

    ReplyDelete
  8. The new background is just great :) And those pictures are just amazing. The illustrations look so pretty that almost make me want to buy one of these :)

    ReplyDelete
  9. I know the post is very old, but I just got my Portable 3 yesterday and I have one issue with it I am unable to solve.
    The case is that 'Waltzenskala'(12) is shifted towards ribbon and both tabulator fingers are hightened. As a result they touch robbon rollers and block carriage from moving. Neither this instruction nor the other one available online tells how to move the 'Waltzentskala' down to the 'Waltze'(14) (platen?).
    Is there any Portable 3 user who could help?

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for your comment! Please note that comments are moderated; so this will be posted as soon as I have read it :)

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...