In 1714, the Englishman Henry Mill filed a patent for a crude form of the typewriter, which was, in reality, an artificial transcription machine. But the first working typewriter was the one invented in Italy in 1808 by Pellegrino Turri so that a blind friend, Countess Carolina Fantoni da Fivizzono, could correspond using it.
A pincushion-like device called the writing ball was invented in 1870 by Malling Hansen, a pastor from Denmark. This was one of the presents given to Nietzsche by his family for Christmas, but he disliked it. Sholes and Glidden's typewriters began production in late 1873 and were first commercially sold in the American market in 1874. It was invented by Christopher L. Sholes and was the first to have an all-capital QWERTY keyboard, which is used for computers even today.
The Remington and the Caligraph of 1880 were the more popular contemporaries of the Sholes and Glidden typewriter. Later makes of typewriters that gained popularity were the Smith Premier (1890), the Hammond (or Varityper), the Crandall (1881) and the Blickensderfer. The Williams, the Oliver, the Daugherty Visible (1891) and the Underwood (1895) all used the QWERTY keyboard. Index typewriters (which sold for five dollars) were the cheapest of all the typewriters (on an average, typewriters cost $100), and in the 1920's and 1930's, they were even sold as children's toys.
A pincushion-like device called the writing ball was invented in 1870 by Malling Hansen, a pastor from Denmark. This was one of the presents given to Nietzsche by his family for Christmas, but he disliked it. Sholes and Glidden's typewriters began production in late 1873 and were first commercially sold in the American market in 1874. It was invented by Christopher L. Sholes and was the first to have an all-capital QWERTY keyboard, which is used for computers even today.
The Remington and the Caligraph of 1880 were the more popular contemporaries of the Sholes and Glidden typewriter. Later makes of typewriters that gained popularity were the Smith Premier (1890), the Hammond (or Varityper), the Crandall (1881) and the Blickensderfer. The Williams, the Oliver, the Daugherty Visible (1891) and the Underwood (1895) all used the QWERTY keyboard. Index typewriters (which sold for five dollars) were the cheapest of all the typewriters (on an average, typewriters cost $100), and in the 1920's and 1930's, they were even sold as children's toys.
